Football Feast, Starting From the Acquisition of European Clubs

   Chapter 243

   "Okay. However, after you rejected Coca-Cola's offer last time, Chen, they haven't replied yet. Do you think Coca-Cola doesn't plan to sponsor us?"

   For Chen Ran to use the competitive relationship between Coca-Cola and Pepsi to make them raise prices for each other, Stephen was a little worried that he had screwed up.

   "Stephen, don't worry. As long as we Crystal Palace can continue to win various championships, then these sponsors will honestly return to the negotiating table in the end."

   "Because they will find after making various comparisons that although sponsoring our Crystal Palace is a little more expensive, it is definitely worth the money."

  Chen Ran said, and took Stephen to the championship trophy display cabinet in his office, pointing to the championship trophies inside, with confidence.

  Because now the old stadium of Crystal Palace has been demolished, the new stadium has not been built. So Chen Ran put the various championship trophies he has won since he entered the Crystal Palace into his office, and enjoy it when he has nothing to do.

   When the new stadium of Crystal Palace is completed, he also plans to learn from those giant clubs to build a championship trophy showroom.

   However, there are only one Champions League trophy, one Europa League trophy, one European Super Cup trophy, two Premier League trophies, one FA Cup trophy, and one English League Cup trophy in the cupboard now.

The number of    is a bit small, a bit unable to support the scene, and I still need to continue to work hard.

   Three days later, in the third round of the English League Cup, Crystal Palace went to Anfield to challenge Liverpool.

  According to the plan made in advance, Chen Ran dispatched a full bench lineup and handed over the command of the game to Guardiola.

   In the face of the cup competition, which is far stronger than the league, and Liverpool, who played the main force, the substitute players of Crystal Palace were inseparable from their opponents.

   In the end, Kuyt scored a lore goal in stoppage time and lost to Liverpool with a score of 2:3, and was eliminated from the League Cup.

   After just a day’s rest, the tenth round of the Premier League is about to start again. Crystal Palace will go away to challenge this season’s dark horse Portsmouth.

   The reason why Portsmouth can become a dark horse this season is inseparable from their big moves in the summer transfer period.

They have brought in a group of strong veterans, such as Andy Cole, one of the former Manchester United's black winds, former Arsenal core Sol Campbell, England goalkeeper David James, and Nigeria striker Kanu.

   Of course, they don’t just buy veterans. Also bought the Croatian star, the national team midfielder Kranica who is known as Boban's successor, and the former Chelsea right back Glen Johnson, two young people who are only 22 years old.

   Coach Redknapp has also coached in the Premier League for many years and is very experienced.

   In the face of this opponent, Chen Ran sent all the main players who had recovered greatly after being rotated and rested on the court.

  Redknapp is also an old fox. Facing the league leaders Crystal Palace, he honestly let Portsmouth tucked into the backcourt to place the bus, hoping to take advantage of Crystal Palace’s intensive schedule and serious physical exhaustion. The opportunity to steal a point.

It's a pity that, in front of the attacking combination of Tony, Ibrahimovic, Kaka, Ronaldo, Ribery and Modric, the bus of Portsmouth is like a piece of paper. It was destroyed by the attack of Crystal Palace, and there was no resistance.

  In the end, with the goals of Ibrahimovic, Ronaldo, Modric and Toni, Crystal Palace won Portsmouth cleanly 4-0 away. Swept away the suffocation before, raised his eyebrows and exhaled.

   After getting three points and continuing to consolidate Crystal Palace's leading position in the standings, it also brought Chen Ran the "level 1 blood recovery card" that he desperately needed.

   Next, there will be a four-day break from the Champions League match between Crystal Palace and CSKA Moscow, which also allows the main players of Crystal Palace to recover relatively abundantly.

Therefore, after being drawn by CSKA Moscow on the road, Crystal Palace took it easy at home this time and started killing, with Ibrahimovic, Thiago Silva and Ronaldo's goals, 3:0 Victory over CSKA Moscow.

  Crystal Palace has won two consecutive games, scoring seven goals without conceding one goal. It can be regarded as a fierce fight against the previous two consecutive games without a victory. The faces of those who looked down on Crystal Palace showed a bad breath.

   Two days later, in the eleventh round of the Premier League, Crystal Palace visited Anfield for the second time in ten days to challenge Liverpool.

   However, the Crystal Palace this time is completely different from the Crystal Palace in the English League Cup ten days ago.

  Because of the club's management problems, Liverpool did not make any big signings during the summer transfer period.

  The biggest transfer was the introduction of Dutch striker Kuyt from Feyenoord for 14.65 million euros.

The rest is to buy midfielder Pennant from Birmingham for 9.1 million euros, the introduction of Wales striker Bellamy from Blackburn for 9 million euros, and the Argentine defender Paletta from Banfield.

  Because Liverpool had just beaten Crystal Palace ten days ago, but public opinion generally believed that Crystal Palace voluntarily gave up the League Cup game because the schedule was too dense.

   So now to play again, Liverpool are full of fighting spirit from top to bottom, ready to give Crystal Palace a little more color.

   Liverpool head coach and tactician Benitez of course also knows that there is a huge gap in strength between Crystal Palace's main lineup and substitute lineup.

   To this end, Benitez carefully designed a set of 4411 tactics that focus on defense and hide needles in cotton.

   Center Kuyt

  Front waist Kewell

   Left MF Zenden, MF Gerrard, MF Xavi Alonso, MF Pennant

  Left-back Riise, center-back Agger, center-back Carragher, right-back Finnan

   Goalkeeper Reina

   On the Crystal Palace side, with the continuous enhancement of the team’s strength, Chen Ran now also has the capital mainly based on me.

  No matter what tactics the opponents use, Crystal Palace has the confidence to stay the same.

   Of course, the premise is that Crystal Palace's main lineup is in good physical condition.

Considering that Riviera had played all the games in the previous two games, as the only player in the main lineup who was over 30 years old, Chen Ran added the "Level 1 Blood Recovery" he just added just in case. Card" was applied to Vieira.

   striker Tony, striker Ibrahimovic

   Left midfielder Cristiano Ronaldo, midfielder Kaka, right midfielder Ribery

   Midfielder Vieira, Midfielder Modric

  Left center back Chiellini, center back Vidic, right center back Thiago Silva

   Goalkeeper Cech

  Because Liverpool took the initiative to shrink their formation and concentrated their forces on their own backcourt defense. Except for Kuyt and Kewell, none of the other players crossed the midline. So Crystal Palace controlled the midfield very smoothly and formed a siege against Liverpool.

   However, Benitez's adjustment to Liverpool is very effective, and every player on the field is implementing his tactical arrangements without compromise.

   So much so that Crystal Palace attacked for 30 minutes, but still did not break the goal guarded by Reina.

   It was not until 30 minutes later, when the first small bottleneck of physical fitness appeared, that Liverpool's defense showed a flaw.

   In the 33rd minute, after receiving a pass from Vieira, Cristiano Ronaldo dribbled the ball along the left line at a high speed.

According to Benitez's original arrangement, it should be right midfielder Pennant to quickly return to defense, keep up with Cristiano Ronaldo, and then intercept right back Finnan frontally, thus forming a double-team situation one after the other. It can make up for the gap in the individual strength of Liverpool players.

   But because of a physical bottleneck, Pennant stopped after a few steps and stopped chasing.

   This can make Finnan miserable. With Finnan's personal strength, how can he defend against Ronaldo?

   Seeing Finnan come up to intercept him, Ronaldo is just a good heel knocking the ball. While passing Finnan, he also successfully completed the inward cut.

   At this time, the center midfielder Harvey Alonso, who was on the right side, found that the situation was not good, and immediately rushed over to make up the defense.

  Cristiano Ronaldo, who just finished kicking the ball with his heels, saw Xavi Alonso pounce on him, and immediately made another fried ball, passing Xavi Alonso again.

   looked up at Liverpool's goal, Cristiano Ronaldo directly pocketed a curve ball with the inner instep of his right foot.

  The ball flew to the upper left corner of the Liverpool goal with a violent spin.

   Seeing Ronaldo's shot, Reina quickly jumped into the air and flew to the side. Unfortunately, he still couldn't touch the ball and could only watch it fly into Liverpool's goal.

   "GOAL!"

   With the wonderful performance of Ronaldo, Crystal Palace finally broke the deadlock on the field and led Liverpool 1:0.

   Benitez is worthy of being a famous coach. Even if he saw Crystal Palace score, he remained indifferent and did not make any adjustments to the team.

   Liverpool's formation on the field is exactly the same as before, and it seems that Crystal Palace's goal does not exist at all.

   "Boss, what is Benitez trying to do? The score is behind and there is no reaction at all. Did he just accept the result of losing?"

  After the excitement of the team taking the lead passed, Guardiola also found something wrong with Benitez.

   "I don't know if Benitez will accept the result of the loss. But if I were the manager of Liverpool, I would have to defend first when I was not as good as my opponent."

   "If in the 70th minute of the second half, the situation on the field is still only one goal behind, then it will not be too late for me to attack again."

   "So that's what Benitez planned."

   Hearing Chen Ran's analysis, Guardiola realized something. However, he then raised a new question.

   "Boss, since you know what Benitez's plan is, how are you going to deal with it?"

"Deal? You don't need to deal with it. There is a saying in the Chinese state, 'one force can defeat ten meetings'. With the current attacking power of our Crystal Palace, Liverpool will just have to defend. As long as they dare to press out to attack, they will surely die miserably at that time. ."

   "Eh, boss, what is 'one power down ten clubs'?"

   It is also difficult for Guardiola to pronounce these five Chinese characters.

  No way, who made the owner of Crystal Palace Chen Ran a Chinese.

   What’s good on the top will be worse on the bottom.

   Now the whole Crystal Palace Club has set off a wave of learning Chinese. From top to bottom, almost all Crystal Palace staff can speak a few Chinese.

   "Simply put, as long as we are strong enough, no matter what tactics Benitez uses, it's useless."

"Understood."

The progress of the    competition seems to be confirming Chen Ran's judgment.

   Under the strict defense of Liverpool, the first half of the game ended with a 1-0 lead by Crystal Palace.

   At half-time, neither Chen Ran nor Benitez made any adjustments.

   At the beginning of the second half of the game, Liverpool still shrunk in their own half and seemed to be really willing to accept the result of a small loss.

   I have to admit that Benitez's adjustment to Liverpool is really in place.

  Be aware that passive defense all the time is very tiring, both physically and mentally. It is very rare that Liverpool players can persist in the majority of the game without collapsing.

   When the game went to 60 minutes later, Benitez shot.

   "Boss, there seems to be a substitution on the Liverpool side."

   After listening to Chen Ran's analysis, Guardiola, who has been paying attention to the movement of Liverpool's bench, immediately noticed Benitez's change.

   Following Guardiola's gaze, Chen Ran saw Benitez called forward Luis Garcia and right back Abeloa from the bench.

   Obviously, Benitez wants to attack.

   "Boss, as you said, Liverpool are going to counterattack."

  Seeing Chen Ran's judgment is accurate again, Guardiola is also very impressed.

   "Josep, remind the players to cheer up, a good chance to score is coming."

   "Haha, boss, you are so bad."

   Guardiola walked to the sidelines to remind the players according to Chen Ran's instructions, and secretly guessed in his heart that if Benitez knew that the boss was waiting for him to make moves, he didn't know what his expression would be like.

   Soon, Benitez seemed to be executing step by step according to the plan that Chen Ran gave him. The attacking striker Luis Garcia replaced the attacking midfielder Kewell, and Abeloa, who was more capable of assists, replaced Finnan, who was stronger in defense than attack.

   On the Crystal Palace side, the players who received the reminder from Guardiola felt a little baffled by Chen Ran's order. However, Chen Ran's long-term victories have made the Crystal Palace players have a tendency to worship him blindly.

   As long as it is an order from Chen Ran, it must be executed if understood, and if not understood.

  Because it has been proven time and time again, the result of executing Chen Ran's orders is usually a victory.

  So, just as Liverpool made a substitution and pressed on the offense, Crystal Palace's offense suddenly increased in intensity.

   For a while, there was a half-court offensive and defensive drill for most of the time, which instantly turned into a spark-splashing battle.

   (end of this chapter)