Chapter 188: What did Arsenal do to compete for fourth place?

"Sheffield United, the biggest variable in the title race between Manchester City and Manchester City!"

This is the front page news of Sky Sports the day after the make-up match between Sheffield United and Manchester United.

As soon as this news came out, it immediately aroused the interest of a large number of fans.

"When Sheffield United won Manchester City in the first half of the league, it helped Manchester United narrow the points gap with Manchester City. Yesterday, Sheffield United won Manchester United and helped Manchester City continue to maintain pressure on Manchester United. In the two games, Manchester City doubled

Both heroes and Sheffield United have played an important role in winning the top spot in the Premier League. And don’t forget that in the 34th round of the league, Sheffield United will face Manchester City again. For Manchester United fans, maybe then

They also have to cheer for Sheffield United heartily like the Manchester City fans did yesterday."

The content of the article is actually a bit of a "clickbait", but fans can't help but want to read it. At first glance, wow, Sheffield United's subsequent battle with Manchester City may affect the ownership of the league championship, but after careful consideration, it turns out that

This is not the case.

After all, there are still ten rounds of league games to be played, and Sheffield United will only play one game against Manchester City. Unless Manchester United wins all the remaining ten games, otherwise, even if Manchester City loses the game against Sheffield United, it will not be the same in the other games.

As long as you get enough points in the game, you can still counterattack and win the championship.

A one-point difference is really almost no advantage in the ten rounds of the league.

After all, as long as Manchester United draws a game and Manchester City wins a game, Manchester City will be one point ahead. Therefore, the article is just exaggerating the influence of Sheffield United, but one sentence is 100% correct.

That is in the 34th round of the league, when Sheffield United plays Manchester City, Manchester United fans will definitely cheer for Sheffield United from the bottom of their hearts. This is also a point that makes Sheffield United players feel very happy.

However, for Sheffield United's coaching staff, after winning against Manchester United, they have another headache.

After the game against Manchester United, the main players' physical energy consumption was quite serious. At least the team doctor gave the advice after testing the players the next day, which was to rest for ten days as much as possible, or at least a week.

But let alone a week now, the Sheffield United team only has three days in total to rest and prepare for the game!

Three days later, Sheffield United will face the quarter-finals of the FA Cup, and their opponent is Chelsea.

This is a very fucked up schedule. The Sheffield United team actually really wants to win an FA Cup. After all, they have tasted the wonderful taste of winning the League Cup and then win an FA Cup that is more valued by the fans.

, will definitely make Sheffield United's season more successful.

But the schedule has been set. After Manchester United, they only have three days to prepare. Either bite the bullet and fight for Chelsea again, or give up the FA Cup game and let the players have a good rest and prepare for the next league game.

Considering the health of the players, Speed ​​is still inclined to give up this round of the FA Cup.

But after the Sheffield United players found out, they were eager to fight and expressed their desire to fight Chelsea again.

Li Mo is also very confused about this matter. He has no major physical problems and can continue to play against Chelsea. However, the team doctor has spoken. It is best for the other main players of Sheffield United to rest now, but these young men are one or two.

They all patted their chests and said they were not tired, which made Li Mo very emotional.

No one would object to having too many championships, especially the FA Cup, which still has a special place in the hearts of English players. Teammates all want to fight for it, so, fight for it?

Seeing this, Speed ​​thought about it again and again, and felt that it was unrealistic to force the players to give up the FA Cup. Since the players didn't want to have any regrets, let's give it another try!

So on March 18, Sheffield United's main players continued to start, and they had a bloody battle with the Blues after the coaching change at Stamford Bridge.

But now Chelsea's acting head coach Di Matteo is different from Villas-Boas. After he took office, he activated Drogba, reused these veterans of the Blues, and regained familiarity with Chelsea's tactics in the Champions League knockout round that ended not long ago.

It even overturned Naples!

You know, they fell behind 1-3 in the first round, and almost all fans thought they were definitely out.

They were able to turn things around after the coaching change. This group of Chelsea veterans gave all Chelsea fans a big surprise!

Carrying the lingering power of their Champions League comeback, the Iron-Blooded Blues gave Sheffield United's young players a hard time at home.

Drogba's regained trust also allowed Sheffield United's defense, especially Maguire, to experience the power of Warcraft.

Maguire, who had just turned nineteen, faced his biggest test since entering the professional arena. Facing the full-power Warcraft, the slightly immature Maguire was obviously unable to withstand it. Even Matthew Lowton fought tooth and nail.

Helped him to defend, but Drogba still used his strong physical fitness to help the Blues open the scoring, scoring a very beautiful header in the first half.

In the second half, it was Drogba again who took the ball in front of Maguire and then successfully separated the sides. Juan Mata passed the ball back to the right side of the penalty area. Lampard followed up and volleyed and succeeded again!

The return of Mikel and Essien allowed Chelsea's midfield and backfield defense to finally get back on track. Although Li Mo worked hard to score a goal in the end, he still could not avoid being eliminated by Chelsea.

The Blues fans finally feel proud at home!

They were very depressed by being beaten twice by Sheffield United this season, but now that the familiar Blues are back, many Chelsea fans are feeling emotional.

Everything is back!

Drogba's penalty area deterrence and ball-playing ability are really Chelsea's urgently needed offensive threat. Villas-Boas abandoned Drogba before, which was really lonely. Not only did he get rid of himself, he also lost the ball.

The team has become what it is now.

If they continue to play like this early and gradually become younger, Chelsea may still be in the top four in the league this season!

Fortunately, they have made it to the quarterfinals of the Champions League, and these veterans still have a chance to chase their Champions League dream. Although the chance is very small, Blues fans are willing to continue to believe in the team and believe in the miracle that is almost impossible to happen.

For the Sheffield United players, this defeat was a big blow.

In fact, if we only look at the score, losing 1-2 is not bad.

After all, there is no sure-win game in the football world, and this season Sheffield United played Chelsea twice, and they gave up a lot of players. If the two sides really want to fight, it is the first time to play Chelsea and Sheffield United.

It remains to be seen whether I can get points.

However, being eliminated from the FA Cup is not completely bad for Sheffield United.

At least Sheffield United can fully prepare for the league, and the players are less burdened with the FA Cup.

After the previous make-up match against Manchester United, Sheffield United has accumulated 56 points, firmly sitting in the third position in the league.

Behind them are Tottenham with 52 points and Arsenal with 49 points. Chelsea currently only has 45 points, ranking sixth in the league and basically unable to pose any threat to Sheffield United.

So looking at the league standings alone, Sheffield United is very likely to be in the top four at the end of the season. This is much better than the top six goal they set in the middle of the season!

However, due to the FA Cup match against Chelsea on March 18, the 29th round of the Premier League match between Sheffield United and Newcastle, which also started on March 18, was postponed again.

Speed ​​gave the players two full days off, but the main players still looked very tired after the vacation.

Fighting against Manchester United and Chelsea in a short period of time can be said to have seriously damaged Sheffield United's energy.

Except for Li Mo, who is still in good condition due to cheating, the other main players of Sheffield United seem to need more time to recover.

Speed ​​had no choice but to implement rotation and take four or five main players to challenge Newcastle away from home.

On March 22, the make-up match between Sheffield United and Newcastle United in the 29th round of the league officially started. Li Mo and Berbatov started the game, but among the remaining starting players of Sheffield United, only Matt was the main player.

Ricci, Matic, Matthew Lowton and Given were left, and the rest of the main players were resting at home.

Although Brother Xiaosha opened the scoring in the game with Li Mo's assist, Sheffield United's substitute midfielder and backfield players were unable to support Sheffield United's defensive system, and Newcastle scored three goals in succession in the second half.

Sheffield United also had to swallow the bitter fruit of the 1-3 defeat. Dragging their tired bodies, the Sheffield United players returned to Sheffield. After playing the game against Newcastle, they only rested for two days.

On March 25, United ushered in the 30th round of the Premier League against Wolves.

After resting for a few more days, Sheffield United's main players finally appeared together again, but Speed ​​was worried about whether the players could perform normally.

Sheffield United's main players have not been able to get sufficient rest time due to the forced FA Cup match against Chelsea, and the players have been training and preparing in a tired state.

Sheffield United's bench depth problem, which was reported by the media at the beginning of the season, finally broke out in the sprint at the end of the season.

In the middle of the season, by giving up a lot of rotation in some leagues, Sheffield United's main lineup was still able to hold on, staying in the top four or even the top three in the league, and was able to win the League Cup.

champion.

However, the continuous hard competition against strong teams actually caused these players to consume a lot of physical energy. However, they were lucky at that time and there was no major injury wave.

Now we are just holding on to play one more FA Cup game, and the players' fatigue has not been relieved in time. Finally, there is a problem with the accumulation of outbreaks.

Speed ​​was just thinking that in this game against Wolves, Sheffield United's main players might not perform normally, but he never expected that, except for a few physical monsters, the rest of Sheffield United's main players would all play

Pretty bad.

The heavy pace made Sheffield United's counterattack and defense extremely poor. Facing the bottom-ranked Wolves, Sheffield United was shocked at home and lost 0-1!

At this moment, the media in England, big and small, were like sharks smelling blood, and began to report non-stop on Sheffield United's recent status problems.

It seems that after playing against Manchester United, Sheffield United, a strong team, began to be unlucky. After playing against Chelsea, it became even more sluggish and lost one after another.

Actually, losing to Chelsea and Newcastle is normal. These two teams are in the top eight anyway. Sheffield United's state has been ups and downs, so the losses are justified.

But now even the Wolves are losing, which is completely abnormal!

But at this time in Sheffield United, the players knew what was going on.

They were simply too tired. They didn't get enough rest after playing Chelsea. The eight-year schedule in the underworld was also completely unaccommodating. They had double games in a week. They were not in a strong body, so they couldn't bear it.

When playing against Wolves, many players couldn't get up to speed and couldn't compete in confrontations. Wolves players are now fighting to avoid relegation. Although it is true that they shouldn't lose to Wolves, there is no way. No matter how good the technology is, no matter how healthy the body is.

Strong, without physical fitness everything is in vain!

Li Mo scratched his head, seeing that Arsenal, who had won two consecutive games in the standings, had overtaken Tottenham, which had drawn in the last two games, and ranked fourth. It was now close to Sheffield United's third position.

, couldn’t help but smile bitterly:

"It's really metaphysics. Arsenal don't know how to do it. Arsenal wants to play in the Champions League. It's so scary!"
Chapter completed!