Chapter 32: England and Scotland
John Motterson was puzzled by what he saw, but the commentator in Scotland had already explained: "The Manchester City players look very calm, but this is just a forced calmness..."
He firmly believes that no one of Manchester City's players can really stay calm amid the crazy shouts of Celtic fans... No, maybe Rong is an exception, but so what if that?
Rong is just one person, but football is a collective event. If the other ten people perform poorly, what is the use of Rongguang alone?
Thinking of this, the Scottish commentator was very confident in winning the game.
In addition to cheering to the home team, it is booing to the away team.
This is particularly obvious after the game begins. As long as Manchester City players get the ball, a booing sounds in the stands.
And when Glory takes the ball, the boo is the biggest.
This is not to say that Celtic fans are very upset about Glory.
Glory is actually a shot while lying down.
The booing of Celtic fans is important to Manchester City's entire team, because Manchester City is a team from England.
The Celtics are the Scottish team.
Since ancient times, Scotland and England have had feuds.
The famous Hollywood movie "Brave Heart" that everyone has watched tells the story of the Scots resisting the English invaders.
This movie can help you understand why some of the Scots’ dissatisfaction with the English.
In history, the Scots were actually Celtics, while the English were Britons ruled by the Roman Empire. For the Britons, the Celtics in the north were barbarians. Later, the Britons were conquered by the Anglo-Saxons of the Germanic people, and through constant mixed marriages, a new nation was formed - the Anglo-Saxons.
Later, after years of civil war, the Anglo-Saxons unified and established the later England.
And some of the British who refused to surrender and ruled by the Anglo-Saxons retreated to the back of the British Isle, merged with the Celtics there, and slowly became later Scots.
The Celtics team can be very clear about who they represent and their attitude towards the English by looking at the names only.
Scotland and England also had a close "honeymoon period" in history. Later, a large-scale war broke out, and almost all of Scotland was annexed by England. The story told by "Brave Heart" took place during the Scottish War.
Although Scotland was eventually incorporated into England and became a country for various reasons. However, in Scotland, there were still many people who yearned for independence.
Especially after many overseas colonies in Britain became independent.
The full name of the United Kingdom is Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and this name is very telling.
It is the United Kingdom, not a republic, nor the United States, because this country is composed of many federal states. At its peak, there were many overseas colonies, such as Hong Kong, Australia and New Zealand...
The real homeland of Britain should be England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland are relatively independent. Later, Ireland became independent and only one Northern Ireland was left behind. However, Northern Ireland was also making independence every day, which caused a headache for the British royal family.
Scotland is no exception. It has always wanted to be independent and hopes to be independent through a referendum.
Therefore, many people in Scotland do not regard themselves and the English as people of the same country.
In football, this emotion is even more obvious. Because football is a war in the peace era, the Scots must not be able to defeat the powerful England in military terms, but they can defeat the English in football and gain national self-esteem.
This is also fully reflected at the national team level.
Why are other countries all national teams, but Britain is divided into several representative teams?
There are England, Wales, and Scotland.
Among them, Wales is basically playing soybeans, while England and Scotland were a pair of close rivals in the early days.
For a period of time after the birth of modern football, Scottish football prevailed. Later, after the development of English football, England finally defeated Scotland, which reversed the power balance between the two sides.
Until now, England has become a world-class team, but Scotland has always been very weak.
So when playing against England, the Scottish team always tries its best to beat England in football, which will make them happy for a week.
Similar things also happen in countries like Spain, where Catalonia and the Spanish central governments, the Basque Country and the Spanish central governments have similar contradictions, and they are also reflected in football.
Teams in the Basque Country, such as Athletic Bilbao, and Catalonia's representative teams, such as Barcelona, are always very excited when playing Real Madrid, which represents the Spanish central government, and Real Madrid is not easy to win when visiting these teams' home courts.
Football plays an important role in allowing opposing parties to vent their emotions in peacetime.
Back in the game between Celtics and Manchester City, the opposition between the two sides is not only historical and political reasons, but also religious reasons.
The state religion in England is Protestantism, and as long as you see the name Celtics, you can know that this is a team that supports the Catholicism.
One of the most famous city derbys in the world, the Scottish city derby "old brand" is actually a battle between two teams that support different religions, so it is so hot and fierce that it may even make people famous.
The wanderers in Glasgow supported Protestantism, while the Celtics supported Catholicism, so they were all "pagans" in each other's eyes. In order to gesture pagans, there were cruel crusades in history and various wars. What is a mere city derby?
Now the Celtics are playing Manchester City at home, just like a Catholic war against Protestants.
So the Celtic fans in the stands were crazy.
Whenever Manchester City players get the ball, there is a booing storm.
In the past, Celtic fans used this storm to cause a lot of trouble for many teams who came to the Celtic Park Stadium, and even the Glasgow Wanderers failed in front of them.
Amid their booing, the Celtics took the lead at the eighteen minutes of the game, with Greek striker Samaras setting the first record for the team.
When Samaras scored, you could not hear anything except cheers in the Celtic Park Stadium. Even if two people shouted loudly in the face of each other, they could only see his mouth moving, but they could not hear what he said.
"Look at this is the home court of the Celtics," the Scottish narrator proudly shouted. "0 Celtics led them and started a good start"
If the microphone was not on the directional radio, he would be drowned by cheers.
※※※
With the backwardness and cheers of the opponent's fans like a show of power, Manchester City players should be panicked, right?
No.
When the TV broadcast cuts the close-up of several Manchester City players, there is no look of confusion and pain in their faces at all, and their eyes are looking in different directions.
But in the end they all gathered only one point, and focused on one person.
In fact, it was not just them, other Manchester City players who did not give close-ups also looked at the first time after conceding the ball.
Not only the Manchester City substitute players, Manchester City coaches, Manchester City fans who go with the team, live cameras, and Manchester City fans in front of the TV.
Their eyes were all turned to one person at this moment.
The man stood in front of Manchester City's penalty area, and the Celtics player who celebrated the goal ran past him. He was like a reef in a turbulent water, allowing the water to flow through both sides, but he remained motionless in it.
He shouted to the goal: "Top the ball over"
Goalkeeper Joe Hart quickly turned around and snatched the football from the goal and threw it to Glory.
Rong Guang reached out to take the ball, held it in his arms, stretched out his right hand and lifted the yellow captain's armband on his left arm.
Without panic, pain, or annoyance of holding his head with both hands, he turned around and ran to the middle circle, running on the football.
※※※
The referee whistle sounded, and the game started again amid the cheers of Celtic fans.
Manchester City kicked off with a goal.
When Berbatov kicked the football to Rongguang, Rongguang turned around and made an action to pass the football back, but his feet hooked the football and turned around suddenly.
I wiped the side of Celtic forward Samalas who rushed up
Just after breaking through Samaras, Rongguang made another move to give the football to Berbatov who was obliquely receiving him. The Celtic striker Sean Malonni, who was originally in the front, took advantage of this opportunity to Rongguang drove the football forward and accelerated in a straight line.
Break through Maroni again
The cheers of Celtic fans in the stands turned into booing.
"Rong Lian passed two people and he had no intention of passing the ball... Is he going to break through directly to the opponent's goal?" John Motterson shouted.
"There is no use in front of us. Rong's breakthrough will definitely be stopped. Even if it is a foul, it doesn't matter. Rong's breakthrough seems meaningless, just like he was angry with a goal loss, but he has lost his mind and is just a reckless man," the Scottish commentator asserted.
What he said seemed to be right, because as soon as he finished speaking, Glory passed another Celtic player, he was knocked to the ground by the fourth Celtic player.
foul
The referee's whistle sounded.
The boo turned into cheers again - Celtic fans were applauding the foul.
"Look, what am I saying? This kind of breakthrough is meaningless. Getting a free kick in the frontcourt is the best result, and this free kick is still so far away from the goal, what's the use? Rong wanted to stage a breakthrough of personal heroism, but he was facing the entire Celtic team, and he was doomed to fail.
Chapter completed!