Fox in the Penalty Area

Chapter 148 A journey of 0 miles begins with a single step

"Hi, Matt. How come I haven't seen you playing "Godfather of Champions" recently?" Hammond Castle head coach Tony Clark greeted Matt Dawn after seeing him.

"I've fully verified what that post said, why keep playing? I'm going to die young if I stay up late, boss."

"No, you won't die young, Matt. Only your hair will."

Matt reached out and scratched the messy hair: "It's okay..."

"You shouldn't be focusing on the top of your head, you should be focusing on your hairline, which is getting taller."

"That's okay with me staying up late playing Godfather of Champions, boss, my dad's hairline is almost at the back of his head, and he didn't have Godfather of Champions when he was young," Matt retorted.

Clark grinned, then changed the subject: "How's your Chinese boy?"

"The league was suspended because of the Asian Cup. He scored two more goals before the suspension, and now he has nine league goals." Matt said of LaiHu with a very proud tone, as if it was really his. A promising player as well.

"Oh, did his outstanding performance get him selected for the Asian Cup?" Tony Clark asked.

"Of course not. After all, it's only China's second-tier league. Just like a forward who scores 30 goals in the English Championship, it's impossible to be selected for the England team." Matt Dorn said.

"Then what happened to his previous national team game?"

"I checked later, and it was actually just the Olympic team, but they participated in the competition in the name of the national team..."

Clark curled his lips: "God, you really care enough. And you haven't even seen him, watched his game... Can you see China's second-tier league in the UK?"

Matt laughed when he heard the boss's question: "Of course I can't see it."

After fully understanding LaiHu's scoring statistics in reality, he became more and more interested in this young Chinese player, so he was naturally not satisfied with just getting to know this person through games or the "transfer window". He wanted to really see how LaiHu performed in actual games.

As a result, there is no media in the UK to broadcast China's second-level league, let alone the second level, and even China's top league, the Chinese Super League, is not broadcast on TV.

Clark didn't expect Matt's reaction: "You're happy not to see him play?"

"Indeed, it's impossible to watch China's second-tier league games in the UK." Matt nodded with a smile, "But I can find his game videos online, although I still haven't found the Chinese League One online." video of the game, but I found the East Asian Cup.”

As he spoke, he took out his mobile phone and found the video he had saved in the album.

"One is a highlight of the match between the Chinese team and the South Korean team, and the other is a highlight of the match between the Chinese team and the Japanese team. Although they are all highlights and the picture quality is quite average, I can still see a lot of things. Boss, you Wanna see?"

Tony Clark shook his head: "No, just tell me what you see. I believe in your vision."

"First of all, the data of "The Godfather of Champions" still generally reflects LaiHu's football style, that is, he is not the kind of player with the ball, he is not good at dribbling, and his speed is not fast. If he is not in the opponent's penalty area, his role can be almost ignored. But on the other hand, his off-the-ball ability is very outstanding." Matt Dawn talked eloquently.

"I've watched him with goals and a couple of times he didn't score, and he's very good at finding spaces around the box and exploiting them..."

"So he's good off the ball?" Clarke asked.

"It's very good, boss," Matt said, "I even have an opinion that I don't think there's anyone on our team who can move off the ball like him.

"

"That's exaggerated, Matt. We're a Championship team..."

"But it is also true that our strikers are not very high-level, otherwise why can we only relegation in the league this season?"

"Let's not discuss this topic..." Tony Clark was a little embarrassed. "The performance of the team is not determined solely by the performance of the forwards."

The team's performance is not good, and his coaching position is unstable. Fortunately, at the end of the league, Hammond Castle succeeded in avoiding relegation ahead of schedule, otherwise Tony Clark would not be in the mood to chat with his video analyst here.

"Sorry, boss, I didn't mean to open your wound..." Matt Dawn also apologized quickly.

Clark waved his hand, signaling him to stop talking: "Apart from running without the ball, does he have any other advantages?"

"From my point of view, although his shooting skills still have room for improvement, he is already very good among his peers. We all know that most players of his age will be keen on dribbling, breaking through, and relying on instinct to play. Few people can calm down and hone their shooting skills. But I think LaiHu should have specially practiced shooting. From this point of view, I disagree with the shooting value determined for him in "The Godfather of Champions". The shot should be above 13, not just 9..."

"Well, he runs well without the ball, and has superb shooting skills... It sounds like he is indeed a shooter. What else?" Clark asked in a more serious tone.

"No more." Matt spread his hands.

"No more?" Clark was a little surprised, "You can see these two points after reading it for a long time?"

"Because it's a collection, it's not complete, and I can't see any more advantages, but there are a lot of disadvantages, such as poor physical confrontation ability, average ball control, mediocre speed...etc. Oh, I feel that he is a pure If you want him to complete some tactical tasks, it may not be realistic."

"A partial student?"

"A player with outstanding advantages and disadvantages needs suitable tactics to make good use of him. I have also experimented in the game. As long as the midfielder can be equipped with one or two passers who are good at passing the ball and are good at through balls, he The number of goals will explode."

Clark frowned thoughtfully.

Matt laughed when he saw him like this: "Isn't it, boss? Were you seriously considering bringing him in just now? Now he can't get a labor certificate. I rented him out for two months in the game." He couldn't do it all season, but in the end, he got British citizenship with a modifier to get his work permit..."

After being reminded by him, Clark also recovered from his thoughts, and then laughed dumbly: "Occupational disease... Well, anyway, it's just a person who has nothing to do with us. Why do you continue to pay attention to him? , Matt?"

"Because the game knew him, and then found that his performance in reality was almost the same as the game, so I naturally paid attention to him, and wanted to see how he would grow in the future." Matt explained.

"What kind of expectations do you have for him? How far do you want him to grow?"

"I think..." Matt thought about it seriously, "He has already been selected for the Olympic team. With his performance, I think it should not be a big problem to enter the real national team in the future. I hope... I hope One day I can see him in the World Cup. I heard that the Chinese team has never participated in the World Cup. If I can see him in the World Cup, I think it must be a very, very interesting thing.”

Tony Clark laughed when he saw what Matt said: "You have become a fan of the Chinese team, Matt. Just because of a young Chinese player who has never met."

"That's pretty cool to hear you say that. Maybe I should go buy a China team jersey?" Matt laughed too.

Tony Clark imagined Matt standing in front of him wearing the Chinese team jersey, and grinned: "Then I must take a photo with you, hahaha!"

※※※

Although Matt Dawn is far away in the UK, he can still keep abreast of LaiHu's recent situation with his well-developed network and timely updated league data around the world in the "transfer window".

But he can only understand this part of the current situation. He can know that LaiHu scored consecutive goals in the game, that's all.

He is completely unaware of many things outside the football field.

For example, he doesn't know what LaiHu is doing now, and he doesn't know that LaiHu was not selected for the Chinese national team. Before the Asian Cup training camp started, it caused a small disturbance in public opinion. It's not like he takes it for granted.

In fact, Hu Lai's performance in the East Asian Cup is still fresh in the memory of many people. Since then, there have been calls for Hu Lai to enter the national team. Although it is not too high, it cannot be ignored.

The upcoming Asian Cup is an excellent opportunity. Fans want to see whether Hu Lai, who has killed all sides in the East Asian Cup, can help the Chinese team make a breakthrough in the Asian Cup.

But after the league was suspended, Hu Lai's name was not included in the training list released by the Chinese team.

Even the name of Guo Junfu, who did not perform as well as Hu Lai in the East Asian Cup, is included, but Hu Lai's name is not.

This made everyone very surprised and very... Angry.

What does the Football Association do? It is always said that we have no talents in Chinese football, but now that talents have appeared, we turn a blind eye!

Is this how you treat our geniuses!

The desire of Chinese fans for talented players and the expectation of the Chinese football team to achieve good results in major competitions such as the Asian Cup are superimposed, and this is a big deal.

In the end, it was Zhao Kangming who came out to explain and took all the responsibility on himself.

He said that he had communicated with the head coach of the national team, Marcel Wilson. This Asian Cup will not recruit Hu Lai, let Hu Lai take a good rest. After the East Asian Cup, he basically started playing in the league without any rest...

The reason for the explanation was actually what he said to Hu Lai, but it was more tactful. After all, he can't directly say that the Chinese Football Association and the fans are eager for quick success, which is not good for the growth of young players, right?

But even so, Zhao Kangming was still scolded bloody by many fans and some media.

Call him that he is selfish, only cares about the interests of the club, disregards the interests of the country, and does not put the overall situation first.

Scold him for limiting Hu Lai's development for his own selfishness.

There are also conspiracy theorists who believe that the Asian Cup is a bigger stage for Hu Lai. If he plays well here, he may be able to leave Flash Star and play in a higher league-this is obviously not in line with Flash The interests of the star club are not in line with the interests of the head coach Zhao Kangming.

So in order to make Hu Lai obediently work for him, he did not hesitate to use his connections in Chinese football over the years to forcibly suppress Hu Lai...

Some people turned over old accounts, saying that it was Zhao Kangming's red card that ruined the Chinese team's road to the World Cup, and now he is ruining the future of Chinese football.

But no matter how the outside world scolded him, Zhao Kangming didn't say a word after explaining. He didn't accept interviews from reporters, and he didn't answer any questions about Hu Lai and the national team.

Just like what Hu Lai once said to Shi Wuyin, in today's Internet information age, although all kinds of information spread quickly, the popularity also fades quickly... After his response of "dead pigs are not afraid of boiling water", After a week, basically everyone didn't discuss this matter much. Maybe it was boring to scold someone who didn't fight back, or because the matter was a foregone conclusion, and scolding was useless.

Anyway, this wave of public opinion is over.

During the whole process, Hu Lai didn't come out and say a word, and the reporters couldn't even find Hu Lai.

So where did Hu Lai go and what is he doing?

In fact, he didn't go anywhere. He joined the team's training normally after he delayed his return from Shanhai for a day.

At that time, both fans and reporters could see him.

And when public opinion fermented, he moved from the rented house to the dormitory at the team's training base.

With him is roommate Wang Guangwei.

At this time, Zhao Kangming had already given the first team a 20-day holiday, allowing the players of the first team to take a good rest. After 20 days, they would gather for a training camp to prepare for the second half of the season starting on July 5th.

But Hu Lai and Wang Guangwei were asked to stay and move to the dormitory building of the training base to avoid external interference and concentrate on training.

The trainee is Hu Lai, and Wang Guangwei is the training partner.

There is only one training content - catching the ball in the penalty area and getting rid of the defensive shot.

When Zhang Qinghuan heard about this training plan, he also wanted to apply to stay and help Hu Lai. He could be the one who passed the ball to Hu Lai.

But it was rejected by Zhao Kangming.

These three people get together, who knows whether it is training or playing around——Zhao Kangming was quite happy when he heard that Zhang Qinghuan was renting across from Hu Lai and Wang Guangwei, and felt that someone finally helped him watch over the "prodigal son" up. As a result, he regretted it a little now, feeling that Zhang Qinghuan seemed to be being led astray by Hu Lai...

So there were only Hu Lai, Wang Guangwei and assistant coach Chen Mo on the empty first-team training ground.

They were sitting under the shade of a tree next to the training ground, taking a rest in the shade and chatting by the way.

"Those grandchildren on the Internet scolded me so hard that I almost couldn't hold back..." Hu Lai was talking about the turmoil that just ended.

"What if you can't help it?" Chen Mo stared at him.

"Uh... Sign up for a trumpet and run to speak for Director Zhao?" Hu Lai shrank his neck under the gaze of the former youth coach.

As the name suggests, Chen Mo has a dark complexion. Generally speaking, people who play football have a darker complexion because they have been outdoors for a long time, exposed to the wind and the sun, but the complexion on Chen Mo's face is particularly dark, so it gives people the feeling None of them looked good.

People often say that one has a fair face and the other has a black face... Chen Mo doesn't need to pretend, his face is just that dark.

Wang Guangwei couldn't help but sneered when he heard Hu Lai's confession for a second.

Hu Lai glanced at him: "What are you laughing at, Old Wang? Aren't you angry at the unfair treatment that Director Zhao suffered!"

Of course Wang Guangwei couldn't say "no", so he had no choice but to say seriously: "Of course I'm not happy..."

"Then why don't you stand up and speak out for Director Zhao? I can't speak because of my identity, but you can! Otherwise, you can register a Weibo, verify your real name to increase your persuasiveness, and then I will use your Weibo to represent our Director Zhao." voice?"

In front of the assistant coach, Wang Guangwei couldn't say "MMP", so he had to silently swear in his heart that when he arrived on the training ground in a while, he must rub Hu Lai on the ground, so that he could fully understand that taking the ball in the penalty area and getting rid of the defense is a matter. What a difficult thing!

Seeing that Hu Lai's words were getting more and more outrageous, Chen Mo coughed: "Don't worry about Director Zhao, he's used to it."

"Can you get used to this?" Hu Lai was a little surprised.

"Why not?" Chen Mo said, "A red card in the top 40 of the World Cup made him scolded for a year. People recognized him when he went shopping on the street, but they didn't sell him anything..."

Oh yes, there is such a thing.

Holly remembered.

In fact, most of the time, if no one mentions it, it is difficult for Hu Lai to connect the gentle director Zhao with the identity of "the sinner of Chinese football".

Because Director Zhao didn't show any depressed or painful emotions at all, he smiled all day long, worked hard, and his attitude towards players was generally approachable and easy to get along with. Of course, when encountering problems, he will also show his serious side as a head coach.

In general, he is just an ordinary head coach, who looks no different from the tens of thousands of football coaches in this country.

It's just that his personality seems to be milder, but there must be football coaches who are gentler than him.

Because of this, Hu Lai often ignores the things that Director Zhao is carrying.

In fact, in Hu Lai's view, the culprit for the Chinese team's failure to qualify for the World Cup was not at all Director Zhao's red card in the 14th minute.

When the Chinese team needs to decide their own life and death in the final battle every time... this is the problem!

Hu Lai believed that even if Director Zhao did not have the red card and was not sent off, the Chinese team would not be able to enter the World Cup. After all, even if they were lucky enough to make it past the top 40, there is still the top 10... Could it be that the Chinese team will enter the World Cup finals if they enter the top 10?

Director Zhao just unfortunately took the blame for the hard-won Chinese football in those dark years and became a vent for everyone's emotions.

He can justify himself, like this time, because not everyone doesn't understand the above reasons.

But he didn't.

He was scolded for a whole year in silence like this, and until now he was pulled out and flogged the corpse every now and then.

"But it's not fair," Hu Lai said. "It's not the responsibility of Director Zhao alone that the Chinese team can't enter the World Cup. It may not even be his responsibility."

Chen Mo looked at him and smiled: "What's fair or unfair? Everyone in the Chinese football circle is responsible. This blame is the same for everyone. You are not because of your status as a Chinese player. Have you ever been scolded online?"

Hu Lai was silent, he thought of the experience of the Olympic team.

East Asian Cup, ×

Debt Repayment Cup, √

To put it bluntly, someone has to pay back the old debts accumulated by Chinese football over the years, right?

If you don't pay it back, or if I don't pay it back, the football in this country will never get better.

Seeing that Hu Lai stopped talking, Chen Mo patted his butt and stood up: "Okay, enough rest, continue to practice!"

Wang Guangwei put down the water bottle and stood up.

Behind them, Hu Lai was the last to get up.

Forget it, I'll pay the debt...

Alas, who told me to hang up?

With great power comes great responsibility.

Hu Lai shook his head, inserted his hands into his shorts to adjust the tightness, followed behind the two, swaying and stepped onto the training ground.

A thousand miles begins with a single step.

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