The Young Lion

The Coimbra Municipal Stadium was officially opened last autumn after the expansion was completed.

However, the capacity of this modern stadium including swimming pool, cinema and health club is still small, only 30,000 fans can enter the stadium.

On June 18, the Group B match between England and Switzerland started here first.

Aldridge strode into the field with his head held high, shook hands with the Swiss coach Kuhn, and then came to stand in front of the coach's bench, silently waiting for the start of the game.

Since defeating the French team in the last game, England's championship favorite index has jumped to the top of this competition.

The urgency of the situation minimizes the fact that England is more of a target than it was two years ago.

In the first match of the group stage, they defeated the French team first, and the latter two opponents were weaker, which created less resistance to their qualifying.

And after qualifying, it will be the top eight, which further shortens the possibility of being attacked by repeated strong attacks.

The games are played one after another, but in the overall situation, it can be said that if Aldridge led England for two years to go to the European Cup, and today is to play the World Cup two years later, then today's situation will be extremely bad , the situation of the top 16 of the World Cup will be far more difficult and dangerous than the situation of the top 8 of the European Cup.

Aldridge's strategic vision has already been cast on the knockout round of the quarterfinals, and he emphasized and clarified the changes of Scholes' delay in the preparations again. This point is targeted. After defeating France, the qualifying situation of Group A, The fate of England itself has also undergone earth-shaking changes, that is, whether to advance to the first place in the group or the second place in the group!

With the appearance of England and Switzerland, the stadium in Coimbra was filled with cheers. The cheering and cheering of the fans of both sides opened the curtain.

The second round of Group B of the European Cup has begun. England and Switzerland are the first to appear. In this group, France and England are favorites to qualify and even win the championship. But after the first round, the French team But ranked at the bottom, the England team has been considered to qualify ahead of schedule, because of the strength of the Swiss team and the Croatian team, it is difficult to stop the firm pace of the new World Cup champion! Let's take a look at the lineups of both sides today. The England team has a personnel Change. That is the captain of the back line Southgate retired from injury, and Terry became the main starter.

Goalkeeper: Robinson.

Defenders: Gary Neville, Campbell, Terry, Ashley Cole.

Midfield: Beckham, Hargreaves, Scholes, Lampard.

Forward: Irving,

Gerald.

The Swiss team started 442.

Goalkeeper: Steele.

Defenders: Haas, m-Jakin. Muller, Spicher.

Midfielder: Vicki. Crestini, Hugel, H-Yakin.

Forwards: Chapu Issart, Frey.

The situation of the Swiss team after the draw with Croatia in the first round is the same as that of Croatia. If they want to qualify, they must at least be unbeaten against France and England! Both teams will be tested today!

The Swiss team also fought back against England. They did not have the technical and tactical strength to escape the frenzied siege of England in the frontcourt by positional warfare. However, England's positional warfare did not play well after the opening.

During the World Cup two years ago, people were talking about Owen's slow return to his best form. In the European Cup, Scholes still did not reach the heights Aldridge expected in the second game.

His position was delayed, and he was originally required to carry out medium and long-distance transfers, instigate offensive threats, but, for passes over 30 meters, Scholes's 5 attempts in the opening 15 minutes all ended in failure.

When Aldridge examines the game, he will silently pay attention to the player's technical ability performance status. Taking passing as an example, if the pass is successful all the time, it means that the state is very good. If one kick is successful and the other kick fails, the fluctuating one means that the state is fluctuating. If the success rate is high, and one or two mistakes are interspersed continuously, it is qualified or not bad, but if it fails continuously, it is in terrible condition.

If you let him continue to pass it on like this, it will only make his heart anxious and his performance will get worse and worse.

Playing against France, the England team had the same number of positional battles or counterattacks with the opponent, and Scholes's state could not see much difference, because the ball was not always controlled by England.

But playing against Switzerland, the England team has an advantage in the scene and stronger control, which puts a greater test on this kind of delicate technical work. It seems that every player is observed under a microscope, and Scholes' poor state is also reflected. more obvious.

Aldridge made a gesture on the sidelines to ask Scholes to reduce the threat of passing the ball in the midfield and make a formula pass, that is, to do a good job in the short-to-medium distance team pass. This will allow him to gradually build up confidence. Another pass was successful, and the team slowly regained its sense on the basis of smooth offense.

Forwards and midfielders must have different methods. Forwards are very simple, they just score goals, and midfielders must pursue the success rate in handling the ball.

Without Scholes' straight-line instigation in the middle, the England team's advance turned into a partial impact and took the sidewalk.

There is room to attack from the wing, and Beckham and Ashley Cole will take the ball forward. When encountering too much defensive pressure, the wing cooperation is also very particular. Beckham mainly relies on Gerrard to retreat and support. , Ashley Cole is more combined with Lampard on the other side, Scholes will cover a wider area in the midfield, and freely move and run interspersed to form a triangle pass locally.

Although Scholes is not good, but today the England team's wing attack threat played so that the whole England fans applauded.

Ashley Cole rushed forward, the Swiss team could hardly stop, and Beckham's cross from the right to the edge of the danger zone was also very threatening.

The two side attacks that lasted for nearly fifteen minutes made the Swiss team increase their defense against the side.

They themselves may not have noticed that due to being attacked back and forth by England's two wingers, their defensive horizontal area was torn apart by the limit width of the field, and their central space was gradually exposed.

In the 29th minute, Ashley Cole caught the ball from the wing and went up the field. This time, instead of cooperating with Lampard, he passed the ball directly to the front of the penalty area, and then inserted Scholes touched the ball diagonally and wiped the Swiss midfielder Vicky. Outside the penalty area, he took a long shot!

Shoot the ball to the left of the goal with the zone facing the right of the goal.

Goalkeeper Steele flew to the end but failed to touch the ball. He only heard a bang, and the ball bounced back against the post!

The Swiss team was chaotic in the penalty area. Owen quickly caught the ball's landing point, stopped the ball, and shot with his legs!

Defender Yakin blocked Owen with his body, and the ball bounced back and popped out of the penalty area.

Lampard, who had been watching from the outside, immediately started to swing his legs and volley towards the ball.

Approximately half-empty, Lampard's long-range shot from outside the penalty area deliberately lowered the ball. The ball shuttled past the feet of the crowd in the penalty area and flew into the goal!

Once, twice, three times! The Swiss team finally failed to withstand the indiscriminate bombing of the England team! Scholes' long-range shot was unlucky, Owen's supplementary shot was blocked, and finally Lampard sent the ball in. In the goal! This midfielder also scored his first goal in this European Cup! The England team leads the Swiss team 1:0!

The England fans cheered heartily in the stands, and smiling faces could be seen everywhere.

There is a strange statistic. According to reports from Fleet Street, since Aldrich became the coach of the England national team, the number of football hooligans and the number of disturbances in England have shown a more obvious downward trend.

Many football critics take it for granted when they comment on this.

England is winning, England will not make people nervous, and the trouble factor will naturally decrease.

Aldridge is like a scheming careerist. Even if the team scores a goal, he just smiles and then returns to a serious look.

The Swiss team is average, only second-rate in Europe. The opponents in the qualifiers are only the strongest in Russia and Ireland, but after all, they are a group of second-rate contenders.

This match against Switzerland must be won. As long as they win, the England team will ensure that they qualify for the group stage. Then, in the final round of the match against Croatia, Aldridge can implement a big rotation, allowing the main players to have 7 days of rest before and after. Time to tackle the knockout rounds!

This is the strategic significance of further striving to go further in the European Cup.

In this era when there are no secrets in tactics, England relies on a group of engineers to conquer the world. If they are exhausted due to the intensive schedule, then the opponents they encounter will be stronger in the future, and England will not have the slightest advantage. At that time, the changes that individual abilities can bring Well, England is really no match for other European powers, just like the European football in the eyes of the English, one is English football and the other is continental football.

Before the game, Aldridge gave the team a death order and must win!

What a joke, the new World Cup champion is playing against Switzerland, of course the goal is to win the game! Even a draw is unacceptable!

After taking the lead, England did not let up. They continued to press strongly on Switzerland. The Swiss started a rough run across the horizontal defensive line. England's methodical attack mode, Scholes' midfield In the transfer, Beckham and Ashley Cole pushed forward on the side, and the side and center combined to play in depth. This system is running very smoothly. It is understandable that the Swiss team can only foul when they are exhausted.

In the 43rd minute, Lampard was knocked to the ground by Vicky in a forward move. The referee decisively whistled for a foul and gave Vicky a yellow card. This was the first half of the Swiss team. The third yellow card.

Beckham took the free kick, and the full moon scimitar stunt reappeared in the world. The ball around the wall not only fell rapidly, but also had a strong arc of rotation, and finally went straight to the lower left corner of the goal, hit the inside of the goalpost and bounced into the goal. .

This goal made many fans on the scene dumbfounded!

Beckham ran to celebrate with a smile on his face. Today was his first international competition as the captain of the national team, and being able to score a goal was an added joy.

It can be considered that England has officially entered a new era. (to be continued..) ()