Chapter 432 Buffon’s Visit

"Ranieri is really something. He has quietly led a mid-table team into the top three of the standings!"

"Why else would you call him a tinker?"

"Ranieri's strength is still beyond doubt. The most criticized point about him is that he is not good at using stars, but he is very good at discovering and training newcomers, bringing a team with average records to new heights. Then, because he could not follow up, he was kicked out by the team owner!"

"Haha, it's so true. If you think about it carefully, isn't Ranieri's past experience a cycle like this?"

The news that Leicester City rushed to second place in the Premier League standings attracted attention and heated discussions from all parties after the end of this round of Premier League games.

For Premier League fans, they have long been accustomed to the scene where the top few places in the standings are dominated by giants like the BIG5. Suddenly an unfamiliar team rushed in, making them a little uncomfortable.

What's more, Leicester City is not a traditional Premier League team. They have been in the Championship for a long time, and it was not until last year that they were promoted to the Premier League from the Championship.

It is really surprising that such a sophomore can burst out with such fighting power this season.

However, what they don’t know is that if Lin Quan, the butterfly, hadn’t flapped its wings, the championship of this season would eventually belong to Ranieri and his Foxes!

However, with the comprehensive strengthening of Manchester City's team including Lin Quan and Guardiola, it will be a bit difficult for Leicester City to snatch the league title from them.

After all, Guardiola's team has always had a stable record in the league, with little fluctuation in results.

After the first five rounds of games, BBC Sports invited some football experts to evaluate the performance of each team in the Premier League in the first month and rate their strength.

All these experts listed Manchester City as an S-level team, which is the only S-level team in the entire Premier League.

"Manchester City's offensive firepower is still terrifying this season, and the most frightening thing is their defensive ability!"

Among the guests invited to the event was Manchester United's legendary coach Ferguson.

He evaluated Guardiola's achievements at Manchester City with an appreciative attitude: "After Pep came to Manchester City, he spent a long time reorganizing Manchester City's defense. Now Manchester City's defense is composed of Kompany, Van Dijk, Zabaleta and Rudiger, with Kroos and Kante intercepting and protecting in front.

When necessary, Guardiola will even use a three-defensive midfielder lineup and send Fernandinho into the field to further enhance the interception ability of the midfield and build an impenetrable wall in front of his own penalty area.

Such a defensive combination is almost invincible in the entire Premier League."

Ferguson's statement is not an exaggeration. Since the start of this season, Manchester City has kept a clean sheet in the past five league games and has not conceded a goal so far.

This is the only team in the top five leagues that has not conceded a goal so far.

This season, Manchester City's defensive ability is very strong.

"So, is Manchester City really invincible?"

After hearing what Ferguson said, the faces of the guests and the host turned serious.

A monopoly is not a good thing, just look at the Bundesliga next door to see that.

Although Manchester City has not yet actually dominated the entire Premier League, they have already formed such a trend.

If Manchester City wins the championship again this season, they will achieve the achievement of winning the Premier League three times in a row.

It has been 15 years since Manchester United achieved this feat in 2001.

"Of course not!"

Ferguson smiled and said: "There is no invincible team in the world, and the same is true for Manchester City!"

"As long as we can find Manchester City's weaknesses, work out a tactical way to restrain them, and with some luck, it is not impossible to defeat Manchester City!"

It's like saying nothing, but Ferguson could only say this, after all, he hadn't found any tactics to restrain Manchester City.

Even if it is found, it will take a team that can play this tactical effect and has strong strength to challenge Manchester City.

However, among the major Premier League clubs, no one has been able to achieve this yet.

So Ferguson can only say some correct nonsense.

…

However, just because Premier League teams cannot do it doesn’t mean teams from other leagues can’t.

After the end of this round of league, this season's Champions League group stage officially kicked off.

On September 16, Manchester City will host Serie A champions Juventus at home.

Juventus has won four consecutive Serie A titles. In terms of league dominance, they are even stronger than Manchester City.

However, the Old Lady's performance in European competitions has not improved much. Last season, they finally made it to the quarterfinals, but unfortunately they met the defending champions Manchester City. They were eliminated by Manchester City with a large score in two rounds and were beaten with almost no chance to fight back.

This season, they were unlucky enough to be drawn with Manchester City again, and their first game was as a guest at Manchester City.

This made the Old Lady's fans very pessimistic about the outcome of the game, and few people thought that Juventus could beat Manchester City away.

The best outcome is to get out of this game with a draw!

If they really lose, they can only hope that their team can hold on and not lose too much. In the future they may have to rely on goal difference to qualify for the group stage. If they suffer a tragic defeat right at the start, it will not only affect the players' mentality, but will also make them fall far behind in goal difference.

With such a pessimistic mentality, the entire Old Lady team arrived in Manchester.

Like many other teams visiting Manchester, the Old Lady chose to rent Manchester United's Carrington training base.

Of course, if a team comes to Manchester to challenge Manchester United, it will most likely rent Manchester City’s training base.

As sworn rivals in the same city, the two Manchester City clubs are probably the teams in the world who most want each other to lose, right?

The training bases of Manchester City and Manchester United are very close, but on weekdays the players of Manchester City and Manchester United do not visit each other.

The feud between the two teams is deep, and this kind of visiting behavior is likely to cause bad influence.

So even though national team teammates De Gea, Mata and others were training on another field separated by a wall, Lin Quan, David Silva and others never visited them.

On the other hand, the same goes for De Gea.

But Juventus is different. They don’t have such a deep hatred with Manchester City.

So, after arriving at the Carrington training base, Buffon and Morata came to visit Manchester City's training base.

"Is this your new base? It looks pretty nice!"

After the two arrived at Manchester City’s new base, their eyes suddenly lit up and they couldn’t help but admire it.

Manchester City invested £260 million in 2014 to rebuild a new training base.

Compared with the previous training base, the new base is more luxurious and has more comprehensive supporting facilities, and has completely surpassed the Carrington training base next door.

If Manchester City players used to envy the facilities of the Carrington training base, now, with better equipment, they only have deep sympathy for Manchester United.

It is really unlucky to meet a family of vampire bosses. Manchester United has made a lot of money for the Glazer family over the years, but the Glazer family is reluctant to spend money to renovate the training base. Now Carrington is so shabby and dilapidated that it is no longer worthy of Manchester United's status as a top club.

"It's okay, no different from other training bases!"

"You call this okay? Are you still talking human language?"

Morata looked like he was saying, "I'm not well educated, so don't lie to me."

Buffon on the side also nodded repeatedly, his eyes attracted by the two brand new buildings in Manchester City's training base.

"What is that?"

"A stadium and a comprehensive service center with a gym, a recovery center, and yes, a swimming pool. You can relax there after training!"

"Depend on!"

When Morata heard that there was a swimming pool in Manchester City’s training base, he cursed out loud.

Damn you, oil man, you really enjoy yourself! "I won't believe you unless you take me to the swimming pool to see it with my own eyes!"

"sure!"

It just so happened that Lin Quan also planned to go back and take a bath, so he took the two of them back with him.

After entering the comprehensive service center, the two were stunned by the dazzling array of equipment inside.

These equipments don’t look cheap just from the outside, but the key is that Manchester City has a very complete range of products, almost everything you need.

When passing by Manchester City's recovery center, they saw several players inside undergoing muscle relaxation and rehabilitation treatment.

Read the error-free version on 6Ⅹ9Ⅹ bookⅩ bar! 6Ⅹ9 book bar first publishes a novel.

Some of these people have just finished training and come here to have the rehabilitation therapist relax their muscles to reduce fatigue.

Others were injured in previous competitions and are currently undergoing rehabilitation treatment.

Italy also attaches great importance to the team's medical care. For example, Milan has the famous Milan Laboratory.

But in terms of scale and professionalism, I'm afraid it's still not as good as Manchester City.

The other party not only purchased a large number of expensive medical equipment, but also spent a lot of money to hire a large number of experts in kinesiology and rehabilitation.

No wonder Lin Quan said that Manchester City’s new base cost 260 million pounds. The two were curious about where the money was spent.

It now seems that, apart from the stadium and various buildings within the base, the remaining money is probably spent on supporting facilities and human resources.

From this point of view alone, it can be confirmed that the boss behind Manchester City is not investing in football as a hobby as the outside world believes.

The capital of the hobbyist is not willing to spend so much money on these invisible places! This shows that the ambition of the City Group is not small.

After taking a bath, the two heard cheers coming from the stadium next door.

Buffon looked at the stadium curiously and asked, "Is there a game going on inside? Why are there cheers coming from it?"

"Well, there seems to be a U15 match during the day over at the youth training center!"

"Let's go and take a look?"

As soon as Buffon heard that there was a game to watch, he became interested.

Firstly, he was very interested in the stadium in Manchester City's training base and wanted to go in and take a look.

Secondly, he is also very interested in Manchester City’s current youth training strength and wants to see how far Manchester City’s own youth training camp has progressed.

"Okay!"

Lin Quan would occasionally go to this stadium to watch football, just to relax.

Morata had no interest in watching the game, so he stayed and continued taking a bath.

Lin Quan brought Buffon into the stadium and sat down in a random seat.

Although this stadium is small in scale, it has all the necessary supporting facilities.

One third of the 7,000-plus seats were empty, leaving about 4,500 people seated.

The U15 match did not receive much attention to begin with, and today was a weekday. In the absence of big-name stars to attract the crowd, it was already a rare event to have so many fans come.

Manchester City U15's opponent today is Chelsea U15, a strong team that has won the championship in the league in this age group.

Compared with them, Manchester City's youth team is much more immature and their strength is weaker.

As expected, the score on the field was Chelsea leading 1:0.

However, the situation of the game was not as one-sided as people imagined. Although Manchester City was at a disadvantage, their counterattacks were sharp and frequently put Chelsea in a state of panic.

After watching for a while, the two were attracted by several young players on the court.

"That No. 7 player seems to be much better than his teammates. What's his name?"

Lin Quan took a look at the player Buffon pointed at and said, "Well, his name is Sancho. He is a very talented player in the U15 team and has been noticed by the head coach of the first team!"

The head coach of the first team is Guardiola. The fact that Guardiola pays attention to him proves that this kid has good talent and strength.

"And the other one?"

"That guy is called Foden, he is from the same year as Sancho and he has good talent too!"

Lin Quan did not mention Guardiola, which proves that Foden did not attract Guardiola's attention.

Perhaps his talent and strength were limited by his age and had not been fully demonstrated.

However, from Buffon's perspective, he believes that Foden will be able to play well in the future.

After all, for old players like them who have been playing football for many years, it is not too difficult to judge whether a person has the talent to play football. What's more, with so many young players on the field for comparison, it is even easier to distinguish.

"How does it feel?"

Manchester City lost the game in the end, but both Foden and Sancho scored goals. It was just that their teammates were not strong enough, which held them back.

However, in youth team competitions, the process is important, and not many people care about the results.

After all, what they have to do now is to train hard and improve their strength. It will not be too late to compete with each other when they reach top competitions such as the Premier League and the top five leagues in the future.

"Not bad, the quality of your team's youth training is much higher than I thought!"

Buffon nodded.

Manchester City used to be just a mid-level team that was not well-known. Only after the Abu Dhabi consortium took over did it have the money to vigorously develop youth training.

After all, the time is too short, and the foundation is definitely not as good as other giants.

Like Barcelona's La Masia training camp, which was established by Cruyff in 1989, it took more than ten years to produce stars like Xavi, Messi and Iniesta.

Manchester City has just started, and if they want to see any results, they will probably have to wait until ten years later.

There is no shortcut to these things, you can only take your time and do it slowly.

However, with the increasing popularity and influence of Manchester City, coupled with their emphasis on youth training.

It will also be easier for them to attract more young players to come for trials, and perhaps results will be achieved sooner.

(End of this chapter)