Golden Greenery

The top 10 Asian World Cup qualifiers have been 'expanded' to become the top 12, and the 10-round competition will be extended to a full year, from September this year to September next year.

After being lucky enough to qualify in the top 40, the Chinese team met South Korea, Iran, Uzbekistan, Qatar and Syria in Group A. There were no surprises and no fuel-saving lights.

This is also Zhuoyang's first game for the national team after his comeback, but whether he can play is still a big unknown.

On the one hand, the lack of ball feel can only dig holes for teammates on the court. Unreasonable and inadequate technical movements can easily cause injuries in confrontations, which is the most fundamental reason for caution.

After a fantastic comeback, the 31-year-old Zhuo Yang made the Chinese team unable to afford to lose him anymore. There will always be competitions, but there is only one Zhuo Yang.

However, after returning to the national team again after two years, the Chinese team finally had 23 players. Last summer, when the national team saw no hope of Zhuoyang's revival, he resolutely announced that he would only sign up for Zhuoyang + 22 players in any game in the future until the day Zhuoyang officially withdraws.

So Zhuo Yang has actually not left the national team in the past two years. He has always been on the injury list of the Chinese national team.

Today, the captain returns.

The first away game of the top 12 is against South Korea. After flying directly to Seoul from Europe, Zhuoyang had a detailed discussion with head coach Siriaco Sforza and finally made the decision to stay on the bench.

Don't go up if you can, and don't cheat your teammates. There was good luck in the five minutes of the Manchester Derby, but you can't always rely on luck to solve problems.

For example, Zheng Zhi has very bad luck.

After returning to the national team on 3rd, he stayed away for half a year due to injury and missed the last two key games of the top 40 competition.

The 31-year-old Zhuo Yang is the only two 30+ players in the 3 national teams, and the rest are under 30 years old. This phenomenon is not due to the rapid development of young players, but the astonishing speed at which veterans wither.

Whether it's because of yellow people's physique or some other obscure reason, it's rare for Chinese players over 30 years old to still be able to make a splash. Therefore, Zhuoyang's comeback has always been considered to be mainly due to commercial factors, and Manchester City also had such a calculation at the beginning.

Zheng Zhi is a weirdo among Chinese players, and he also reflects too much helplessness.

At the Seoul World Cup stadium in Seoul, it was also Zheng Zhi's first game for the national team this year. There were two captains, one and one, and Zhuo Yang was on the bench. Zheng Zhi wore the armband and shouldered the heavy burden.

But his luck is really bad.

Because Zhang Chendong injured his ankle in La Liga, the Chinese team started with only three overseas players today, while South Korea excluded the Chinese Super League and J-League, and as many as seven players in the starting lineup played in Europe.

The most famous and popular one is obviously the winger Son Heung-min who plays for Tottenham Hotspur in the Premier League. Compared with him, the center Ji Dongyuan who plays for Augsburg in the Bundesliga is much shorter in stature.

The 25-year-old Ji Dongyuan had already surpassed Sunderland in his first league, but he didn't do very well afterwards and never played the main role anywhere. In the 2014-14 season, he even went to Dortmund and was trained by Uncle Zha for a year.

Now in Augsburg, Ji Dongyuan is not as good as national team teammate Gu Zizhe and Japanese Usami Takashi. The two of them are the main players and the rotation, and he is still a dead substitute.

Everyone's eyes were fixed on Zhuo Yang on the bench and Son Heung-min on the court, but at the Seoul World Cup Stadium, Ji Dongyuan became the most popular person.

The first to suffer was Zhang Linpeng. After the 2014 World Cup, Zhang Tiedan moved to Bundesliga side Hoffenheim and has basically been rotating the main force in the past two years.

In the 17th minute of the game, South Korean midfielder Koo Ja-cheol made a direct pass to the ribs. Full-back Oh Jaesuk overtook Zhang Tiedan from the outside, suppressing him with his body and footsteps.

Forced by helplessness, Tiedan had no choice but to knock down Wu Zaisuo outside the corner of the penalty area. Being wiped out by him will force Zheng Zhi, who is playing as a central defender today, to go to the knife mountain.

But even if Tiedan received a yellow card, Zheng Zhi could not avoid bad luck.

Son Heung-min swung the free kick towards the goal. Ji Dongyuan stood out among the crowd. He flicked his big head and pushed the football directly towards the outside of the goalpost without hesitation at all.

Rescue? Undercover?

The football hit Zheng Zhi on the head, who was caught off guard, and went into the far corner in an instant. Yan Junlin looked at Lao Zheng pitifully.

The Chinese team scored an own goal, and the Koreans took a 1:0 lead at home.

In fact, compared to South Korean head coach Uli Stillik, Sforza's tactical arrangements are better.

Former German internationals Stillik and Rummenigge are contemporaries. The most glorious experience in the player era was playing for Real Madrid for 8 seasons. However, Stillik, who served as a coach after retiring, was far less beautiful than his playing career, and traveling around the world was not very exciting.

After the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, Stillik succeeded Hong Myung-bo as South Korea's new coach.

Sforza knew very well that the national team without Zhuo Yang was inferior in skills, so today he arranged tactics to compress the midfield and tighten the wings. On paper, this is already the best choice, but the flaw still lies in the ribs, and the fact that Zhang Tiedan is the best in the defense.

All tactics must be executed by the players. If people are not as good as people, it will be useless even if the coach can break the sun.

Sforza asked Zhang Tiedan to play right back today just to contain Son Heung-min on the left side of the South Korean team, but Tiedan was obviously struggling. However, in the subsequent games, he blocked Gu Zizhe's breakthrough shots twice, which saved a lot of face.

The only commendable thing about the Chinese team is its tenacity.

In the 28th minute, Zheng Zhi stole the ball in the backcourt, Zhang Xizhe directly launched a long pass counterattack from the sideline, and Wu Lei received the ball in the frontcourt and formed a single shot.

The moment he broke into the penalty area to shoot, the football was shoveled out of the baseline by Hong Zhi.

Wu Lei: "..." He smiled awkwardly.

Two years later, Leizi's shooting ability seems to have made little progress, and he is still suppressed by various foreign players in the Chinese Super League's top scorer list.

In the 40th minute of the first half, the Koreans gave a big gift. After right back Zhang Xiuxian teased Yu Hai in the backcourt, he kicked the ball back to the center, but it went to Huang Bowen's feet.

Xiao Huang unceremoniously pushed it to the alert Wu Lei, and the penalty area was empty to face Korean goalkeeper Zheng Chenglong.

Definitely don't let anyone rush out! Because Wu Lei's shot was at least 5 meters away from the goal post, it was essentially a clearance.

Zhuo Yang: "..."

Wu Lei smiled shyly.

As for the Chinese team's opportunity to take advantage of the frontcourt sideline kick in the second half, Wu Lei grabbed a self-shot shot in the penalty area, and finally flew into the air to hit the goal. It was indeed a real miss. Zhuo Yang applauded him.

However, even if you grabbed this opportunity, but you missed it in the small penalty area, it is still a bit unjustifiable, right?

In an extremely passive situation, the only three opportunities were all wasted by Wu Lei. Whether it hurts the character or not, you can carefully judge.

Wu Lei could only smile bitterly.

Next, it only took the Koreans three minutes to beat Zhuoyang to the point where he stood up from the bench.