Chapter 159: I only see the new people laughing, but I don’t see the old people crying Inter fans are obviously very angry about Vieri's departure. As Inter Milan's former top star, Inter Milan spent a huge price to introduce Vieri. But the opponent took the initiative to defect to the city's arch-rival AC Milan, which made Inter Milan fans feel nakedly betrayed. If the team he joined was not AC Milan, Inter fans would not hate him so deeply. But the good news is that the 5000 million euro man has performed mediocrely after joining AC Milan. Not only did his appearances drop drastically, but his goal tally also hit rock bottom. After half a season, the former Inter Milan star only scored one pitiful league goal in AC Milan, not even a fraction of Inter Milan's super substitute Kroos. His poor performance also made him disliked by AC Milan fans, and he was forced to transfer again during the winter break and went to Monaco in Ligue 1 to seek gold. Although Ligue 1 is also known as one of the five major leagues, compared with other leagues, Ligue 1's overall strength and influence in football are far inferior to the other four major leagues.
Apart from anything else, just looking at the number of Champions League titles, Ligue 1 is lagging far behind. So far, Marseille is the only French Ligue 92 team to win the Champions League title in the 93/ season. This is in stark contrast to the other four major leagues which have won the Champions League many times! Moreover, Marseille's championship trophy is still extremely controversial. Not only did they completely eliminate Van Basten in the game, but they were also accused of doping after the game. At that time, Desailly, Edler, Waddle and Cascalino of the Marseille team were all accused of taking performance-enhancing drugs. More than a decade later, the accusation was confirmed, and Edler personally admitted that he and many players on the team had received doping injections. This news caused an uproar in the football world. As the victim at the time, AC Milan immediately appealed to UEFA, hoping to get back Marseille's championship trophy. It’s a pity that UEFA did not agree to AC Milan’s appeal due to various concerns. Otherwise, Ligue 1’s number of Champions League titles would have been zero! Therefore, fans of Serie A, or fans of the other four major leagues, look down on Ligue 1. Vieri was once a top star, but now he has fallen to the point of having to work hard in Ligue 1, a league with a low level of competition. It is really a pity. But the worse his life was, the more relieved the betrayed Inter fans felt. I asked you to betray Inter Milan, and now you are in trouble, right? Now that we have Lin and Cruz, we don’t give a shit about you! …… Lin Feng had no connection with Vieri, so he naturally wouldn't waste his energy paying attention to an irrelevant stranger. After the competition, he treated Liu Xiang to a meal at an Italian restaurant in Milan. As a famous food country in Europe, Italian cuisine is rich in variety and has its own unique flavor. Although it has not reached the level of the big Eastern countries where everyone is a foodie, it still stands out among the crowd in Europe. At least compared to a certain island country with a food desert, Italian food is simply amazing. Lin Feng is very fond of pizza, a type of Italian cuisine. It’s not that the pizza here is so delicious, but mainly because their tomato sauce is very special. I don’t know if it’s because of the variety and origin, but Lin Feng feels that Italian tomatoes taste much better than German tomatoes. Italian tomatoes have the right amount of sweetness and sourness, a refreshing taste with rich layers, and leave you with an endless aftertaste.
It is said that these tomatoes are produced in the Naples area, where there is an active volcano called Vesuvius. This volcano has erupted many times in history, and the famous ancient city of Pompeii was buried because of its eruption. After a volcano erupts, it leaves behind a lot of volcanic ash, which is excellent nutrients for crops. Crops grown in these areas not only have extremely high yields, but also affect the taste. Maybe this is why Italian tomatoes are so delicious? After the meal, Liu Xiang did not stay in Milan for too long and left overnight on a flight that evening. The Lunar New Year is coming soon. If we are any later, we may miss the Spring Festival in China. Moreover, as a big star in the sports world, Liu Xiang will be invited to attend the Spring Festival Gala and may even go on stage! The program team of the Spring Festival Gala actually invited Lin Feng, but this year's Spring Festival conflicted with the league, and Lin Feng really couldn't spare the time to return to China to participate in the Spring Festival Gala, so he refused. He has made a plan. After he achieves better results with the national team, he will go on the Spring Festival Gala openly and vindicate Chinese football in front of the national audience. But before that, you should just keep developing yourself honestly! …… After Inter Milan defeated Lazio, they successfully advanced to the semi-finals of the Italian Cup. Their opponent in the semi-finals is Serie A powerhouse Udinese. It is worth mentioning that among the four teams that entered the semi-finals, only Inter Milan is a top club. AC Milan and Juventus both stopped in the quarterfinals, being eliminated by Palermo and Roma respectively. Although Roma is very strong, it is still far behind top clubs like AC Milan and Juventus. So after seeing the list of teams that advanced to the semi-finals, everyone in Inter Milan felt very excited. Their chances of defending the Italian Cup have increased again! On February 2, the 5rd round of Serie A kicked off. In this round of the game, Inter Milan will face the challenge of Chievo, which is ranked seventh in the league, at home! Chievo is a strong team, and they want to push forward and fight for a place in the European competition next season, so they are challenging Inter Milan in this game with the mentality of getting points. Inter Milan had just played against Lazio not long ago, and their players have not yet recovered to their best form. So after the opening, the visiting team Chievo took the initiative and suppressed Inter Milan. In the first half, Chievo was ahead of Inter in ball possession and number of passes, but their attack did not pose much threat. Inter's defense performed very stably and did not leave too many chances for the opponent. After more than half a season of running-in, Inter Milan's defense has become more and more solid. The performance of new goalkeeper Cesar has won unanimous recognition from teammates and fans, and the performance of new defender Samuel is fully worthy of his price. Thanks to their outstanding performance, Inter Milan's number of goals conceded in the league has dropped significantly this season, and their defensive ability has been greatly improved compared to last season. So far, Inter Milan has achieved a good record of 21 unbeaten games in all fronts. Of course, in addition to the strong defense, the pressing and interception in the midfield and frontcourt also contributed greatly. Under their crazy pressing, it was difficult for the opponents to organize attacks patiently, and the offensive threat was greatly reduced. After blocking the opponent's attack, Inter Milan quickly launched a counterattack. In the 38th minute, Inter Milan's attack reached the front of the opponent's penalty area.
After Lin Feng got the ball in the flank area, he passed the ball back to Cambiasso, who passed it directly to Veron in the frontcourt without stopping. After Veron got the ball, he could have passed it to a teammate in a better position in the penalty area, but he chose to shoot directly. Unfortunately, this long shot did not pose any threat to Chievo's goal, and Inter Milan's attack came to nothing. Lin Feng glanced at Veron and shook his head helplessly. Adriano was clearly in a very good position, he didn't understand why Veron didn't pass the ball! But soon, the situation occurred again, but this time the person who did not pass the ball became left winger Martins. After the latter was intercepted after breaking through the wing and cutting into the penalty area, he could have passed the ball back to his teammates and reorganized the attack. But he chose to force a shot. Under the blocking of the opponent's defender and goalkeeper, this small-angle shot naturally did not pose any threat. This kind of situation happened one after another, and Lin Feng couldn't help but frown. Teammates, especially the frontcourt players responsible for offense, obviously felt a little anxious. Obviously sometimes we can be more patient and cooperate more to find more suitable opportunities to score. But they seemed to have forgotten the need to cooperate and simply chose to fight alone or even act recklessly. It would be fine if they had the same strong individual combat capabilities as Ronaldinho, but they don't have this ability. So the result of working alone is that Inter Milan wasted offensive opportunities again and again. At the end of the first half, the score was still 0:0. Mancini was naturally very dissatisfied with this result. During the half-time break, he repeatedly emphasized in the locker room that the players should be more patient and not be so anxious. "I know everyone is under a lot of pressure. We are six points behind Juventus, so we have no room for error. We have to win and keep winning to have a chance to make a comeback. But I still hope that everyone can forget about things off the field, forget about the league rankings, forget about everything, and just focus on the game itself! Chievo is not a weak team, but it is not a strong team either. As long as we can play to our normal level, we have a great chance of winning this game!" Mancini did not give his players any encouragement or anything, instead, he tried to relieve the pressure on the players. Obviously, he could see that the team was on edge. The record of 11 consecutive victories can greatly boost the morale of the team, but it can also put a psychological shackle on the players, a shackle that makes them want to win but fear losing. The more winning streaks there are, the deeper this shackle will be, because the players will care more and more about the winning streak, and even during the game, they cannot avoid thinking about it. When players have concerns on the field, they simply cannot play to their full potential. Once the team fails to open the situation in time and the score on the field is deadlocked, the players' mentality will become impatient, just like in the first half. The first twenty minutes of the game were fine, but when the team was unable to score a goal, the players on the field began to get anxious. Just like when the team is behind in the score and there is little time left, the audience in the stands and in front of the TV will become very impatient when they see their team passing the ball back and organizing the attack. They would like to skip all the offensive organization and just make a long pass directly to the forwards to let them complete the shot. The best way to solve this problem is to draw or even lose a game and take the initiative to get rid of this burden. As long as the winning streak is ended, the players will naturally stop thinking about this matter and can focus on the game. But now Inter Milan is far behind Juventus in points and they can't afford to lose. So I can only dance with shackles on! Seeing the team members nodding numbly, I didn't know if they heard it or not.
Mancini was worried and found Lin Feng, Cruz, Zanetti and other few players who still remained calm, and asked them to find a way to cooperate with each other. Since the other players are unreliable, we can only trust these reliable players. …… After the half-time break, Inter Milan made the first substitution. Adriano goes off and Cruz comes on. Seeing Inter Milan's super substitute come on the field, the Inter Milan fans who came to the scene were full of expectations, and some even applauded him. Inter Milan won most of the games that Cruz played. He can not only score goals, but also bring good luck to the team. No one would dislike such a lucky player. But the applause made their king feel a little depressed. Adriano was substituted at halftime and was in a very bad mood. This situation is usually a warning from the head coach to the players expressing dissatisfaction. Otherwise, the head coach will generally let the players play for a while in the second half and make substitutions after sixty minutes. But Mancini couldn't wait any longer and replaced him directly during the half-time break. This hurt Ade a lot! Ade's performance this season cannot actually be said to be very bad. So far this season, he has scored 11 goals in the league, which is not far from the 16 goals he scored last season. There are still 15 rounds of the league, and he has a great chance of breaking last year's goal record. But whether the performance is good or not depends on who you compare it with! Inter Milan’s current top scorer is not him, but Lin Feng. So far, Lin Feng has scored 17 goals in the league, which is higher than Adriano's total number of goals last season. If he continues to play like this, it is almost certain that he will score more than 20 goals in the league by the end of this season. If it was only Lin Feng who performed so well, that would be fine! After all, some people are born evil, and ordinary people cannot compare to them. What makes Adriano most nervous is actually the number of goals scored by his substitute Kroos. So far, Cruz has scored 13 goals in the league, two more than Ade. The difference of 2 goals may not seem big, but Cruz is a substitute and his number of starts and time are much less than Adriano. But even so, the opponent still surpassed him in the number of goals with his super high efficiency and strong ability to seize opportunities. Fortunately, the opponent is older, otherwise, he would begin to doubt whether he could still keep his main position in Inter Milan. It seems that he needs to reduce the number of times he goes to nightclubs. He is worried that if he continues like this, he will lose his position as a main player. After Cruz came on the court, Lin Feng consciously increased his cooperation with him. In the 55th minute of the second half, during an attack by Inter Milan, Cruz used his height advantage to grab the ball and passed Cambiasso's long pass to Lin Feng.
Lin Feng made a high-speed run, adjusted a few steps with the ball, and kicked the ball decisively, completing a high-quality long shot from 22 meters away from the goal. (End of this chapter)