Ultimate Demon Sword

Chapter 330 Five Stars Are History
After all the games in the group stage are over, half of the teams will go home, and the other half of the teams, including the Chinese team, are lucky. They can stay and continue to fight for their goals.

Of course, we have already reached the knockout stage, all teams are more or less, and every player is strong or weak, and they all have the idea of ​​going as far as possible, and even going to the end.

There are more accidents and greater variables in the knockout match where the outcome is determined by a single game. Strength is only an important part of the knockout match, not the whole thing. Only the team with the strongest psychology, will, individual and team has the possibility to advance with its head held high.

When looking forward to the knockout round, almost all the media are unanimously optimistic that Spain, Portugal, France, and Argentina can advance smoothly.As for Iceland, Costa Rica and China, the three teams that have shown or are showing their dark horse qualities, most media have not asserted, and are in a cautious and expectant wait-and-see state.Any one of these three teams can go further, which means a shocking upset, which means that at least one of the three world-class traditional teams France, Germany and Brazil will be blocked from the quarterfinals.It also means... This World Cup will form a new championship pattern.

Between the group stage and the knockout stage, there are about four to five days, and for the Chinese team, the time is longer.The eighth-final match between the Chinese team and the Brazilian team was scheduled for the penultimate game of the eight knockout rounds. The Chinese team ended from the group stage and had five days to adjust and prepare.For Lippi's coaching staff, the tasks of these five days can be said to be quite heavy.

In the past, the Chinese team was directly eliminated in the group stage of the intercontinental competition for a long time, so most of the players faced the knockout round with black eyes and no experience at all.Moreover, the single-match elimination system of the World Cup is very different from the two-round elimination match of the Champions League, and the experience accumulated by Wen Zhihao in the Champions League is not completely applicable.Without being familiar with the opponent, the opportunity to come back in the next round is left, and if you want to stay on this stage and move on, every game is a duel where you meet on a narrow road and the bayonet hits the spot.

At such a juncture, the biggest capital of the Chinese team may only be the experience of the head coach Lippi who led the Italian team all the way to the final championship, and the work of the coaching staff has been quite heavy in the past few days.It is necessary to study the characteristics of the Brazilian team at the tactical level to make targeted deployments, and to instill experience in the team for the World Cup knockout.

Everything that Lippi emphasized to everyone can be summed up in four words: offense!initiative!

"In the knockout round of the World Cup, there is no retreat that allows us to take a step back. If we want to continue going down, we must show enough courage. Costa Rica, the biggest dark horse in the last World Cup, is the most vivid example. Facing the Netherlands, they defended perfectly for 120 minutes, and they defended desperately for half an hour in overtime, but they still lost in the penalty shootout. Therefore, the offense can win the game. , When I faced Germany, I once said that against such a strong team, we may lose 99 games in [-] games, but we did not lose in the last game. The first thing to look at in a top match is mentality. What kind of mentality do you use to face your opponents?

……

The Chinese team returned to Sochi one day later, and the quarter-final match against Brazil was played at the Sochi Olympic Stadium. This stadium, which brought the Chinese team their first World Cup victory, is already a blessed place for Chinese football in the eyes of Chinese fans and the media.Although the vast majority of Chinese people do not believe in God, many people still believe that there is God's will in the dark. Does this mean that the Chinese team will perform a miracle here again?

Such associations are not groundless. Although the Brazilian team has Neymar and the 2014 Golden Boy Award winner Gabriel Jesus leading the striker, their midfielder has no obvious advantage over the Chinese team. Only Coutinho is the real offensive brain. Paulinho and Renato Augusto are no strangers to the Chinese team. The former is a former teammate of more than half of the Evergrande players in the Chinese team. All are Paulinho.As for Augusto, he is basically a high-quality foreign aid in the Super League, and this BJ Guoan midfielder is not considered a top foreign aid in the Super League.Those who win the midfield win the world, this is the confidence of the media.

……

As the results of the quarter-finals are determined one by one, the time for the Chinese team to play is getting closer and closer.

What is surprising is that in the four games before the Chinese team, there was really an upset.

One of the favorites to win the championship, the number one favorite of the betting company, the French team experienced 120 minutes of fierce fighting, and was reversed by the Iceland team 2:1. The small Nordic country that was a blockbuster in the 2016 European Cup broke into the quarterfinals of the World Cup. In the qualifiers, they passed without any danger.

And with the emergence of this super upset, the media is more interested in the next game.

At the pre-match press conference, a reporter from a local TV station in Sochi asked Wen Zhihao a seemingly foolish but practical question: "Facing the Brazilian team, how sure do you think the Chinese team is?"

Facing such a question that would offend someone if he didn't pay attention, Wen Zhihao stepped forward and replied: "At the beginning of the game, the score was 0:0. Every point depends on everyone's hard work on the court. We only focus on studying our opponents."

"Then how do you evaluate the Brazilian team?" A reporter from a Brazilian TV station asked.

Wen Zhihao thought for a while, and replied: "It should be said that I am familiar with it. I have played against Casemiro and Paulinho many times. As for the result... everyone knows it in their hearts, so I won't say more."

The reporters sitting below booed slightly, they could all hear the confidence conveyed behind Wen Zhihao's non-intense expression, and... fearlessness.

The reporter's expression was fixed, and he continued to question: "But the Brazilian team has a brilliant record in the World Cup, five-star Brazil, this background is genuine, and the Chinese team does not."

Wen Zhihao looked at his earnest rebuttal expression, suddenly smiled, and said: "These things have been experienced once, and they will naturally happen. And Mr. Reporter, I was only two years old when the Brazilian team won the championship last time. Five-star Brazil is just a noun to me. Five-star Brazil has been called for many years. Why hasn't it been changed to six-star Brazil? Five-star Brazil is history, and it can only represent the past. Historical things can't be used for today. Otherwise, China should be the overlord of the football world. Do you have a thorough understanding of the history of football? It’s okay, you can give free science to all reporters. Football, first called Cuju, originated in China 1000 years ago..."

(End of this chapter)