It's April now, and the Championship is about to kick off its 41st round this week.
In this round, Leeds United will host Derby County at home.
In their previous eight matches, Leeds United have achieved a record of four wins and four draws, and are currently sitting atop the Championship table with 100 points.
Sunderland, ranked second, also achieved a five-game winning streak after three consecutive draws, and even narrowed the gap with Leeds United to 3 points, reaching 97 points.
With 86 points, Derby County surpassed Wigan Athletic, who were previously ranked third, to move into third place.
With five rounds remaining in the league, if Leeds United can secure three points in this match, they will be guaranteed promotion to the Premier League!
Therefore, in the first two rounds of the competition, Li Shiguang arranged for the starting players to take turns resting, in order to make full preparations for this week's competition.
Besides leading the team in matches, Li Shiguang has also been busy with other things during this period.
This morning, Li Shiguang, who had just arrived at the office, took advantage of the time before the training session started to plan ahead.
First, there's the previously planned player recruitment.
The first response came from Yaya Touré's side.
The day after the staff arrived in Donetsk, they called to say that they had reached a preliminary agreement with Donetsk Metallurgy. Before their departure, Li Shiguang had offered Ture a maximum price of 1.6 million euros, but during the negotiations, they reduced the price to 1.45 million euros. Subsequently, in accordance with Li Shiguang's stipulations, they reached a personal contract with Ture for 3 years, with a penalty of 43 million euros for breach of contract.
The second response came from the scouts they had sent to Argentina. In mid-March, they called to report that after arriving in Argentina, they had observed two matches, one against Falcao and the other against Mascherano.
As Li Shiguang said, they are indeed two extremely talented players, and their current strength has reached the level to play in Europe.
Although it's uncertain whether they can establish themselves in the Premier League, it's believed that under Li Shiguang's guidance, they should quickly adapt to the British football environment.
Li Shiguang then told them over the phone that they could quote a price to Riverbed and try to reach a preliminary agreement with Riverbed at the lowest possible price.
After hanging up the phone, Li Shiguang thought to himself, "It seems that the fine tradition of flattery is not only in the East, but Europeans do it too!"
Yesterday, they sent Li Shiguang a template of the letter of intent, and River Plate has agreed to sell Falcao and Mascherano for 3.5 million euros and 6 million euros respectively.
Regarding personal contracts, following Li Shiguang's old practice, they are all signed for 3 years.
Falcao's release clause is €47.5 million, while Mascherano's is €59 million.
Like Bell, the two young men still can't figure out why their new boss thinks they're worth that much!
The three planned signings were quickly finalized.
Berbatov's side, however, encountered difficulties.
Berbatov has scored 14 goals for Bayer Leverkusen this season.
After receiving a €10 million offer from Leeds United, Thomas Hitzlsperger, who had just taken over as head coach of Bayer Leverkusen after the resignation of Skibbe, immediately expressed his stance to the club's management: Berbatov is the most important part of his team and absolutely cannot be lost!
Seeing Hitzlsperger's firm stance, Leverkusen's management rejected Leeds United's offer.
In their view, Berbatov's form is getting better and better, and more big clubs will definitely pay attention to him in the future, at which point he should be able to fetch a higher price.
Seeing that Leverkusen had directly rejected his offer.
Li Shiguang wasn't worried. Anyway, there was still some time before the summer transfer window opened. At worst, he could wait until he sold his players and then personally make a trip to Leverkusen.
Then there's his youth training program, which Li Shiguang has put a lot of effort into, since the cost of players trained by himself is much lower than that of players purchased.
During the winter transfer window, due to limited funds, he only managed to bring Bale to the youth academy.
Last month, he checked Bell's attribute panel and found that after several months of training, his overall rating had risen from D+ to C+. Moreover, in terms of speed/top speed, Bell, who will turn 16 in July this year, has already reached 82/86.
No wonder he's an S+ talent player; he's so young, yet so terrifying!
He plans to promote Bale to the first team next season, believing that his attributes will improve even faster under his training.
After more than two months of hard work by his scouts, Li Shiguang successfully recruited all the young players on the list he had previously provided.
In addition to Bale, Leeds United's youth academy has also brought in 15-year-old Hazard, 14-year-old Courtois, 13-year-old Lukaku, and 15-year-old De Bruyne from Belgium.
If viewed from the perspective of his pre-rebirth self, this youth academy now essentially forms the core framework of Belgium's golden generation.
As for the remaining future talents in the plan, he intends to acquire them one by one after the club's financial situation improves.
Looking at the fairly satisfactory results, Li Shiguang took a sip of tea, picked up some of his tactical splints, and headed towards the training field.
As soon as he went downstairs, he saw Allen running towards him at top speed.
Seeing him like this, Li Shiguang teased, "Good morning, Allen. Is there a dog chasing you? You're running so fast."
Allen, panting, glared at his boss and, after a short rest, said, "Boss, I just received another offer for Adebayo in my email."
Li Shiguang was already used to news of Adebayo's offer.
Adebayor's performance during this period can be described as phenomenal in the Championship. He scores every time he plays, which has attracted the attention of many clubs, including some big names.
Glancing at Allen, Li Shiguang said irritably, "It's not like we've received offers for him before. Why are you in such a hurry? Didn't I say before that as long as it doesn't trigger his breach of contract penalty, we'll reject it all?"
Allen paused for a moment: "But this time the offer came from Arsenal, and they raised their offer to 20 million euros."
Hearing Allen say this, Li Shiguang was delighted. There was still some time before the summer transfer window, but Arsenal made a move. Judging from the price, Wenger must really want to bring Adebayor to Highbury Stadium.
But then I thought about it again. I know that Arsenal has been short of funds in the last two years because of building a new stadium, but you're such a big club, can't you even afford 9 million euros?
Adebayor's release clause is €29 million, and Arsenal's offer of €20 million is still far from Li Shiguang's target price.
Thinking of this, Li Shiguang's lips curled into a wicked smile once again.
You want to pull me into a fight, huh?
Then I won't drag you until you're numb!
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