Chapter 737 The decisive battle at Anfield
Liverpool's opponents in the last two rounds were Charlton and Fulham. If nothing unexpected happens, there is no doubt that they will win the championship. Liverpool is now focusing on the second leg semi-finals between the Champions League and Chelsea.
In the first leg, Liverpool drew Chelsea 1-1 away, winning the initiative in the home finals, but Mourinho is definitely not an easy opponent to deal with, nor is he a person who easily admits defeat. The second game will definitely be a fierce battle.
After the first leg, Chelsea has been very low-key. Neither players nor coaches or management personnel have mentioned anything about the Champions League, but the media revealed that if Chelsea had lost all four of them this season, Mourinho is likely to be fired by Abraham. There are now great conflicts between Chelsea's players and management. The players support Mourinho and vow to use the Champions League victory to defend Mourinho's coach position.
Liverpool did not underestimate the difficulty of this game against Chelsea, otherwise they would not be so passive in the game against Portsmouth. After the game against Portsmouth, Liverpool did not relax at all and directly prepared for the game against Chelsea.
Liverpool must play defensive counterattack in this game. Benitez focused on practicing Drogba's defense and the use of Chen Yu. These two points are necessary for Liverpool. If you can't defend Drogba, you will have no way to start with defensive counterattack. If you can't use Chen Yu's sharpest knife, Chelsea will have no scruples when attacking. It is almost impossible for Liverpool to defend.
Drogba is definitely not something that can be defended by one player. One person must be guarded by everyone and everyone can help defend, so that Drogba can be restricted.
The use of Chen Yu is also very important. In the last game, Chen Yu performed his bravery. In this game, Chelsea will definitely strengthen its defense against Chen Yu. Only by releasing Chen Yu's attack power can Chelsea not dare to put all its troops into the offense. This will reduce the pressure on Liverpool's defense line and complete the 00-year mission.
The most powerful one for Chen Yu is definitely the 433 formation. Three forwards are in front. Whether Chen Yu plays as a center or a winger, someone will share the pressure with him. Chen Yu can pass and shoot, and it is difficult for the opponent to adopt a double-team tactic for him, because once he is tied, the positions of the other two forwards will be empty. However, Liverpool cannot line up a 433 formation to fight against Chelsea. Such a formation is too risky. They hold the advantage of away goals, which is not cost-effective to play like this...
After testing several formations, Benitez finally decided to use a 45l formation to fight Chelsea, but the L in this formation was not Chen Yu, but Kuyt.
Benitez's intention to arrange the lineup like this is very obvious. Kuyt's role in the front is actually to play a role in a stirring stick, attracting the opponent's defense, handing the ball to Chen Yu, and let Chen Yu attack Chelsea's defense.
Chen Yu is very clear about his role in this game, which is important and the key to victory or defeat. He also trains carefully to find players who are suitable for binding so that he can fully display his strength in the game.
Chen Yu had just entered the star development system and immediately heard the voice of the football elves, "Congratulations on upgrading. Through this period of hard training, your strength has increased greatly. Now you can bind the consciousness of the intermediate superstar."
Chen Yu couldn't help but be overjoyed when he heard this. He was worried that his strength was not enough and it would be difficult to perform at a normal level under the close siege of opponents. Now, he can upgrade his line of fire and bind it! He is destined to be an intermediate superstar. Then even if he cannot play the true strength of an intermediate superstar, he still has the hope of exerting the strongest strength of a junior superstar.
Chen Yu has been in the midfield these days in training, but his defensive task is the lightest. Head coach Benitez has also instructed him that although he is in a forward position, his main task is still attacking. Even if he cannot score a goal, he must put enough pressure on his opponent on the offense so that the opponent dare not easily press on the attack.
Chen Yu knew that he played as a shadow striker in the upcoming game, so he repeatedly looked for stars suitable for him in the star development system.
According to the division in the star development system, the top one is the King of Football, below are the top superstars, intermediate superstars and junior superstars. Let alone the King of Football level, only Pele and Maradona can reach this level, and they can change the game with their own strength; the top superstars are the players closest to the King of Football, and the stars of this level have not become King of Football because of this and that. In fact, their abilities are not much worse than King of Football, just like Ronaldo, Messi, Ronaldo, Zidane, Stefano, Beckenbauer, Cruyff and others are all at this level. Although the intermediate superstars are a little worse than the top superstars, they are all powerful figures in football history. For example, Platini, Eusibio, Galincha, Cristiano, Baggio and others, there is actually no difference in strength than the top superstars, but the achievements may be a little smaller.
Since Chen Yu will appear in the midfield in this game, Chen Yu initially chose Robert Baggio. He thought Baggio was the best No. 9 and a half, and chose him to complete the tasks assigned by head coach Benitez. However, after binding Baggio's consciousness, Chen Yu was surprised to find that after binding Baggio's consciousness, his own body and consciousness could not be completely matched. After all, as the stars at the top of the football sport, their consciousness is beyond ordinary players. Their consciousness is combined with the body's muscle memory and nerve reflexes. Although Chen Yu's body is getting stronger and stronger, it is not so easy to adapt.
During the next two days of training, Chen Yu tried his best to adapt to his bound consciousness and try his best to synchronize his bound consciousness.
While Chen Yu and Liverpool players were preparing for the intense battle, Chelsea had arrived at Liverpool quietly.
It is not that the reporters and fans did not notice them. In fact, when Chelsea got off the plane, there were not many fans and reporters who picked up the plane. It was just that the Chelsea coach was too low-key and they didn't give anyone any face at the airport and refused to accept interviews from anyone.
Although Mourinho is known as a madman and often scolds reporters, he is the most popular coach among reporters because he can create topics. Even if nothing happens, as long as Mourinho speaks, it is good news, but it is rare for Mourinho to speak.
Mourinho likes to play verbal battles before the game, and likes to make the opponent's coaches, players and fans furious, and then take the opportunity to pick up the opponent. His abnormality made Benitez feel wary. Before the game, he warned his players that this game is definitely not easy to play, and Chelsea will definitely put all the hopes of this season in this game. Liverpool must be prepared to play the most difficult game.
Benitez didn't just say it, he even considered the penalty shootout and personally led the players to conduct penalty shootout training. From this point of view, Liverpool players realized that the head coach did not rely on the advantage of away goals and was blindly optimistic, which made some of the players who did not have enough understanding of the difficulty of the game also recognized the situation and changed their attitude.
Such a game that concerns Liverpool and Chelsea who will reach the final has attracted the attention of media and fans around the world. The most enthusiastic and caring about Liverpool fans and Chelsea fans. The tickets for this game were sold out early, and the fans who came to watch the game were much more than Anfield Stadium could accommodate.
According to statistics from the Liverpool Municipal Government, there are about 60,000 foreign fans who come to Liverpool to watch the game, of which nearly 40,000 are Liverpool fans, nearly 20,000 are Chelsea fans, and only more than 40,000 are Liverpool able to accommodate. Moreover, there are local Liverpool fans, and these extra fans do not have tickets.
So many fans came to Liverpool to watch the game, which put a lot of pressure on the Liverpool city government. England fans were originally a lot of football hooligans, and there were deep grudges between Liverpool and Chelsea. The Liverpool government and Liverpool club were worried that there would be fans causing trouble after the game. Therefore, the Liverpool city government and Liverpool club both increased the number of security personnel on the court and off the court to ensure the smooth progress of the game and ensure that there were no accidents outside the court.
On the afternoon of the game, Liverpool coach Benitez and Chelsea coach Mourinho attended the pre-match press conference together.
When they met, Mourinho and Benitez shook hands, but they didn't even have a minimum greeting. Their eyes were dull, as if there was nothing in front of them.
Now that he has to speak, Mourinho once again showed his arrogance and confidence to the world, he said: "The game at Anfield is definitely extraordinary, but he believes that Chelsea will win because they are Chelsea. Mourinho believes that the result of the last game is not a problem. He believes that Liverpool will never dare to defend 90 minutes. No one in this world can guarantee that Chelsea will not be able to break their goal."
Benitez performed more maturely and steadily. He said in a low-key manner that Liverpool should forget the result of the last game and fought with his own efforts to make this game. Benitez believed that Liverpool would definitely advance to the final, because this was at Anfield Stadium, where Shankley's soul was blessing them to strode forward, and Liverpool fans cheered for them.
Chapter completed!