legendary player [football]

58 England vs France 1

When the assistant coach announced his name, all his teammates looked left and right, and then Leo followed his teammates to look at Mathieu who was standing on the edge of the crowd.

The 32-year-old central defender from Barcelona was even faster in the team's short-distance sprint test than Martial, Griezmann, Pogba, Kante and other young players known for their speed.what is this concept

Even Deschamps couldn't help but look at him a few more times. The French team, where there are so many monsters, has not reserved a place for this veteran in the national team for a long time.As a central defender, Mathieu is tall, physically strong, has good steals, a good sense of position, rich experience, and such impressive speed and explosive power.

In fact, Mathieu's speed test in the Barcelona club is the fastest, yes, surpassing Messi, Alba, Neymar and others.It was only at his age that he was called into the national team. Last year was a young year of football and there were no major competitions. There were few training camps. Didier Deschamps did not recruit him for a few friendly matches, so no one noticed that he had reached the end of his career. An honest man who still tries hard to do better.

The gaze of the coaching staff and teammates made Mathieu smile a little embarrassedly, his smile was peaceful but resolute.

Leo remembers reading a report a few months ago, it was FIFA official about Mathieu.It was another false report from the Confidential newspaper: he asked Deschamps to call him into the national team after the national derby.

Mathieu explained this: "Since I started my professional career at the age of 17, I will choose to respect every decision made by the coach. I have never said that I want to be re-selected into the national team. I just hope that Deschamps can Give me an explanation, if he says that I'm not good enough, or that I've played too little at Barcelona and that he doesn't have a place for me, then there's no place for me, that's all."

After the results were announced, everyone started training in groups. Leo turned his head and looked at Mathieu who followed his teammates to the other side of the field. At this age, he can pursue his dreams desperately, which is always worthy of everyone's respect.

The training of the national team is longer and more intensive than that of the club, especially the special training and confrontation training for each position. Leo feels that the training camp these days is more tiring than the club's weeks. Sometimes Deschamps even arranges to go to the illuminated stadium at night. train.

In training, it is inevitable that he, Martial and Koeman, the three young people who are the same age and were the top three in the Golden Boy Awards last year, will be constantly compared and adjusted by the coaching staff.As Leo expected, Martial is indeed the strongest personally, and Koeman has a very good breakthrough ability on the wing, and only he can cooperate with Griezmann and even Giroud.

Despite his need for the ball, Leo has never been a very solitary player.After getting the ball, the timing of controlling the pass is accurate. When it is time to take the ball, he will never take too much. When the breakthrough is more conducive to offense, he will choose to pass by himself.

Leo received a pass from Matuidi in a confrontation training. When he took the ball forward, he just raised his head to observe the position of his teammates. Suddenly, the figure in front of him shook twice. The ball is gone.

This interception is really beautiful. Although Leo protects the ball, he dare not say that he will almost never lose it if he is scrambled by a few people like his father, but he has this confidence, his basic skills are solid, and his ball control and dribbling skills are not bad. .But who is this master in front of him? It can be called a world-class defense. The timing is just right, and the kick is clean. This must be Makelele's possession.

Although Leo's heart was full of disbelief, his face was still as calm as ever. When he turned his head to look over, he saw the man slightly raised his head and smiled at him honestly, showing his big white teeth.

The French team can be said to be the country with the most black players among European countries. They have a common characteristic, they are tall and strong, with abnormal physical fitness, and they can't run to death on the court.But although the black boy in front of Leo's eyes was full of energy and able to run, he was not tall enough, so Leo had to lower his head slightly to look at him.

N'Golo Kante, 25 years old, is currently playing for Leicester City, the Premier League's No. [-] team, and is a defensive midfielder.He is the well-deserved stealing leader in the Premier League this season. No number of powerful defenders can compare with him in terms of the number of steals. However, his high-efficiency steals are accompanied by extremely low fouls.He is like a piece of brown candy that can't be shaken off and can't get rid of.Not only that, but he also handles the ball quite well after intercepting, and the transition from defense to offense is quite fast and accurate.

It only took Kante three years to go from the sixth-tier French league to the top-ranked club in the Premier League this season.This makes how many players who came from the youth training camps of wealthy families but are still in the middle and lower reaches of the team or even the second-tier teams feel ashamed.As far as defensive midfield skills are concerned, although Kanter is not much worse than Pogba, his worth is not even a fraction of the opponent's.He is not as amazing as the "Demon King", but he keeps his feet on the ground and lets himself go further step by step.

Leo smiled back at him, and when the corner of his mouth just raised, he immediately stuck it up to fight back. The opponent still had a simple smile on his face, and then kicked the ball to Payet.

Because of this, Leo took him to practice breakthroughs and steals after several days of training. His humbly study, hard work and serious attitude really surprised Kanter, an honest man. Zidane's son actually He will also ask him for advice humbly and proactively, which makes this midfielder who is used to dirty work but no one pays attention to it feel very incredible.

The England-France international friendly match is scheduled for Saturday at Wembley Stadium in London, England.However, a few hours before the game, there was news of a terrorist attack in Paris. Wembley Stadium was decorated with lights in the blue, white and red colors of the French flag, which was extremely quiet against the backdrop of the night.

A huge French flag was propped up in the England fan area in the stands. Before the game, Prince William presented flowers on behalf of the British royal family, and the Prime Minister represented the British government in person.When the players of the two teams entered the field, they hugged each other in the middle circle and sang the Marseillaise, with black veils tied on their arms.

This feeling is very subtle. The tricolor flag and the Marseillaise are both strange and familiar. Leo has never sung them before, but they are very fluent when they sing along with the music.Especially after such a special event as the terrorist attack in Paris, he, like everyone else, always thinks about what he can do for the victims.

Leo got the No. 10 left by Benzema, but Didier Deschamps did not have him in the starting list.The three strikers are Martial, Guignac and Ben Arfa.For the coach's arrangement, Leo didn't have any thoughts, just sat quietly in the corner of the bench to watch the game, with his good friend Griezmann sitting next to him, and the two chatted about the situation on the field from time to time.

England and France have fought 28 games before, and the Three Lions have a record of 15 wins, 5 draws and 8 losses, which is a clear advantage.Because it was a friendly match, both sides played fairly peacefully.In the opening 2 minutes, the French team's No. 17 left-back Digne made a forward drive on the left side and brought the ball directly to the corner flag area. Interestingly, it was England's right-winger Sterling who defended him.The two stalemate for a long time, but the ball did not understand. Digne pulled the ball with one heel, passed Sterling, but was intercepted by No. 2 Klein who made up the defense in time.

On the previous international football match day, England lost 2-0 to Spain. The head coach Hodgson even said in the post-match press conference that England has a natural disadvantage to Spain. The ability is not as good as the opponent, and it is completely a confrontation between two levels of teams.He even believes that not only England, but also no team in world football can match Spain in this regard.

Although what he said is correct, the England fans are emotionally confused about which team you are the head coach of.

Maybe it was because Rooney played too late in the last friendly match and the loss in the end was a bit ugly. The captain was placed in the starting lineup for this game.

The first shot since the opening came in the 6th minute. France's No. 6 Cabaye shot a long-range shot just after passing the midfield. The quality was not bad, but it missed the goal slightly.

Because he played in the Mexican League, Leo knew almost nothing about Gignac. However, Deschamps had a place for him in every national team training list. If it wasn't for the good statistics in Mexico, then As the outside world said, this is Deschamps' godson.

Based on Leo's observation alone, he feels that compared to Giroud's tall and strong, Griezmann's aura is sharp, Gignac is really a player with no characteristics, even though he once won Ligue 6 for a certain season The top scorer, but Leo still feels that his technique is quite rough.Gignac made a breakthrough with the ball from the left, and England's No. [-] central defender Stones just posted it to interfere twice, and he even missed the ball himself.

In the next attack, Gignac received a pass from Martial, and the opponent's three players blocked the goal. He actually chose to hit the goal directly, while Varane, who was inserted on the side, was in a better position and had no chance. man marking.

Leo and Griezmann looked at each other and shook their heads slightly.

In the 8th minute of the game, Captain Lloris made a clearance and the ball was passed directly to England striker Ali at the front of the penalty area. Fortunately, Varane made a timely clearance in front of the goal and England won the first corner kick of the game.

Not only because of the impact of the terrorist attacks in Paris, but also because the two sides in the friendly match did play relatively friendly.Although the French team possesses the ball for a long time, they always fall in the midfield.It wasn't until the 18th minute that there was a threatening shot.

Martial retreated to the left of the midfield to get the ball. At the same time, Matuidi quickly advanced, but Martial should have judged that he was in an offside position and did not pass the ball, but he helped Martial attract. After a defensive player, Martial chose to go inside by himself, cut inside to the left side of the front of the penalty area, and hit the goal directly after a slight adjustment.But the angle was too straight, and the ball was directly confiscated by the opposing goalkeeper Joe Hart.

In the 19th minute of the game, England took advantage of a corner kick from the French team and directly launched a counterattack after grabbing the spot. Sterling counterattacked and passed it to Kane from midfield. Ali at the far end, but the player born in 96 failed to stop the first ball, and lost a chance to directly face goalkeeper Lloris.It seemed a little blind to pass the ball again, and the ball was destroyed by Varane and went out of the sideline.

Leo shook his head, he observed the field very carefully.The reason why Ali failed to hold the ball well was that his judgment on the first landing point was biased, and the height of the ball after rebounding made people uncomfortable. He tried to stop the ball with his knees and chest but failed. He went straight to the sideline with the ball, and when he chased it back, the French team's defense was already in place.

In the 22nd minute, the two sides scrambled for positions at the front of the French team's penalty area. Sterling passed the ball and the ball rebounded and hit the hands of French team defender Schneiderlin.England win a superbly placed free-kick at the edge of the box.

The rebroadcast shot showed England captain Wayne Rooney, who hadn't had the ball a few times in the previous 20 minutes. All 10 players of the French team retreated into the penalty area. Rooney and No. 8 put Cali in front of the ball, but everyone could see that Rooney Will definitely take this free kick.

After the referee blew the whistle, it was the captain's run-up. The quality of the free kick was not bad. The ball went over the wall and landed in front of the goal. Unfortunately, the goalkeeper Lloris had already predicted the direction of Rooney's shot and moved to the side of the wall ahead of time to take it steadily. to the ball.

After this free kick, the England captain seemed to have found some feeling. He frequently took the ball in the midfield, and the most threatening time appeared in the 30th minute of the game.The French team made a mistake after a few inversions in the frontcourt. No. 5 Cahill launched an attack after stealing the ball. England's counterattack was very fast.Cahill crossed the ball to find Rooney. The latter faced Koscielny in a one-on-one chance. A very beautiful fake move shook Koscielny's center of gravity, and then he hit the goal with his left foot. Unfortunately, the ball was slightly deflected. Out of the left post of the goal.

The England fans in the stands burst into waves of shouts because of the captain's wonderful performance.

Griezmann next to him was discussing Rooney's shot just now with Giroud on the other side, while Leo was still silently observing the situation on the field.Although the French team has an absolute advantage in possession of the ball, every counterattack by England is extremely threatening.After two or three simple passes from the backcourt to the frontcourt, they will choose to transfer the ball to the far end to find Rooney or Sterling on the front line. After the latter gets the ball, they will either face a defensive player one-on-one. , or directly face the goalkeeper.This tactic has been tried and tested. If the French team's midfielder can't put pressure on the opponent, then they should not be far from conceding the ball.

Only 5 minutes later, Schneiderling and Ali fought in the midfield, and neither of them fell to the ground at the same time. Rooney on the right took the ball and directly gave it to the one who had just got up and was actively attacking. Ali, the latter took the ball calmly at the front of the penalty area and took a long shot. The ball went straight to the dead corner on the left and entered the net. Goalkeeper Lloris was beyond his reach.

Even Leo, who was on the bench, couldn't help applauding the opponent in his heart for this shocking world wave.After a frontal fight between Ali and Schneiderlin, the latter got up and immediately went into the attack, and raised his hand to ask for the ball from Rooney, while Schneiderlin, as a defender, still sat there and complained.And the place after Ali took the ball happened to be the position where Schnettlin participated in the defense, and at this time Schnettlin had just stood up from the ground.

Leo is a little impressed, are you Premier League players so good at playing?

When the game went on to 42 minutes, Deschamps made 2 substitution decisions.He replaced Gugnac with Leo and Matuidi with Pogba.