Starting from playing as a defensive midfielder for Real Madrid

“I said it, Tony, that guy will amaze you! I watched the last few games at Leicester City and his performance as a substitute was crazy.

No matter who the coach is, it would be a crime not to put him in the starting lineup under these circumstances..."

When the game entered the intermission, Li Ang, who walked into the tunnel side by side with Cross, did not hide his admiration for Kante.

Cross nodded subconsciously. After all, he also suffered from Kanter's steals in the first half of the game.

Leicester City indeed gave Chelsea players too many "surprises" in today's game.

A capable striker combination, a solid and tough defense, and a midfielder with a balanced offense and defense.

Coupled with Ranieri's new tactical system tailored for this team, all these factors add up to make Leicester City's transformation so magical.

And the Premier League fans who had watched the first half of this game had to take the initiative to overturn the inherent impression of Leicester City in their hearts.

How can this be the strength that a mid-to-lower relegation team should have?

They were able to deal with Chelsea for a full 45 fucking minutes, and they looked really capable of threatening Chelsea's defense!

Don't talk nonsense about not being able to beat Chelsea.

Now even if this Fox City can't beat Chelsea and Manchester City, isn't it still confident that it can deal with other mid-to-lower Premier League teams? !

It seems that the top six of the Premier League are going to undergo another turbulent reshuffle.

Liverpool failed to seize the opportunity to stay in the Champions League last season, rushing up and falling down again.

Southampton and Swansea are one move away from each other, and they almost made it to the European Theater for two consecutive seasons.

Now these three teams can't stand it anymore and are about to return to the mid-table. As a result, before Tottenham and Everton had time to be happy, Leicester City suddenly emerged.

However, this slightly chaotic and unexpected competitive situation is exactly what more neutral Premier League fans are looking forward to.

Orderly rankings and competition are no fun at all.

In recent years, the most popular thing for Premier League fans to watch is probably the Premier League game in the season when Li Ang and Mourinho first joined Chelsea.

Because Chelsea represented the rebellious challenge force at that time, and they indeed successfully overturned the Manchester City duo's inherent dominance of the Premier League that season!

Of course, Chelsea have now replaced Manchester United as the dominant team, and they are no longer the popular challenger team in the minds of neutral Premier League fans.

Leicester City is limited by financial resources and influence, and it seems impossible to replicate Chelsea's extraordinary success.

But this does not prevent them from rising from the grassroots and they are likely to gain the support and preference of more and more neutral fans in the future.

As long as they continue to maintain their current growth potential, they are destined to occupy a place in the Premier League in the next few seasons.

However, after all, Leicester City has not reached the peak of its lineup strength.

They can cause a lot of trouble to Chelsea, but it is still too difficult for them to win the game against Chelsea.

Mourinho did not put too much emphasis on Leicester City's offensive counterattack in the second half in the locker room at this moment.

He just asked his offensive players to try to avoid sticking to the ball too much in the midfield and frontcourt.

This is the greatest respect for Kanter's outstanding performance today.

When Old Mou spoke, no Chelsea main player dared not listen.

After the start of the second half, Chelsea's midfield and frontcourt offensive players, including Li Ang, took more shots.

Hazard no longer dribbles and sticks the ball too much, and like De Bruyne, begins to frequently retreat to the midfield to catch the ball and involve Leicester City's defense.

When Chelsea changed their offensive style, Mourinho also looked at Kanter with great interest. He wanted to see how well the black midfielder could read the game.

Even though Kanter's large-area coverage in the midfield has attracted his interest, he is still very greedy and wants to further see the upper limit of Kanter's performance.

Just like he worked tirelessly to tap Li Ang's offensive and defensive potential on the training field many years ago.

The thrill of digging deep into "treasures" fascinated Mourinho.

As for the fact that Kante still belongs to Leicester City 100%?

This is even more of a trivial matter~

It is already October, and there are only a few days before the opening of the 2016 winter window. As long as he feels it is suitable, neither Kante nor Leicester City can refuse Chelsea's sincere offer.

If that doesn't work, then we can just loan out Van Ginkel and Loftus-Cheek, who still need more game experience in the team, to Leicester City.

Mourinho now just wants to know clearly whether Kanter is worth his money!

The French midfielder's interest in the rival manager was completely unexpected.

He is now thinking of ways to further reduce the defensive pressure on his midfield partners and even his teammates on the defensive line.

His playing style is very "dark and hard", but his mind is very smart and flexible.

Unlike many tough midfielders from Africa, Kanter still likes to use his brain to think and read the game.

Physical fitness and outstanding stealing skills are his strengths, and under these superficial strengths, he also has positions and defensive anticipation talents similar to Li Ang.

So when Chelsea drastically changed their offensive style of play and used more passes to involve Leicester City's defense, Kanter only adapted slightly and then changed his defensive mode.

His running coverage on the court is still very wide, but now he is more combined with his defensive anticipation ability to force Chelsea's offensive "receivers".

Yes, the potential receiver rather than the ball carrier.

Such defensive changes cannot intuitively improve Kanter's defensive efficiency in terms of statistics, but it is very effective in delaying Chelsea's vertical passing attempts.

It's a simple truth. Kante is very good at running. He can use many seemingly blind pressing choices to bet on a certain Chelsea forward pass.

But Chelsea's offensive players did not want to bet on Kante's interception ability, let alone give Leicester City a chance to seize the opportunity to counterattack in transition.

Even after adding more lateral pull passes, Chelsea can still securely obtain some threatening passing opportunities, and can also securely tear apart Leicester City's defense.

But it is obvious that Kante delayed Chelsea's general attack on Leicester City, and he also did the best within his current abilities!

After seeing Kanter quickly change his defensive method, Mourinho sat on the coaching bench and slapped his thigh hard, as if he had made an important decision!

However, more neutral fans in front of the TV did not see what important contribution Kanter made to his team.

They just watched this short black midfielder running tirelessly on the court.

It was inefficient to press Hazard and Suarez, Chelsea's threatening offensive players in the frontcourt, again and again.

In the end, Leicester City still failed to withstand Chelsea's offensive pressure. In the 78th minute of the second half, the defense was torn apart by the pass-and-run connection of Leon and Suarez!

However, this time it was not Li Ang who passed the ball to Suarez to move forward, but Suarez who dropped back to receive the ball and sent Li Ang a beautiful diagonal through ball!

This contrasting style of play made Leicester City's defenders very helpless.

After Li Ang successfully countered offside and got a single chance, he hit a shot from the far corner very simply.

And Schmeichel was beaten so badly that he didn't even touch the football spinning in the air.

Li Ang's shooting skills have improved a lot compared to what was visible to the naked eye last season.

When it comes to seizing opportunities, Li Ang is becoming more and more like a "cold-blooded shooter".

Of course, he still can't shoot at the same level as he did before.

But he basically scored all the goals he should score, and rarely made any mistakes. This is already a quite remarkable performance!

After taking a two-goal lead, Chelsea shifted into a defensive posture that shrunk across the board.

Ranieri replaced two forwards at the last moment to give it a try, but in the face of Mourinho's bus formation, Leicester City could only suffer at home.

The score is not big, but the gap in strength between the two teams is still quite obvious.

However, Leicester City fans are not frustrated. They are very satisfied with the team's remarkable performance in the game against Chelsea.

After the game, Li Ang took the initiative to find Kanter, who played very well today, exchanged jerseys with him, and gave him a very friendly hug of encouragement.

It's this shy guy who still has a little problem with his English pronunciation. He clearly said thank you to Li Ang, but to others around him, it became the internationally accepted "greeting".

Drinkwater's expression changed instantly when he heard Kanter's pronunciation, for fear that Li Ang would misunderstand.

In the end, Li Ang laughed and waved his hands to indicate that he heard clearly, and said to Kanter jokingly:

"In the future, if some reporters with bad intentions interview you, just greet them directly like this, and then issue a statement saying that they heard wrongly. This is an excellent reason~"

Li Ang's easy-going and generous attitude made Kanter and other Leicester City players relax.

However, when Li Ang left with satisfaction and Mourinho took the initiative to praise Kanter for his outstanding performance today, the eyes of a large number of reporters on the sidelines suddenly lit up!

But Mourinho did not show too much enthusiasm for Kante alone. He also embraced Vardy and Mahrez, who also performed well today, and seemed to treat them equally.

As for what news reports reporters will write tomorrow, Mourinho has nothing to do~

While handing Leicester City their first defeat of the season, Chelsea also continued to put pressure on leading Manchester City.

However, Manchester City's performance in the new season is indeed very outstanding and stable. In this round of the league, they defeated Crystal Palace 3-0 and still sit firmly at the top of the Premier League.

It seems that it is impossible for this year's Premier League to decide the winner as soon as possible. It will once again be an endurance competition between two monster teams.

After this round of league play, Chelsea and Manchester City once again faced the challenge of the Champions League group stage.

Compared with Manchester City's home game against Sevilla, Chelsea's game in Moscow is much more "arduous".

In late October, the temperature in Moscow at night has reached subzero, and the coldest time is almost minus ten degrees.

This extremely cold weather coupled with the artificial turf at CSKA Moscow's home court is a great test for Chelsea's players!

Fortunately, this is not the first time Mourinho has brought the team to Moscow to play a game, and the Chelsea coaching staff is therefore very well prepared.

Li Ang also kept reminding his teammates of the things they need to pay attention to before the game.

But "what you see on paper is ultimately shallow." It was only when the game started that night that Chelsea's other main players understood what difficulties and troubles they were going to face.

Playing games on artificial turf filled with hoarfrost is not a problem for CSKA Moscow players, but it greatly limits Chelsea's overall technical advantage.

In order to score as many points as possible at home, the CSKA Moscow players are also very motivated and have put in a lot of effort in fighting and fighting.

Li Ang adapted quickly. He already knew how to compete with his opponent in today's game.

Under the instructions of him and Mourinho, Chelsea's midfield and backfield players decisively gave up their plan of calm organization and directly adopted the old tactics of the Premier League team.

Long pass!

CSKA Moscow's playing style today was already very direct, but they did not expect Chelsea to play more directly than them!

Li Ang almost used himself as a tactical center, just holding a high-altitude ball in the frontcourt, and then looking for Suarez or other teammates to move.

Such simple offensive tactics are very practical and easy to use today.

Chelsea's other offensive players can therefore use their saved energy to attack CSKA Moscow's defense.

In the 28th minute of the first half, Suarez received a pass from De Bruyne and scored successfully!

Just eight minutes later, Li Ang also headed back a set kick opportunity in the frontcourt, assisting Kroos to score at the top of the arc in the penalty area, expanding the lead!

But just when the Chelsea team wanted to pursue the victory and gain more goal difference advantages, Hazard sprained his ankle during a counterattack.

This bad injury situation came to our door and instantly put the entire Chelsea team in a bad mood!

Mourinho cursed the cold weather in Moscow at night and quickly made tactical adjustments to signal the Chelsea team to slow down their offensive.

Salah also played more carefully after coming on as substitute for Hazard.

Chelsea spent almost the entire second half of the game defensively.

CSKA Moscow also scored a goal through a set-piece opportunity in the 83rd minute of the second half.

But with Mourinho's decisive adjustment at the last minute, when two defenders were substituted, CSKA Moscow's set-piece play no longer worked.

Chelsea finally defeated CSKA Moscow 2-1, and also neatly won three consecutive victories in the Champions League death group!

However, with Hazard's unexpected injury, a difficult problem has also been placed in front of the Chelsea coaching staff.

That is, in the following tight schedule, the league and the upcoming EFL Cup quarter-finals, which end should Chelsea pay more attention to?

But Mourinho quickly gave his answer.

In the 10th round of the Premier League against West Ham United on October 24, Mourinho continued to send out most of the starting players.

This basically means that Chelsea will give up the EFL Cup match on October 27th!

Faced with the decision made by their own coaching staff, Chelsea fans expressed their understanding and support.

After all, the team's bench is far less thick than last season, and there are not many veterans on the bench. How far can they go in England's two domestic cup competitions with only young players?

And with Hazard's accidental injury, Chelsea's main lineup now needs more careful protection and rotation.

If you give up, you will gain. Chelsea's situation this season is also very similar to the third year of Real Madrid.

If you want to complete the great feat of winning three consecutive league titles and defending the Champions League, then you must abandon the burden of the game decisively!

At least now it seems that Mourinho has a very clear mind, and he and Li Ang have led Chelsea on an old path.

A road to championship that they have successfully walked!