Chapter 416 Revenge goal after 389 days

Author: The first foodie in darkness

After the Champions League knockout rounds entered the final quarter-finals, the rest time between games was much shorter than before.

Sheffield United eliminated Barcelona, ​​beat Everton to win the Premier League championship, and then played a league match with Chelsea before facing Bayern Munich directly.

In only two weeks, Sheffield United had to collect information on Bayern's recent matches, personnel status information, tactical changes, and prepare for two league games.

It can be said that the Sheffield United coaching staff returned to the work rhythm of staying up late to prepare for games after a short break.

But Sheffield United's players still got enough rest.

In a strong dialogue with Chelsea, Speed ​​planned to use a 4-4-2 formation for the sake of safety, allowing Li Mo and Vardy to start together in the first half.

Bell and Neymar need to sit on the bench.

In the midfield, Dembele and Drinkwater will form today's starting double midfielder, with Matic also waiting for the opportunity to play on the bench.

De Bruyne and Joaquin served as the starting left and right midfielders.

As for the defense and goalkeeper positions, Speed ​​did not rotate the main players and chose to play all the main players.

Chelsea has now been eliminated from the knockout stages of the Champions League and is no longer tied to other cup competitions, so it is fully committed to competing for the top four in the league.

There is currently an eight-point gap between them and fifth-placed Arsenal, and with the last four rounds left in the game, Chelsea has at least a margin of error for two wins. It can be said that it is basically guaranteed to qualify for next season's Champions League.

And Arsenal can’t blame anyone else.

In the last round of the league, they themselves lost 0-3 to Everton, while Chelsea won steadily 1-0 against Swansea.

The five-point gap instantly widened to eight points, and Wenger was unable to recover.

Mancini is finally relieved now.

In his first season with Chelsea, he reached the quarterfinals of the Champions League and the top four in the league. His reconstruction work can be said to be quite successful.

Except for Lukaku's mistake, he has made good use of the newly introduced players in the team and the young players left by the previous coach.

The "Hazard + Bertrand" left wing combination he created is second only to Sheffield United's "Bale + Felipe Luis" left wing corridor in terms of lethality in the Premier League this season.

It is said that Chelsea and Manchester City have recently reached an agreement on the transfer of Dzeko.

The Bosnia and Herzegovina center was suspended at the end of the winter window due to Pellegrini's objections and ultimately failed to transfer to Chelsea.

However, there is a high chance that he will get his wish this summer and be reunited with his mentor.

Chelsea, which introduced Dzeko next season, has basically made up for the shortcomings in the center lineup.

If Lukaku is not sold, the center rotation of Dzeko and Lukaku is enough for Mancini to worry about.

Overall, Chelsea has had a solid rebuilding season, with decent results, young people growing up smoothly, and Mancini's coaching position naturally becoming more secure.

I don’t know if this is the reason, but Mancini didn’t seem to have much interest in winning against Sheffield United this time.

At the pre-match press conference, Mancini even sent his blessings in a personable manner, hoping that Sheffield United can successfully enter this season's Champions League final.

This sounds so nice to say.

The last trace of anger left in this game gradually dissipated in the air before the game.

Speed's original plan of 442 was to let Li Mo and Vardy break up Chelsea's defense in the first half, and then use Bale and Neymar to complete the harvesting task in the second half.

But now that Mancini has taken the lead in showing goodwill, Speed ​​has followed suit and changed the offensive wheel battle into a rhythm control battle.

It would be best for Sheffield United to win this game, but a draw with Chelsea at Stamford Bridge is not unacceptable.

In the next three rounds of the league, Sheffield United will play Cardiff City, Manchester United and Swansea respectively.

In addition to the make-up match against West Bromwich Albion, the opponents Sheffield United faced were not too strong, and there was no big problem in winning three of them.

Manchester United, well, Manchester United, which is still ranked eighth in the league, can only be said to be an ordinary mid-to-upper-tier team in the Premier League.

Maybe they will still have the idea of ​​defeating Sheffield United and causing trouble for Sheffield United.

But here at Sheffield United, they are actually no different from Swansea.

They are no longer regarded as opponents by Sheffield United.

※※※

"The referee blew the whistle at the end of the game! 1-1, Sheffield United and Chelsea drew at Stamford Bridge. The two sides shook hands and reached a draw, which can be regarded as a result acceptable to both parties. Even in this round of Arsenal's game

With the victory, Chelsea still leads Arsenal by six points with only three rounds left in the league, firmly grasping the initiative in the fight for fourth place. Sheffield United, on the other hand, can set its sights on the Champions League semi-finals four days later.

It’s the first leg of the final!”

"Medel said in an interview before that they will complete their revenge against Bayern Munich this year. Sheffield United are currently eager to compete. The Champions League semi-finals on the night of the 23rd will definitely be exciting!"

After the Premier League game, Zhan Jun and Zhang Lu looked forward to the upcoming Champions League semi-final between Sheffield United and Bayern Munich.

Four days later, not only will they broadcast the Champions League match live on time on Sina Sports, but Channel 5 will also send a frontline commentary team to bring an audio-visual feast of top-level matches to Chinese fans.

After this round of Premier League games ended one after another, the whole of England began to build public opinion for Sheffield United.

The first leg of this round of Champions League semi-finals will be played at Bramall Lane Stadium, and the media in the UK have almost all stood behind Sheffield United in the past few days.

Bayern Munich, which has also passed two knockout rounds, is naturally full of confidence.

Sheffield United want to win all the club titles this season, and so do they.

After the restructuring of the Champions League, no team has ever won the title back-to-back.

The strong Real Madrid at the beginning of the century did not do it, Manchester United, which reached three Champions League finals in the 2007-11 season, did not do it, and Barcelona, ​​known as the Cosmos team, also failed to do it in the 2008-12 season.

And this season, Bayern Munich has reached the final four of the Champions League, and is almost only one step away from achieving re-election to the Champions League.

Who can resist the temptation to leave their name in football history?

Guardiola also came to Sheffield United's home court with great ambitions.

After he left Barcelona, ​​he got the opportunity he had dreamed of to continue to implement his coaching philosophy at Bayern.

At the beginning of the season and in the middle of the season, all of Germany was still discussing what Heynckes brought to last year's Bayern Munich team.

But now, as he led the team to secure the league title early in the Bundesliga, he easily defeated Kaiserslautern and entered the German Cup final, and also led the team to the semi-finals of the Champions League.

Germans are already talking more about the bright future of "Melon Bayern" and "Bayern of Pass and Control".

Barcelona was eliminated, but the new Bayern he led still continued to advance in the Champions League stage using pass-and-control tactics.

Guardiola feels he has proven how important a role he played in Barcelona's glory in previous years.

What he once said has been confirmed one by one.

The current Barcelona management is stupid and only knows how to provoke infighting, and some of the Barcelona players are so arrogant that they eventually lose control of the team.

These people are the main culprits of Barcelona's "degeneration" in the past two years, not him.

Now he has to further prove to the world that he can replicate the luxurious results achieved by Barcelona in a new team using his own coaching philosophy.

Sheffield United is very strong, but Guardiola has stronger confidence in Bayern Munich, which he leads.

Moreover, Heynckes led Bayern Munich to successfully overcome Sheffield United last season.

If he does not successfully reach the final this year, the public opinion in European football after the game will drown him and the entire Bayern team.

Guardiola couldn't accept this result.

Therefore, apart from his firm belief that he would lead Bayern to success, he also had no intention of thinking too much.

On the evening of April 23, 2014, the long-awaited Champions League match between Sheffield United and Bayern Munich finally arrived as scheduled.

Both teams were well mobilized before the game.

Bayern will not back down at all from its goal of retaining the Champions League.

Moreover, they are facing Sheffield United, whom they defeated last season. Regardless of whether there are some problems in the process, they will have some psychological advantages.

Sheffield United are even more aggressive here.

This is their battle of revenge!

Li Mo no longer needs to make a long speech in the locker room.

He only said that he would return the painful defeat to Bayern tenfold and a hundredfold. His teammates became angry and roared that Bayern must bleed out at Bramall Lane Stadium!

This is an endless battle, at least here at Sheffield United, they are mentally prepared to fight until the last minute.

But when the game officially started, they were surprised by the familiar yet unfamiliar Bayern.

Ball control, conduction, and the pursuit of controlling the ball are even greater than maintaining the offensive speed!

In the minds of many Sheffield United players, even now Bayern has changed its head coach and changed its style of play.

But the head-to-head confrontation in the middle and the rapid advancement from the wing will never change.

Because that was the key to Bayern's great success last year.

Just like the current Premier League fans can't imagine that Arsenal has changed to the rough traditional English long pass.

Sheffield United abandoned their anti-counterattack style and instead played technical football that tried to avoid fierce confrontations.

This is something that subverts their common sense, and it is also an exaggerated change that makes it difficult for them to adapt quickly.
To be continued...