Coaching career started as a college team coach

Although the atmosphere of the Wolves players as spectators was very cheerful, the Newcastle United players as players on the field were not very cheerful. In this game, they walked onto the field with great pressure.

"No matter what, we must win the championship this season. For this goal, you must work hard! Work hard!" Benítez once again made a championship declaration in the locker room. He has said this many times on other occasions.

The standings are not secret data. Everyone can see it, the fans can see it, the head coach and his team can see it, and of course the players can see it.

The Wolves' reversal victory the day before is still vivid in our minds. Now the points gap is almost nine points. Even if this game is won, the gap will only remain at six points, that's all.

In fact, apart from their head coach, not many people still believe that Newcastle can still win the championship, but Benítez still believes it, or rather, he is unwilling to admit that he has lost the championship.

"Hard work, hard work" is what Benítez often emphasizes. Every player has been scolded by him for "not working hard enough" on the training ground, and even his captain Lascelles was not spared.

Everyone, including captain Jamal Lascelles, can't help but think about a question, that is - they have worked hard enough, but still can't catch up with Wolves. What is the reason?

Or to put it bluntly, the players must take part of the responsibility, but the head coach can never get himself out of it.

No one will refuse the opportunity to win the championship, especially professional players. They are certainly willing to fight for the championship, and they are also trying to do the work Benítez has given them.

But it's still not enough, at least in Benítez's opinion, it's not enough.

Even if a ball is lost on the court, there will be a lot of criticism during the halftime break.

Benítez has become more "irritable" recently, and his requirements are more stringent, or harsh. On the one hand, everyone is trying their best to meet the requirements of their head coach, and on the other hand, they have some opinions about Benítez's almost "unreasonable" requirements.

Obviously everyone did well enough, but it was difficult to get even a word of praise.

"Effort" has been emphasized for most of the season. Even if everyone did not achieve 100% of the requirements, 90% must be achieved. But football is not a game that can be played well by "effort". On the contrary, it is a game that requires strategy.

But Benítez kept saying the same few words about effort, and the players' ears were callused.

As the captain, Russells could not easily express his opinions, but he knew that the locker room was no longer on Benítez's side. There were already some whispers, wondering if their head coach had no way to make adjustments, so they kept pushing the responsibility to the players.

This was just a head coach who had run out of ideas and pushed the responsibility to the players after failing to achieve a result that was impossible from the beginning.

"I think he is a little crazy." Isaac Hayden, a midfielder who transferred from Arsenal at the beginning of this season, and his good friend Russells complained privately.

Russells did not comment on such a statement, which also showed his own attitude. We are all adults, and we are not ignorant. We all know what you think and what I think. We just don't show it.

But what the young captain did not notice was that when such an idea began to take root in the heart of the first person, the locker room was no longer so "united".

In this game, Benítez still said "championship" and "effort". He made almost no adjustments to the tactics. It was still the 4-4-1-1 play routine. No one had any opinions, and no one dared to raise opinions.

At the beginning of this game, Newcastle United's players felt the pressure.

Pressure is normal. Since losing to Wolves, Newcastle United has felt more and more pressure from opponents in the league. It may be that Wolves have given each team a "reference answer". Although other teams will not innovate multiple solutions to one question, they will at least copy the answer.

After all, the question has basically not changed, and at most one or two numbers are changed.

Not long after the start of this game, Wei Le shook his head in disappointment.

"What's wrong?" A player in the back row asked Wei Le. Wei Le shook his head and indicated to continue watching the game.

The team often organizes everyone to watch the game together. At first, they just watched. Later, Wei Le made a brief analysis of a game by chance. As a result, everyone found that Wei Le's analysis of tactics was always much clearer than the on-site commentary. After all, he was a "professional".

Wei Le's explanations were always very vivid and interesting.Everyone is also very happy to listen to Wei Le's talk about the game, so now, the process of watching the game has gradually evolved into a process of communication.

Wei Le's explanation is meaningful, and the angle is usually very tricky, so everyone can learn something from it.

After three or five minutes of the game, Newcastle and the opponent were evenly matched, attacking and defending each other, and it looked relatively dull, and Wei Le sighed again.

"To be honest, I am quite disappointed with the tactical play of Benítez in this game. I thought he should have made some progress after changing so many people, but now it seems, tsk..."

"It's not as good as our game." Rodri added the second half of the sentence.

"Do you think Newcastle United's offense is strong?" Wei Le turned around and asked the players in the back row. Everyone looked at each other and thought.

Seeing someone nodding, Wei Le also nodded in agreement, "Very strong, indeed. After all, their offensive line is too luxurious. Except for our team, no other Championship team can compare with them."

This sentence is true. Judging from the value, the value of Newcastle players is generally ridiculously high. After defeating Queens Park Rangers (QPR) this season, QPR head coach Hasselbaink expressed his helplessness, saying, "Newcastle has a lineup worth 100 million pounds. You can see the difference by looking at it. Mitrovic is 15 million pounds, Shelvey is 12 million pounds, and Matt Ritchie is 11 million pounds - should I continue?"

Of course, it is definitely unreasonable to measure it this way. After all, it is people who play football, not money. But the value can still reflect the ability of the players in most cases.

"But how is their offensive efficiency?"

"This..." This time, it was Celars who reacted, "Not really."

"You all know that Newcastle is very good at set pieces. The only goal they scored against us in the second round was a set piece from Shelvey to Mitrovic."

"After they came to the Championship, eight of their first ten goals were scored from set pieces. In the second half of the league, more than 40% of their goals were scored from set pieces, which is really high. Ours should be more than 10%."

"This is a good thing, but it's not a good thing. It is certainly a wise choice for a team to improve its set-piece tactics for the purpose of expanding its arsenal, but goals can't always rely on set pieces, right?"

"When a team's offense always relies on set pieces to gain an advantage, then..."

Everyone understands. It seems that Newcastle United has no chance of winning the championship. Their offense is the primary problem.