The Godfather of Football

"You're still too young after all, Michael!"

On the rostrum of the Arena Stadium, Barcelona president Gaspart and Ajax president Van Praag, sitting next to him, said with a smile with a bit of arrogance unique to wealthy clubs.

What he refers to has a double meaning. On the one hand, it is Ajax head coach Ye Qiu, and the other is Ajax’s average age and lineup. Both of Ajax’s can be said to be very young, and lack of experience.

Over the years, Barcelona has always looked at Ajax with an unconcealable condescension in their eyes.

Not to mention, even if Ajax is one of the founders of G14, and even if Van Praag has a decisive influence in European football, the Eredivisie is always just the Eredivisie, and Ajax is just Ajax. Ajax, the glory was all in the early years. Today, Ajax has become the arsenal of wealthy teams. This is the reality!

Walking out of Ajax and entering Camp Nou seems to have become the same trajectory for many players from Ajax. This seems to give people the impression that Ajax is Barcelona's star-making factory. Became the youth team that helped Barcelona develop players.

This situation makes Barcelona look at Ajax more or less like a leading big brother.

After being the vice-president of Barcelona for more than 20 years, he succeeded and became the chairman. If Gaspart had some ambitions when he was just elected a year ago, then today, a year later, this Ambition has been worn away, replaced by a sense of frustration.

He was elected because he had a campaign team of more than 80 people. Everyone in this team was either responsible for raising funds for him or preparing for his campaign. After he was elected, these 80 people They all entered Barcelona's management, euphemistically called the Chairman's Advisory Group, but in fact they lined their pockets.

Under the control of such a huge bureau, what can Gaspart do? Can Barcelona not be in chaos?

Some people choose to be discouraged when faced with setbacks, but some people do not. They will try their best to find their own remaining, even if it is a pitiful, pitiful sense of pride from others.

Gaspart belongs to the latter, but this does not mean that there is anything about Ajax that makes him proud.

"It's a bit younger, but you have to be careful, because this young Ajax is fearless!" Van Praag replied with a smile. He is now the host and must retain some hospitality etiquette.

"Fearless?" Gaspart laughed after hearing this, "In the face of absolute advantage, any resistance is powerless!"

Van Praag had no way to refute, because from the beginning of the game, Barcelona quickly took advantage and initiative. It seemed that Ajax was completely passive and disadvantaged in terms of strength and situation.

"Times have changed, Michael!" Gaspart said with a smile when he saw Van Praag didn't speak.

If you give him a thick cigar at this time, I believe he will be more like a gangster brother.

But just before his laughter subsided, he saw Ajax, who had been suppressed below the court and wearing red and white jerseys, suddenly rushed towards Barcelona's position, and from Ajax's backcourt , a long diagonal pass accurately sent the ball along a beautiful parabola to the left side of Barcelona's position.

Among the red and blue jerseys of Barcelona, ​​the red and white jerseys of Ajax looked very eye-catching. Therefore, when Robben passed the ball in Kiev, at lightning speed, he passed the ball from Frank De Boer. When the ball passed by and a counter-offside flag was formed in an instant, everyone in the Arenal Stadium couldn't help but rush up from their seats.

It's as fast as lightning! !

I believe this was a shock to everyone who saw Robben sprinting, because the Dutch winger was already ready to go. As soon as Kivu got the ball, he sprinted as fast as possible, which made many fans follow the ball with their eyes. , when he saw Robben, the Dutchman had reached his fastest speed, and the shock was absolutely amazing.

Rushing forward quickly along the left wing, stopping the ball did not slow down Robben's progress at all. He advanced to the left side of Barcelona's penalty area almost in an instant. He stopped and adjusted without waiting for Frank De Boer to approach. Suddenly accelerated towards the baseline and made a cross.

When Robben advanced, Ibrahimovic and Van der Vaart had already moved forward quickly. Both of them were waiting for the opportunity. This time the Swede faced Kristan Val. The central defender who just moved to Barcelona from Monaco this season obviously does not know Ibrahimovic very well.

Robben's cross was obviously aimed at Ibrahimovic, but when the Swede suppressed Kristan Val with his body, he chose to stop the ball with his chest. The ball landed and he volleyed with his left foot vigorously, which made Kristan Val, who had been wary of Ibrahimovic's header, collapse.

Isn't this deliberately teasing people? You can obviously header the ball directly, why do you have to stop the ball? Show off your skills?

Before Cristan Val could react, Ibrahimovic, who had scored the goal, had already raised his arms high and excitedly rushed out of Barcelona's penalty area, talking to his Ajax teammates along the way. In celebration, he rushed to the corner flagpole of Arena Stadium, fell to the ground, and let his teammates fall on top of him.

"In the 36th minute, Ajax broke through Barcelona's goal through a quick counterattack. The shot came from Swedish center forward Zlatan Ibrahimovic, but Robben on the left also performed very well. The two of them contributed this wonderful goal together!"

When everyone in Ajax was celebrating, Ye Qiu kept shaking his head on the sidelines. Sometimes he couldn't understand what Ibrahimovic was thinking. He could obviously use a header, but he didn't want to. He insisted on taking the more troublesome stop and then volley.

If it was a year ago, he would definitely scold the Swede severely, but in the past year, Ibrahimovic has made obvious progress, especially in his playing style, which has obviously changed a lot compared to a year ago. Ye Qiu thinks that he should let it go occasionally, turn a blind eye, as long as he doesn't miss the opportunity.

If you treat a player like Ibrahimovic too seriously, the effect may be counterproductive. You need to take it slowly and change him in a long-term way, rather than letting him change for you in a short time.

"Wow!!!!"

Seeing Ibrahimovic score, Van Praag in the stands excitedly raised his arms and celebrated in front of Gaspart. He even rushed out of his seat and celebrated this late goal with all the Ajax fans in the stands.

Gaspart, who had just put on a winning attitude and believed that Barcelona could easily crush Ajax, had lost his smile at this moment, and could not see the slightest bit of pride. Instead, he was embarrassed and disappointed, and even a little angry.

"I said, we are fearless!" Van Praag said with a smile as he straightened his suit when he walked back to his seat.

At this moment, he felt that Ye Qiu and his team were really awesome and would never let him down.

Gaspart barely squeezed out a smile that was uglier than crying, nodded, and could not speak.

After all, it was too embarrassing!

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After scoring the first goal, the rhythm and cooperation of the entire Ajax team followed suit.

One of the important reasons why Ye Qiu played safe at the beginning of the game was that the team lacked experience, and there would inevitably be some pressure in the first Champions League game, so he was worried that Barcelona would catch him off guard.

But now the situation is different. After half an hour of the game, Ajax's players have obviously found the rhythm of the game and stabilized their mood. In addition, with the lead gained by Ibrahimovic's goal, Ajax has enough chips to compete with Barcelona for the game and rhythm again.

After losing the ball, Barcelona was a little flustered, but they were more experienced. The two teams competed very fiercely. In the end, the score of 1:0 was maintained until the end of the first half. But at the beginning of the second half, Ye Qiu boldly used the opening attack to launch a strong attack on Barcelona.

After the first half and the goal lead, Ajax's players were obviously more morale and more confident, so they were more active in cooperation, especially Ibrahimovic, the hero of the goal.

In the 61st minute of the second half, the Swede scored a goal for Barcelona. After getting the ball at the front, he knocked it back to Sneijder, who passed the ball straight to Barcelona's defense. Van der Vaart quickly penetrated the penalty area through the gap between Coco and Cristanval, dribbled past goalkeeper Bonano, and shot into the empty goal, 2:0!

"2:0! Van der Vaart's goal sentenced Barcelona to death!" the commentator said excitedly.

"If Ajax was passive for most of the first half, then the situation took a turn in the second half. Ajax began to be more proactive and aggressive in looking for opportunities, while Barcelona seemed a little passive, especially in the midfield. The midfield composed of Gabri, Xavi and Cocu was obviously suppressed by Ajax."

"Overmars performed poorly in this game against his old club. He had almost no performance on the left and even lost his trace. Although Ajax right-back Maicon paid more attention to defense and his performance was not outstanding, if compared, Overmars' poor performance made Barcelona more passive!"

"Perhaps, replacing Overmars with Maicon was Ye Qiu's tactical plan!"

Relatively speaking, Barcelona has an obvious shortcoming, that is, the last pass in front of the penalty area. This is a problem that has existed for a long time. Whether it is the previous Guardiola or the current Xavi, they are not the type of last pass. At least Xavi is more like a midfield organizer now, and his position is further back.

Rivaldo has never been a passer, so after seeing Rexach's deployment, Ye Qiu realized that Barcelona not only did not change the team's problems last season, but made them worse, because once they suppressed Barcelona's midfield, their ball advancement would have to rely entirely on Overmars on the left.

In this case, Ye Qiu chose to let Maicon mark Overmars and suppress Barcelona in the midfield.

Although Ajax players had problems in executing tactics at the beginning and almost let Barcelona score a goal, they quickly stabilized the situation and froze Barcelona's attack, and Ajax themselves became more and more confident.

In the second half, this situation became more and more obvious. Kluivert was excellent and Rivaldo was also excellent. But behind these two outstanding scorers, no one could provide them with a steady stream of scoring opportunities. What can they do?

Ajax's technical team once conducted a data analysis on Barcelona's offense. For every 10 times Kluivert received passes at the front of the penalty area, only 1.3 of them were good goals. As you can imagine, Barcelona The real problem is in advancing the ball.

Rexach was obviously aware of this problem in the end and quickly made adjustments, replacing Overmars with Saviola.

This substitution was a bit of a slap in the face, because Saviola should have started earlier.

Ye Qiu also made substitutions. Yaya Toure replaced Van der Vaart, sending Keita to the left and Sneijder to the right. The purpose of Ajax's substitutions was still to suppress Barcelona's midfielder. field, ensuring a 2:0 lead.

Perhaps because he saw that the substitution was not effective, Rexach replaced Christian Wahl with Rosenbach again, hoping to further strengthen the thickness and resistance of the midfield, but he soon replaced him with Herard. Kecu used up three substitutions early.

Ye Qiu's second substitution was to replace Robben with Van der Meyde, allowing Van der Meyde and Ibrahimovic to form a double forward. The team changed to 442, adopting a more solid overall defensive position, freezing and limiting Barcelona’s attack.

The last substitution was to replace Ibrahimovic with Huntelaar. The Dutch center also got a chance on the court, but it was a pity that he was a little slow when outflanking Van der Meyde's cross in front of the goal, resulting in a follow-up. His first Champions League goal came from nowhere.

In the end, the referee blew the whistle for the end of the game. Ajax defeated the visiting Barcelona 2:0 at the Arena Stadium and won the first game of the Champions League. This was also the first victory in Ye Qiu's career. First Champions League victory!

When the whistle sounded at the end of the game, Ye Qiu breathed a sigh of relief and excitedly high-fived the assistants around him. He walked into the court and hugged the players to celebrate, because winning this game would undoubtedly give Ah Jax's Champions League group stage got off to a good start.

Although the process of the game seems a bit conservative, it is a good thing to win, right?

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"We tried very hard to play real football, but unfortunately, luck was on our opponent's side and the team that played better ended up losing the game. I feel very sorry for this, but this is football! "

At the post-match press conference, Rexach was visibly aggrieved by the loss.

Judging from the data, situation, etc., Barcelona does have the advantage. Except for the opening stage of the second half, Ajax was in a passive defensive counterattack state most of the time. According to the standards of La Liga fans, Barcelona did play better. Some are also more proactive.

But Ye Qiu disagreed with Rexach's statement.

"I don't think winning is due to luck, our players played better, so we won the game, it's that simple!"

"I think Barcelona's biggest problem is their lineup. They lack thickness and effective means to turn the situation around when the game is unfavorable. Therefore, although they seem to have the initiative for most of the game, in fact How many threats have been created?”

None of the reporters present could refute Ye Qiu's words, even the media close to Barcelona. On the contrary, many people felt that Ye Qiu's analysis was more to the point than Rexach.

But this is an objective question. The transfer period is over, and Barcelona is destined to play with this lineup.

"The score of 2:0 seems a bit cruel, but I want to remind those who think we are lucky that they should take another look at the process of the game. We missed at least two very, very threatening scoring opportunities. If If we seize these two opportunities, the score will not be 2:0, but 4:0!”

Ye Qiu's words were obviously a counterattack against Rexach. The latter's expression was embarrassed and annoyed, but there was nothing he could do about it, because what Ye Qiu said was the truth. Barcelona seemed to be proactive, but in fact it was very passive.

Soon, the reporters stopped focusing on this game and turned to look at Ye Qiu.

This young head coach led his team to participate in the UEFA Cup and won the championship for the first time, becoming the youngest coach in the history of the UEFA Cup. Now he leads the team to participate in the European Champions Cup, coupled with the focus of UEFA, naturally Attract extra media attention.

"Mr. Ye Qiu, many Ajax fans hope that in your hands the team can return to the peak of glory during the Van Gaal era in the mid-1990s. What do you personally think of this?"

This is a problem that cannot be avoided when coaching Ajax, and Ye Qiu has been mentally prepared for it.

"Of course I hope the team can return to the top, but it's unrealistic to think about it now. Our goal this season is to qualify from the group stage. Everyone knows that Eredivisie teams have not been able to qualify from the group stage for many years. , we hope to make a breakthrough, this is what we should consider now!”

Whether it is PSV or Feyenoord, the results in the Champions League are not very satisfactory, and the competition in the Champions League is very fierce now. It is very difficult to qualify from the first round of the group stage.

Even if they beat Barcelona in the first game, Ye Qiu was not confident enough, because the three opponents in this group were very strong, and Ajax was not confident enough no matter who they met.

The Ajax management also knew the current situation of the team, so the Champions League results this season were just to strive to qualify for the group stage, which would not bring any pressure to Ye Qiu. The real highlight was still in the Eredivisie championship battle.

That was Ye Qiu's main battlefield!