Starting from playing as a defensive midfielder for Real Madrid

There is not much spring in London in March, and the daytime temperature is still very low. Fortunately, it did not rain on March 1st, which was a suitable weather for the game.

Before the arrival of daylight saving time, the time difference between England and China was still eight hours.

So the English League Cup final, which started at 4 pm in London, was broadcast live in China at midnight.

This time point for watching the game is barely friendly to Chinese fans.

The various live broadcast platforms with copyrights also started their promotion early.

PPTV even directly created a live broadcast gimmick.

Zhan Jun and Zhang Lu teamed up to broadcast the live broadcast, and General Fan even temporarily acted as a live reporter, preparing to interview Li Ang before and after the game.

This move naturally attracted most of the Chinese fans to choose to watch the live broadcast of the game on PPTV that night.

The FA and Chelsea officials would never refuse such an opportunity to show their faces.

After coordinating the time, Lao Fan first chatted with the FA officials and Chelsea's global business development officer for 20 minutes.

Afterwards, Li Ang, who had finished warming up some time in advance, appeared in the live broadcast camera.

General Fan and Li Ang have seen each other in China in recent years, and they are quite familiar with each other, so after smiling and hugging and greeting each other, the two went straight to the topic of the interview.

"Do you have the confidence to win this crucial battle today? As soon as I arrived in London, I felt the enthusiasm of Chelsea fans."

"Of course I have confidence! I have never lost to Tottenham since I transferred here. They give me the feeling of Atletico Madrid back then, very powerful, but they just can't win against our team~"

Li Ang started a group fight right away, not only against Tottenham, but also against Atletico Madrid. This answer made Old Fan secretly smack his lips.

"Well... it's good to have this confidence. We just got the starting eleven of the two teams today. Tottenham has all the main players. You have never encountered such a situation when you played against each other before.

So I would like to ask here, does the Chelsea coaching staff have any countermeasures?"

Old Fan also asked the question in the hearts of most Chinese fans at this moment.

Chelsea had a good chance against Tottenham before. They tied with Tottenham in the second league game because Chelsea rotated their main players, which meant strategic abandonment.

But now Tottenham's main players have recovered from injuries and have won three consecutive games in the league. They are in good shape and should not be underestimated.

Chinese fans are of course more confident that Chelsea will win, but after all, this Tottenham is very different from the previous one. They are still a little worried that Chelsea's coaching staff is not fully prepared.

Li Ang touched the back of his head at this time and gave a positive answer with a smile.

"Fans don't have to worry about the tactical level. Our coaching staff is well prepared. If the game doesn't go well today, it should be that our players on the field have problems.

Of course, this situation is rare. I think my teammates and I can continue to suppress Tottenham. We are sure and confident!"

Seeing that Li Ang had set a flag again, Lao Fan was afraid that he would say something like "must win" later. After blessing him, he decisively ended the pre-match interview.

However, Li Ang's confidence was fully felt by domestic fans.

This made them curious and wanted to quickly understand what kind of tactical play Mourinho had prepared today, which made Li Ang so sure that he could continue to control Tottenham.

Fortunately, the waiting time was not long. After another ten minutes, the players of both teams followed the referee team and stepped onto the court to start the pre-match formation ceremony.

Chelsea and Tottenham both played with their main players today, so the court was also star-studded for a while.

Even compared with the strong confrontation between Chelsea and Manchester City last season, Chelsea's opponent in today's final was slightly inferior in star configuration.

But it was better than the quality of the League Cup final most of the time.

After all, the past two seasons have been strong dialogues between the top teams in the Premier League, which can attract more fans to watch the game than teams like Villa and Birmingham.

There is no need to question the excitement of the game. After all, it is a London derby, and Tottenham is also eager for the championship trophy. No matter how you look at it, they will go all out to fight Chelsea to the end.

After the pre-match ceremony, the battle was about to begin. Pochettino walked to the sidelines and looked at the court with a serious face.

He really showed all his cards today!

In order to ensure the stability of the midfield defense, he directly sent out the double defensive midfielder combination of Dembele and Dell.

His favorite organizing midfielder Ryan Mason was on the bench today.

This is contrary to Pochettino's own coaching philosophy, but there is no way. The lessons learned from the previous match with Chelsea made him compromise with reality.

If you can't withstand Li Ang's back-up impact, then winning the game is just empty talk.

Pochettino has figured it out. When the cup competition reaches the final decisive battle, you have to be conservative. If you don't do well on the defensive end, you can't win the championship even if you play well on offense.

So today he also has to learn from Mourinho, tighten his own fence first, do a good job of defense, and then attack!

Every time Manchester City is tortured by Chelsea in the final stage of the game, there is no good way to break the deadlock, because they don't have a strong center forward to support tactics.

Tottenham don't have this lineup flaw.

Although Kane is no match for Chelsea's top headers in the defense, he is still very good at getting the ball into Chelsea's hinterland.

If that doesn't work, let Fazio step up to serve as the tactical fulcrum, which can also have miraculous tactical effects.

In short, Tottenham has no shortage of offensive methods and can use any offensive style. The key depends on whether today's midfield defense is strong or not.

Pochettino can be regarded as having a psychological shadow from Li Ang's performance.

It wasn't until the referee blew the whistle to officially start the game that he came back to his senses from the memories of previous games against Chelsea.

The huge Wembley Stadium erupted with excited cheers from the fans of both teams.

At this moment, Li Ang, who had received a return pass from his teammate, also began his routine full-court observation.

The midfield teammates who partnered with him today are Kroos and Matic, and their opponents are Eriksen, Dembele and Dier.

Li Ang simply ignored Eriksen's pressing intensity.

After seeing that Dembele did not actively attack, but chose to stand his ground first, Li Ang began to worry about it.

Several of Tottenham's frontcourt offensive players still worked very hard in pressing.

After all, they are all young people, full of physical fitness, and there are no big stars. Pochettino can command them all.

But there are still some problems with their pressing system.

In other words, when the two defensive midfielders prioritize staying in position instead of assisting them to attack together, their pressing level is almost non-existent.

The offensive players in front finished one round and were easily resolved by Chelsea's midfielder, and then repeated the round again...

This pressing method can only be said to have slightly delayed Chelsea's offensive process, but it actually has no big effect.

Reflected in the game, there is a strong sense of fragmentation.

Li Ang finally saw Pochettino's concerns and his tactical ideas.

He couldn't help but smile secretly in his heart.

"Sure enough, I'm still new to Tottenham. Why do I still have illusions? This tactical arrangement is too..."

Li Ang did not feel underestimated. After all, Pochettino has not been deeply involved in Chelsea's tactical construction. Naturally, he does not understand the power of Chelsea's backcourt ball control and transmission.

Guardiola understood this best, so he took the lead in making changes.

Pochettino has also made tactical changes now, but it is not enough. In other words, he was not beaten badly enough by Chelsea and he still does not understand Chelsea well enough.

Controlling the rhythm in the backcourt and making Tottenham's offensive players feel dizzy, Li Ang launched the first offensive attempt of the game.

His sudden forward movement is like a signal to attack.

Kroos held the ball to the side and quickly knocked it back to the center. Li Ang led the ball and accelerated past Eriksen who wanted to interfere with him, all the way to the center line.

Dembele was the first to come forward, but he did not attack easily. He cleverly kept his distance from Li Ang and compressed Li Ang's forward space.

His defensive method is completely different from that stupid boy Bentaleb that Li Ang met before.

He is responsible for attacking, but not recklessly. There is also Dell behind, for double insurance. It is no wonder that Pochettino expressed confidence in today's final before the game.

The defensive ability of such a double midfielder combination is indeed quite impressive. Looking at the entire Premier League, it is not an exaggeration to say that the defensive strength ranks in the top three.

However, Dembele had a different idea. Li Ang had no idea of ​​attacking their midfield defense.

Chelsea's ability to attack from behind is indeed the best in the Premier League, and even in Europe.

But in addition, Chelsea is also good at playing offensive tactics with both wings flying together.

Li Ang can be the best midfielder in active football, but he can also be one of the top playmakers in Europe.

Perhaps this season Kroos has assumed most of the midfield organizational tasks in the Chelsea team.

So many fans have subconsciously forgotten that Li Ang alone supported the operation of Chelsea's offensive system last season.

So when Li Ang moved forward to the midline, he simply divided the ball to Hazard and De Bruyne, providing them with offensive shells.

Many fans felt that this scene was a little strange.

But in fact, this was the organizational work that Li Ang did most last season.

When Cross also stepped in, assisting Li Ang in controlling the midfield rhythm and participating in the distribution of ball rights, Chelsea's offensive on both wings quickly opened up the situation.

So much so that Danny Rose and Kyle Walker, who subconsciously took the first position at the beginning of the game and wanted to participate in the offense, had to retreat to honest defense at this time.

Without the two full-backs to advance with the ball, Tottenham's offensive efficiency on the two wings will be greatly reduced.

Chelsea can be regarded as using offense instead of defense, using their own strong path to suppress Tottenham's strong path.

At this moment, Dembélé and Dier, who were still stuck in the middle, became the most embarrassing Tottenham players on the field.

If he pulls to the side to help his teammates defend, who will keep an eye on Li Ang in the middle?

But if they don't pull wide, the full-backs on both sides will be unable to withstand mistakes.

Once the defense on this side is torn open, do you really think that Ibrahimovic, who is stuck in the Tottenham penalty area at this moment, is not a threat?

Pochettino also had a headache watching the sudden change in the game situation.

Mourinho, who was not far next door, calmly took a sip of water and then continued to discuss Tottenham's defensive weaknesses with Holland on the field.

To put it bluntly, attack where it must be saved. At this time, as long as Tottenham's tactical layout is disrupted, it will be chaos everywhere!

Chelsea has the ability to forcefully break the situation from the wing or the center.

But Tottenham do not have the ability to fill two holes at the same time.

In terms of defensive system construction, Tottenham lags far behind Chelsea.

With Mourinho's order, Hazard and De Bruyne on the Chelsea wing can return to their own defensive third at the same time.

Moreover, this kind of return to defense is systematic and will not affect the performance of Bertrand and Azpilicueta.

But Tottenham can't do this.

Kyle Walker is very capable, but to be honest, he can't withstand Hazard's repeated one-on-one impact.

At this time, if Pochettino wants to pull in the midfielder to help defend the wing, Li Ang, who is stuck on the center line, will have to move.

This is a sharp knife hanging over the heads of all Tottenham players. It may fall down at any time and give them a severe blow!

Pochettino hesitated, but he finally chose to support Chelsea's wing attack. In his heart, Li Ang was the greatest threat.

It's the lesser of two evils.

At this time, Chelsea attacked fiercely from the wing. Tottenham's defensive players were a little uncomfortable, but they could still withstand it.

But for Li Ang to become active, it's not just as simple as being uncomfortable on defense.

Most of the cup competition efforts of most of the season will probably be ruined in this game!

Pochettino feels that he has done nothing wrong, and he feels that his players can also understand this kind of tactical play.

But in fact, the Tottenham defenders on the field at this moment completely cannot understand their head coach's delay in making tactical adjustments.

The defense is about to be penetrated, why don't you let the midfielder assist you in returning to defense?

I really think Hazard and De Bruyne are vegetarians!

Kyle Walker is completely in trouble right now.

He really tried his best to defend, but facing Hazard at his peak, he really couldn't stand it!

At the 21st minute of the first half, Hazard once again took the ball and advanced along the left sideline.

Facing Kyle Walker's cautious retreat, Hazard dribbled for a while and then suddenly exploded and accelerated to the bottom!

Kyle Walker quickly turned around to chase back, but Hazard stopped and spiked the ball after he lost his defensive position, and cut inside the Tottenham penalty area!

The first reaction of Fazio and Vertonghen at this time was not to intercept Hazard or keep an eye on Ibrahimovic.

Instead, he looked outside the penalty area to see if Li Ang intervened at the same time.

This is also the defensive key point that Pochettino gave many instructions before the game.

But at this moment, the two of them looked at each other and found that Li Ang was still standing at the top of the arc in Tottenham's half.

Seeing that Fazio didn't press forward immediately, Hazard felt happy. After a slight adjustment, he directly hit a shot from the far corner!

The moment Lori saw Hazard taking off his feet, he secretly said something bad!

He pushed hard to make the save, but his slightly awkward wingspan became his fatal flaw at this moment!

The angle of Hazard's shot was very tricky, and the ball speed was not slow. Lori tried his best to stretch his fingertips, but in the end he still failed to touch the football!

When the football spun and plunged into the upper right corner of Tottenham's goal, the entire Wembley Stadium shook and became noisy!

Li Ang stood on the center line and smiled.

He, Cross, and Marco Polo, who came over, gave each other high-fives and hugs, and then the three of them ran to the frontcourt to join in the celebration.

Pochettillo stood on the sidelines, his whole body in a mess.

Mourinho calmly applauded and celebrated, then looked at Bob and shook his head.

In terms of tactical games, Pochettino still needs to learn more...

A sword is most intimidating when it is unsheathed!