With two wonderful goals on Giroud's debut, Mainz struggled to defeat Werder Bremen at home, which allowed them to overtake Bremen with 12 points in the standings.

May and Bayern Munich, with 14 points, ranked third.

But more importantly than the improvement in rankings, Mainz has proved with its strength that their dark horse is not just a matter of luck.

Stuttgart, Hamburg, Leverkusen, Dortmund, Werder Bremen... Mainz's schedule for the first eight rounds, even if it is said to be the most devilish schedule in the Bundesliga, is probably not an exaggeration.

The result? They stepped on the heads of the southern king Bayern Munich and the defending champion Werder Bremen.

Not to mention it is a dark horse, even if it is replaced by an established giant, do you dare to say that it can do better than Mainz?

For a time, Mainz was so popular that even old foxes like Schnellinger couldn't help but murmur in their hearts: Can this newly promoted team really knock Bayern Munich down? By the way, they will ride on Bayern's head.

Is it done?

But he quickly realized that even if this Mainz team was as evil as Kaiserslautern back then, what would happen? The guy who said "pulled Bayern down" was not even a player in the Bundesliga.

We haven’t even touched the turf yet!

Fortunately, I have been a senior reporter for more than 20 years, but I am so impatient!

Schnellinger secretly laughed at himself.

Of course, having said that, it has always been Schnellinger's rule to despise the enemy strategically and pay attention to the enemy tactically. He then found the youth league game report and took a look:

"Well, no goals or assists in five games? Huh, what gave you the courage to say that kind of performance?"

Schnellinger just glanced at the game report and basically sentenced Levi to death. In fact, he actually hoped that Levi could perform better, otherwise wouldn't it be too boring? Watching him rise to the first team,

Then I was taught how to be a good person by Bayern Munich in the Bundesliga. It’s exciting to think about it!

"What a pity," Schnellinger glanced at the Mainz youth team's next match and shook his head, "I'm afraid you won't even be able to pass the next level."

※※※※※※

The guy who overestimates his capabilities as mentioned by Schnellinger obviously does not have the consciousness to act within his capabilities. For the next sixth round of the Youth League, Levi is bound to win.

Of course, to a certain extent, this is indeed because Levi does not know the weight of his opponent. After all, he has no idea about the strong teams in the German Youth League.

The Stuttgart U19 youth team, the opponent of the Mainz youth team in the next round, won the Southern Germany Youth League championship three times in the six years from 2004 to 2010. This number is even inferior to the Bundesliga class leader Bayern Munich.<

/p>

In the 0607 season, the Stuttgart first team, which was based on its own youth training team, set off a youth storm, defeating many strong opponents and winning the Bundesliga championship silver plate.

And just for the stars who were about the same age as Levi around 1985, the Stuttgart youth training camp produced Khedira, Gomez, Weiss, Baker, Badstuber, Taschcher, Gentner, Uhl.

Reich, Shaloy and many other good players.

If the above honors and names are not enough to attract your attention, then let me add one more thing - in the original history, the Stuttgart Youth Team was the winner of the Southern German Youth League this season.

I have to admit that this is the strongest opponent Levi has encountered so far since arriving in Germany.

Faced with such an opponent, it is no wonder that Michael was dissatisfied with Klopp's move to transfer Giroud.

……

Of course, Levi is no longer the stupid young man he was more than a year ago. People of all ages have suffered losses because they did not understand their opponents in advance, from Rooney to Lallana to Cesc Fabregas, Bale, and Volco.

Special...

No matter what happens, he should learn a lesson. Now, he will at least pay attention to the opponent's lineup.

But he doesn’t know whether he is lucky or unlucky. Due to his ignorance of the Bundesliga, he only knows one Khedira in Stuttgart’s roster.

Originally there should have been Mario Gomez, after all, he was the main center forward for Bayern Munich and Fiorentina, but last season he won the top scorer of the Southern Youth League with a crazy performance of 30 goals in 26 games.

, has entered the second team of Stuttgart this season, and will be officially promoted to the first team in the foreseeable future.

Therefore, in Levi's view, the Stuttgart youth team with "only" Khedira is not a special threat.

Fortunately, Tuchel is not as "ignorant" as Levi. In this game, he kept his posture very low and adopted a defensive and counterattack posture - of course, there is no way around it.

Otherwise, if any team suddenly loses its main center three days before the start of the game, it will definitely be broken.

A person like Tuchel who changes tactics immediately is considered a leader in adapting quickly. If an ordinary coach is still lucky enough to stick to the same old style of play, he will probably be taught how to behave.

But even with such a low profile, Tuchel believes that the chance of winning is less than 30%, because Stuttgart is powerful in all aspects.

Serdar Tashci, Andrea Baker's back line, Sami Khedira, Christian Gentner's midfield, even if Mainz attacks with all their strength, they may not be able to break through.

, not to mention that only very few troops can be invested now.

And the heavily defended backcourt may not be able to stop Stuttgart's hot center forward, Danny Garm. Even though this guy didn't have any success later, his performance in the youth competition was unparalleled.

There are not too many examples, and Garm is one of them. This season, he scored 21 goals and became the top scorer in the Southern Youth League.

This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading!

To put it simply, based on the comparison of paper strength, the Stuttgart youth team completely defeated the Mainz youth team, and the latter barely saw the slightest chance.

But, how to say it?

As the old saying goes, football is round.

※※※※※※

Tuchel used a 3-5-2 formation for this game. Although three central defenders are no longer popular nowadays, Tuchel has always believed that there is no such thing as a useless formation, only a useless coach, even the ancient 2-3

The -5 inverted pyramid formation may not be lifeless in his opinion.

For Mainz, who wants to strengthen their defense in this game, adding a central defender is indeed the most cost-effective option. In fact, when defending, two wing-backs are recycled, which is the same as 5-3-

2Almost.

There is no suspense about Levi's position. Naturally, he is one of the two defensive midfielders. Partnering with him in the center is Neustadt. The latter has strong offensive ability and is not considered a full-time defensive midfielder, but he can do the job in Levi's position.

After the single defensive midfielder, the combination of the two complemented each other, with Damir Vrancic serving as the attacking midfielder.

Up front is Pupalovic's partner Kohamba Emani (

Khaibar Amani), with Mario Vrancic and Christian Telch on the wings.

The three defenders are Banuas, Subotic and Sebastian Kress. The one guarding the final goal is Thomas Wiener.

To be honest, apart from Subotic, few of these supporting characters will be able to appear again in the future. However, as long as they can make up the word count, I will reluctantly give them a chance to appear.

Stuttgart has a pretty decent 4-4-2 formation. As for the lineup, I won’t introduce them one by one in order to avoid the suspicion of trying too hard to make up the word count. All you need to know is Khedira, Beck, and Gent.

It is enough that Na, Tashche, and Garm all appear.

In other words, this is the strongest lineup of the Stuttgart youth team.

And this game with clear distinctions between strong and weak begins with the strong taking the lead.

Just three minutes after the game started, Garm opened the scoring after receiving a pass from Khedira in the penalty area. While continuing his hot form, he also continued to lead the scorer list in the Southern Youth League.

This goal was undoubtedly a huge blow to the Mainz people. They had just prepared a defensive counterattack and they lost the ball? So what's the point of defending? Even if the opponent never scores again, then it's not

Are you still losing?

At this time, it is very easy to have inconsistent ideas. Some players on the field want to attack, some want to defend, and they are completely opposite. Those one-sided defeats often start like this.

Fortunately, there is still a keen person at the helm on Mainz's coaching bench.

※※※※※※

Tuchel took advantage of the dead ball opportunity to call in captain Subotic:

"In the text, the strategy remains unchanged. Follow the tactics formulated before the game."

"Understood!"

Subotic nodded and then ran to the court to convey the message.

Watching him running away, Tuchel sighed softly. To be honest, it was frustrating to fall behind at the beginning, but it would not be wrong if he did not expect it at all before the game.

Continuing to maintain a defensive counterattack strategy after losing the ball is also a countermeasure he had thought of before. Blindly counterattacking at this time will only expose more flaws to the already weak side.

However, this can only keep the team from getting into chaos.

If there were no unexpected variables, this game would indeed be difficult to handle.

……

After Tuchel's instructions were conveyed to the entire team, the situation on the field quickly stabilized.

Tuchel's correct response is certainly part of the reason, but more importantly, these young players on the field have almost blind trust in the former.

Although his tenure is not long, it is really easy for Tuchel, a world-famous coach in the future, to win the trust of these young players.

However, Levi is not yet included.

Although he knows Tuchel's future achievements better than anyone on the field, he still insists on his simplest understanding - if you don't attack, you can't score.

Of course, thinking this way does not mean that Levi will immediately disobey Tuchel's instructions and do his own thing.

In the first two rounds of the league, although he has shown extraordinary defensive strength, even surpassing his strength at Leeds United last season, the only flaw is that he has never regained his offensive ability.

You know, as early as a year ago, he was no longer an engineer who only did dirty work. Klopp and Tuchel also valued his ability as an organizing midfielder.

But since the first training camp in the summer, he has never shown his ability in this area - it's not that he doesn't want to, but that he really can't do it.

If the main reason for the performance in the first three rounds of the league was physical discomfort, then obviously this cannot be used as an excuse in the first two rounds of the league.
To be continued...