Emily knew from Chu Zhongtian that they advanced to the quarterfinals and had to go to London to compete. She was very envious: "This is great, my dear! But I'm so sorry, I can't go to the scene to cheer you on..."

"I know, you're busy with work, it's okay."

"But I'll make a promise to you: I'll definitely go to your finals!"

Chu Zhongtian laughed when he heard Emily say this: "Wouldn't I also promise you that I will help the team reach the final?"

Emily also smiled: "Then are you making a promise or not?"

"Of course promise! If you can reach the final, why not?"

Even if it is not for Emily, Chu Zhongtian wants to reach the finals. Any player who plays professional football does not desire victory and championships, he is an unqualified professional player.

Every successful person must first be a competitive person.

Chu Zhongtian is very competitive.

Chu Zhongtian, who returned to Metz, washed the trophy he had for the Portugal competition this time and hung it in a special cabinet.

This is a wardrobe, but not an ordinary wardrobe. It doesn’t hang Chu Zhongtian’s own clothes or Emily’s.

This cabinet only hangs the jerseys of each team obtained by Chu Zhongtian after the game because of exchanging jerseys with his opponents. The most precious one is the jerseys that Zidane exchanged with Chu Zhongtian after the warm-up match. If Escher Belmont saw this jersey, he would definitely have a red-eye disease because it was the jersey that Zidane himself wore.

Now there will be another jersey worn by the midfielder in this cabinet - the jersey of the Portuguese Rui Costa.

After the game, Chu Zhongtian did not expect Rui Costa, who had been replaced, to come back again. After comforting his teammates, he walked straight towards him.

He was dressed neatly, holding the shirt he had taken off in his hand.

"Can you exchange jerseys with you?" he said in Portuguese.

Chu Zhongtian doesn't understand Portuguese, but there are many actions on the court that you can understand without language. For example, if you exchange jerseys, just pull your own jersey and then point to the other party's jersey, any player will know what it means.

Chu Zhongtian was quite surprised, but he quickly took off his jersey and handed it to Rui Costa.

After Costa took his jersey, he also gave his jersey to Chu Zhongtian.

Then he didn't say anything, just patted Chu Zhongtian on the shoulder and turned around and left.

Chu Zhongtian looked at his back and was soon pulled into the circle of celebrating victory by his teammates. When he celebrated the victory and came out again, Rui Costa could not be found on the sidelines.

This midfielder who was once as famous as Zidane for a while was a representative of Portugal's golden generation. In terms of short pass ability alone, he may still be above Zidane.

What a pity... Chu Zhongtian hung the jersey into the cabinet and carefully flattened it to ensure there were no wrinkles.

※※※When returning from Lisbon, the whole team of Metz is still so excited that they can't concentrate on the league. On March 17, Metz, who had just ended the League Cup, lost to Saint-Etienne away with a score of 1:3 in the 29th round of the league.

No one takes it seriously. Metz's local media is still hyping up to Metz's entry into the quarterfinals of the League Cup, and is still proud that Metz is the only team in Ligue 1 to continue to stay in the European arena.

Next was the international match day. Chu Zhongtian was recruited by the national team and played two warm-up matches. He played in total for 75 minutes in two games. The Chinese team first lost to Australia 0:2 in Guangzhou, and then defeated Uzbekistan 3:1 in Macau.

Chu Zhongtian had neither responsibility nor contribution to this failure nor a victory. It seemed that he came to the national team just to make the number of appearances... In fact, it was because Zhu Suishen's tactics were not suitable for Chu Zhongtian, so Chu Zhongtian was unable to integrate into the team for a long time.

Some media already know what makes Chu Zhongtian's performance in the club and national team completely different. They have made suggestions to Zhu Suishin more than once that Chu Zhongtian should rebuild the national team with Chu Zhongtian as the core. However, their proposal was refuted by other media. They believe that it has been several years since Zhu Suishin built Zheng Zhi into the core of the national team, and the tactical system of the entire national team has been improved. Now there are three months left before the Asian Cup. Once again establishing the core and changing tactics is no good for the team's performance in the Asian Cup, and they should still seek stability... The media of both sides launched a war of words on their respective positions. Chu Zhongtian did not participate. When he did not accept interviews from the national team, he did not answer any questions about his position when he could not avoid it.

After playing two warm-up matches, Chu Zhongtian returned to Metz. Considering that he flew back and forth tens of thousands of kilometers and was exhausted from the journey, Fernandez did not allow him to appear in the league two days later. Chu Zhongtian didn't even make the roster and watched his team lose to Socho in the stands with a score of 0:1.

Not only Chu Zhongtian did not play in this game, but Ribery, Traore, Rodriguez, and Ibisevic, who also played for the national team, did not play in this game and did not play for a minute. They were all hidden by Fernandez, just for the first leg of the game against Tottenham Hotspur.

It is not a good thing to play at home first, and Tottenham is better than Benfica, so Fernandez is very cautious.

The two-game losing streak, the Metz team has already dropped to fifth place after losing to Sosha, but no one cares about the league at this time.

After playing at home with Socho, Metz would not go anywhere, so she quietly waited for the arrival of Tottenham at home.

It's not quiet in fact.

Every time during training, teammates would gather together to chatter and discuss the League Cup final. The Hampton Park Stadium in Glasgow, Scotland seemed to be close.

Everyone seemed restless and wanted to end the quarterfinals and semi-finals early. It would be better to have a nap tonight. When you open your eyes tomorrow, it will be the League Cup final.

"Why are there 32 teams in the League Cup knockout round? Why don't we start from the quarterfinals like the Champions League? We have to be one round of knockout rounds than the Champions League! But I can't wait! I want to play in the finals now!"

"I think only the finals can stimulate my fighting spirit..."

"Tottenham? Maybe they are strong, but we are stronger! Haha!"

"I just want to play one game this season, that is the League Cup final!"

"Oh oh oh! Final final! Let's go to the district final!"

Even Chu Zhongtian only had the finals in his mind. Because Emily would go to watch the game on the spot when reaching the finals, compared to the non-finals, he did not pay attention to the non-finals.

※※On April 5, they waited for Tottenham.

Mess thought Tottenham would be as vulnerable as Benfica, but when the first half ended, Mess' fans were silent when they looked at the scoreboard - it was 0:2, the visiting team Tottenham Hotspur 2, and the home team Mess 0.

"Oh oh! Berbatov, Berbatov!" the English narrator shouted excitedly.

The French commentator sitting next to him covered his forehead and was unwilling to speak.

On the court, Dimitar_berbatov, wearing a white Tottenham jersey, was running, followed by a large group of Tottenham players. They just scored the goal and are now celebrating.

"The score is 0:1! The home team Mess is behind! Berbatov's volley in front of the goal is quite beautiful! The distance is too close, Mess' goalkeeper Gregori Wynby has no way to make any save!"

Although there were only 3,000 fans following Tottenham, they created a sound that was comparable to 30,000 people at the Saint Mountain Forian Stadium. Metz's fans were completely suppressed by these "guests".

This happened at the 21st minute of the first half. At that time, Metz was not staring at the back line, which led to Berbatov being able to calmly set off and shoot in such a close situation.

Then in the 37th minute, Tottenham scored another goal, this time it was Robbie Keane and Aaron Lennon who made a two-pass and one-on-one cooperation, and then made a move to break into the penalty area, causing the Metz player who was defending him to retreat early, leaving him with enough space. Keane then took a long shot directly, and the football bypassed Winby's ten fingers and flew into the goal.

He led 2:0 in the first half and scored two very important away goals, which was a perfect first half for Tottenham.

But Metz's players were very frustrated when they came off the court.

They didn't expect that the first half would be so unbearable. Before the game, they thought Tottenham were vulnerable opponents, but they didn't expect that they were themselves who were really vulnerable.

The Metz players who returned to the locker room saw the outbreak of Fernandez, and their head coach got angry very rarely.

"Look at your first half! What do you look like? Don't you know this is the quarterfinals of the League Cup?" Fernandez glared at a group of players who dared not speak in the locker room.

They themselves also knew that their performance in the first half was really bad, and they felt that they could not get in. However, Tottenham was well prepared and pressed against Mets' players from the beginning, which was unexpected by Mets - they did not expect Tottenham to be able to take the lead.

"In the first half, counting how many times did you have threatening shots? Five fingers are enough! The kicks are so bad!"

"Is it because of physical fitness? But most of you didn't play in the last league. So what exactly is the reason? Can anyone tell me?"

Although he was asking everyone, his eyes kept looking at Chu Zhongtian.

Proman was still recovering from his injuries, and the injury to his toes was worse than he thought.

Bobby Coni has basically lost his main position now and has only the chance to play in the league rotation. So the captain's armband is still worn on Chu Zhongtian.

As a representative of the player, the captain also has to pay a price while enjoying authority. For example, he has been on behalf of the entire team.

Chu Zhongtian knew that he was the captain, so he had to stand up and speak, whether it was a defense or an apology, he had to stand up.

"I'm sorry, sir." Chu Zhongtian stood up and said, "I'm not doing well."

His performance in the first half of this game was really bad because he did not play a role in connecting the entire team. He made continuous mistakes in the first half. His own mind seemed to be not on the court. He relaxed too much before, but now he thinks tightly and finds some difficulties... "Your performance is not bad, it is very bad!" Fernandez, who has always liked Chu Zhongtian, showed no mercy this time.

Faced with such harsh criticism that the head coach had never experienced before, Chu Zhongtian could only lower his head and didn't know how to deal with it.

Fernandez did not let Chu Zhongtian go, but continued to find out his fault: "Have you estimated the distance you ran in the first half? How many are there? I have statistics here - just four kilometers! You ran four kilometers in 45 minutes, and what is your usual number? At least 5.8 kilometers! If you don't run, how do you connect with the team?"

"In addition, you made eleven mistakes in the first half. You only made 27 passes and 20 successes. You were violated six times and others four times." Fernandez seemed to have seized Chu Zhongtian, a typical example of taking the initiative to stand up and admit his mistakes, and launched a ruthless criticism.

"Is this kind of data normal for you? In which game you have passed less than eighty passes?"

Seeing the head coach criticizing Chu Zhongtian angrily, the other players also fully felt Fernandez's anger. No one dared to speak out, and no one dared to stand up for Chu Zhongtian.

"If you can't run or not actively, and the few passes are not active, what does it mean? It means that you are not involved in the offense enough! What does it mean that you are not an important person in the opponent's defense at all, and it means that you have performed too badly, so the opponent does not need to impose oppressive defense on you! You are our core, offensive and defensive hub. Can the team be good with your performance like this?"

Faced with Fernandez's series of rhetorical questions, Chu Zhongtian was speechless.

Don’t think that Fernandez would let Chu Zhongtian go like this, it’s not over yet.

"I know you have performed very well this season and you have played a decisive role in many games. But don't be proud of it! You are just at Metz, which is just Ligue 1. There are several leagues with higher levels than Ligue 1. If you feel that you can win the game without hard work, then your career will be at most this step! Who do you think you are? You are just an unknown little man in European football! There are many more players in the world that are better than you. If you feel that you can stop and rest now, you will never get up again in your life!"

It was said that it was the team's halftime break, but Fernandez actually scolded Chu Zhongtian for nearly ten minutes in one breath. His expression of criticizing Chu Zhongtian's appearance scared many Met players. In the end, those people thought that the head coach was actually using the opportunity to scold Chu Zhongtian.

For fifteen minutes, when he went out to silence, Fernandez's criticism always echoed in the locker room. He did not speak invisible words like some irritable coaches. On the contrary, he never swears, but his aura of speaking puts a lot of pressure on everyone.

Apart from criticism, he did not make any adjustments to the second half, and after criticism, he brought the team back to the court.

※※※In contrast to Metz, Tottenham's midfield break was very easy because they scored two away goals and led 2:0. Although Benfica also scored away goals in the last round of the game, can one away goal be compared with two?

Tottenham believe that as long as they perform properly, these two away goals will play a huge role after returning to White Hart Lane Stadium.

So they stepped back onto the Furyan Stadium in the Holy Mountain with a very relaxed mood.

They didn't expect that Mess in the second half were completely different from those in the first half... In the first half, Mess' team was stunned by Tottenham's tight defense and fast-paced passes and cuts. They couldn't adapt for a long time. After finally getting used to it, they were completely dismissed by Tottenham's second goal.

The situation in the second half is no different from the first half, except that the roles of both sides were exchanged.

Tottenham also looked at Mess in the first half, believing that Mess will continue to be confused in the second half. After all, he lost two goals at home, which will be a big blow to any team. Mess' core Chu Zhongtian doesn't know why the state of this game is not good. Mess' offense can only be seen as a single fight by a few people, which poses no threat to Tottenham's defense.

Unexpectedly, as soon as the second half came, Chu Zhongtian used a fierce shovel to announce his recovery.

At that time, Lennon, who was extremely fast, shook away Oblaniak's defense by speed and planned to continue to break through the bottom. However, Chu Zhongtian returned from the side and kicked the ball out of the sideline with a fierce but accurate tackle. Lennon was also thrown to the ground because he couldn't hold back. He lay on the ground and raised his hand to signal the referee that Mesz would foul No. 8, but the referee did not punish Chu Zhongtian for a foul, but only signaled to Tottenham to throw the ball out of the bounds.

The lineman was near the scene of the incident and saw it clearly that Chu Zhongtian shoveled the ball cleanly, while Lennon kicked Chu Zhongtian's leg because he couldn't hold back and was thrown out by inertia.

Lennon waved his arm angrily, then he pointed to his eyes and questioned the lineman's judgment.

This protest acted as a yellow card warning from the referee, and the Metz fans in the stands were also booing to express their dissatisfaction to Lennon.

Chu Zhongtian didn't argue with Lennon, so he turned around and ran back, pointing at the same time with his arm wearing the captain's armband, pointing to several dangerous figures in Tottenham, loudly reminding his teammates: "Be careful to defend them! Don't miss it when you are staring at people!"

He felt the anger of the head coach. He wanted to use practical actions to prove to the head coach that he had not fallen. It was just a small accident. In the last forty-five minutes of the game, he had to show all his skills!
Chapter completed!