Chapter 558 Barcelona and Manchester City, the struggle in the Champions League

. On September 17, the fifth round of the Premier League kicked off.

Chelsea, who had just been tied in the previous game, was defeated by Liverpool at home in this round.

After two rounds of failure to win, their ranking suddenly dropped to sixth place and was overtaken by Liverpool.

Liverpool has been in good form recently. Since their unexpected loss to Burnley in the second round, they have been unbeaten in three games, and the opponents they have defeated in the last two games were both strong.

In the last round, they defeated last season's runner-up Leicester City with a clean 4:1 score, and this round they defeated the Blues Chelsea away.

The two victories greatly improved the outside world's evaluation of Liverpool, and even Liverpool fans began to gradually regain their confidence at this time.

Compared to Liverpool, this defeat has lowered the outside world's expectations of the Blues. Many people feel that this is the Chelsea they are familiar with! Chelsea's three consecutive victories before seemed to be just an accident.

Although Conte does seem to be quite capable, the strength Chelsea has shown so far is still a long way from winning the championship, at least not compared with Manchester City at the top of the list.

The reason I feel this way is because Manchester City won again in this round of the league, and it was a big win of 4:0.

If that’s not shocking enough, how about 10-man Manchester City’s 4-0 win over their opponents?

I don’t know if it was a deliberate targeting by the referee, but Manchester City, playing at home, received 5 yellow cards and 1 red card in this game.

The player who was sent off with a red card was winger Mbappe, who came on as a substitute. He fell twice in the penalty area, both times considered by the referee to be diving. He received two yellow cards in just 15 minutes and was sent off.

Mbappe felt wronged and wanted to explain to the referee, but the referee didn't listen at all.

Poor child, he almost cried all the way to the end.

Guardiola gave Mbappe a big hug on the sidelines and did some psychological work on him for half a day, finally calming him down.

Although Manchester City had one player sent off, it did not have any impact on the outcome of the game.

Manchester City scored in many places in this game. Lin Quan, Aguero, De Bruyne and Van Dijk all scored goals. The team was in hot form and showed no signs of fatigue at all. You know, they had just participated in the Champions League three days ago.

Maybe participating in the Champions League is not a debuff?

In this round of the Premier League, all four teams participating in the Champions League won.

Arsenal beat Hull City 4:1 away, Leicester City beat Burnley 3:0 at home, and even Tottenham, who lost in the Champions League, beat Sunderland 1:0 at home.

Manchester City is receiving good news one after another, while Manchester United next door is in a gloomy situation.

Manchester United's morale suffered a big blow after losing to Manchester City at home in the last game.

In this round, they lost to Watford unexpectedly while visiting Cavage Road.

And the loss was quite tragic, with the opponent scoring three goals.

This made Manchester United fans extremely depressed. The confidence that they had accumulated with great difficulty in the first three rounds became shaky at this moment.

Fortunately, Mourinho made timely tactical adjustments and led the team to a 4-1 victory over Leicester City in the sixth round of the league on September 24, finally stopping Manchester United's declining morale.

Manchester United was in excellent form in this game. The team's offensive was like a tide, and all kinds of wonderful cooperation were dazzling. Before the end of the first half, they had already scored 4 goals, which made the fans at Old Trafford very excited.

Ranieri's Leicester City were completely defeated, and the cameras at the scene captured Ranieri's helpless look as he was running around on the sidelines, unable to do anything.

Leicester City's record this season has been up and down, basically winning one game and losing the next, and all the losses were against strong teams.

In other words, Ranieri's team does not have the strength to fight tough battles and can only bully those weak teams ranked in the middle and lower reaches of the league.

It is obviously impossible for such a team to win the championship, and it may not even be able to maintain a top four position.

Many people felt it was a pity that the team that was a dark horse last season was brought back to its original form so quickly.

It seems like they are going to fight with their old enemy, the Red Devils. If Manchester United beat their opponent by three goals, then the Reds must win by four goals!

Liverpool, also playing at home, slaughtered the visiting Hull City with a score of 5:1.

After winning this game, Liverpool's winning streak has reached three games, and their points have surpassed Arsenal to move into third place.

This makes Arsenal feel a huge threat, and the competition for the Champions League seats in the Premier League this year is unprecedentedly fierce.

Apart from Manchester City, the leader at the top of the list, the points gap between 2nd to 7th place is very small, and one may fall behind if not careful.

Although Arsenal has extensive experience in maintaining a top four finish, no one can guarantee success every time.

So, when facing the visiting Blues Chelsea, the Gunners players gave their all, and scored three goals in 20 minutes, which directly stunned Chelsea.

With this victory, Arsenal overtook Liverpool by one goal difference and returned to the top three in the league.

But what made them extremely depressed was that their city rivals Tottenham also won and ranked ahead of them.

Arsenal have 4 wins, 1 draw and 1 loss, with 13 points, while Tottenham have 4 wins, 2 draws and 14 points, one point more than them.

What’s even more infuriating is that Tottenham is one of only two teams in the Premier League this season that remains unbeaten.

Arsenal fans are furious when they think of this: sometimes watching the opponent win is more painful than losing themselves.

Although the competition for 2-7th place is fierce, it does not pose much threat to Manchester City, who are at the top of the list.

In this round of the game, they defeated Swansea 3:1 away. Lin Quan, Aguero and Sane scored three goals and won very easily.

…

After finishing the sixth round of the game, the Manchester City team rested for two days and then flew to the away game to prepare for the second round of the Champions League group stage.

In this round, their opponent is the Scottish Premier League giants Celtic.

The Celtics were not very strong, so everyone in Manchester City was very relaxed and few people took their opponents seriously.

However, they soon paid the price for their underestimation of the enemy.

On the road, Celtic striker Dembele was in great form and helped the team break through Manchester City's goal in the third minute.

Then in another fight, Manchester City's defender made a mistake, resulting in an own goal.

In less than 20 minutes, Manchester City was already two goals behind.

This result can be said to be completely beyond everyone's expectations.

The Manchester City players were a little confused and seemed not to have recovered yet.

And in Barcelona, ​​far away at the Borussia Park Stadium, news of another stadium has already been learned.

"Manchester City are behind!"

Assistant coach Unsue came over and spoke in Enrique's ear.

"Oh? The Celtics scored a goal?"

"It's more than just a goal. Manchester City was stunned. They are now two goals behind!"

Another coach, Moreno, said with joy.

He couldn't help but get excited. Barcelona, ​​who had just played against the Celtics, knew very well how strong the Celtics were.

This team was just slaughtered by them 7:0 half a month ago!

Such a team that is almost a bottom-ranked team can actually force Manchester City into this situation. It really makes people doubt Manchester City's condition.

Enrique raised an eyebrow, suppressed his excitement, and quickly calculated in his mind.

They fell behind by 2 goals in less than 20 minutes. If the Celtics had known better, they would have immediately shrunk their formation and played a defensive counterattack. Even a strong team like Manchester City would have found it difficult to reverse the game.

If the Celtics were in better shape and had seized the opportunity to launch a counterattack and score another goal, the probability of Manchester City losing would be close to 100%.

If Manchester City loses, Barcelona, ​​as the biggest competitor in the group, will be able to gain the upper hand in the competition for the first place in the group.

Even if Manchester City is lucky and equalizes the score, Barcelona can still lead Manchester City by 2 points as long as they can beat Monchengladbach! As for whether they can beat Monchengladbach, is there any need to say?

Borussia Mönchengladbach is just an ordinary team in the Bundesliga. They have some experience playing against Bayern. They are no match for Barcelona at all.

Thinking of this, Enrique couldn't help but curl up the corners of his mouth.

For him, there is nothing better than being able to beat Manchester City coached by Guardiola.

However, just as Enrique was secretly feeling proud of himself, a thunderous cheer erupted over the stadium.

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"What's going on?"

Enrique was startled and looked towards the field quickly.

The players of Borussia Mönchengladbach were celebrating wildly on the field, while the players of Barcelona were stunned, looking at their own goal in frustration.

Inside Barcelona's goal, there lies a football that is bouncing playfully.

Barcelona's goal was also breached.

…

At Celtic Park, after falling behind 2:0, Guardiola was very angry. He took off his coat, rolled up his sleeves and began to direct the team to launch a massive attack.

The reason why we lost the ball so quickly and in succession in this game is closely related to coach Guardiola.

Because he felt that the opponent was relatively weak and it was only the group stage, Guardiola boldly tried his new tactics in the game.

In this game, he arranged a strange 4141 formation, with only one defensive midfielder in the midfield, and it was not the main defensive midfielder Kante, but Fernandinho.

It can be said that Fernandinho tried his best, but it was a bit too much to ask him to do the work of two people.

The biggest fear of the single defensive midfielder formation is that the opponent will attack the empty spaces on both sides of the ribs, and that is what the Celtics did.

The opposing forward Dembele is only 20 years old. He is not only tall and strong, energetic, but also fast.

Once he successfully gets the ball in the flank, he will immediately become a threat.

Guardiola was very persistent and he refused to change the formation.

In fact, Gundogan is on the field. If he retreats a little, the formation can be changed back to 4231, and the threat to the flank can be eliminated immediately.

But when Gua Tu got stubborn, he didn't care about anything anymore.

I'm going to kill you with this weird formation, just tell me what to do! There are a lot of substitutes in Manchester City's starting lineup for this game, and the main players are still sitting on the bench watching the show! If it really doesn't work, let them play in the second half, I don't believe I can't beat you!

At Guardiola's request, Manchester City attacked quickly.

Son Heung-min and Sane on both sides took turns attacking the opponent's flanks.

David Silva and Gundogan, who were in the midfield, either launched into the attack or delivered wonderful passes.

For a time, Manchester City's offensive was like a tide, making it difficult for the opponent to breathe.

In the 23rd minute, Son Heung-min received a wonderful pass from David Silva and helped the team score a goal.

In the 28th minute, Sane cut inside and shot, changing the score to 2:2. Manchester City equalized the score in less than 10 minutes.

It turns out that the strength gap between the two teams is indeed a bit big.

When Manchester City got serious, it was difficult for Celtic to resist their attack.

After realizing the huge gap in strength between the two sides, the Celtics retreated across the board, guarding their own goal like an iron barrel and not giving the opponent any chance at all.

Although they also want to get 3 points, it looks like if they don't defend completely, they won't get even 1 point, let alone 3 points.

Since Lin Quan was not on the field, Manchester City lost a powerful weapon for attacking the city. Facing the opponent's iron bucket formation, they could not find any good solution for a while.

We tried various methods and besieged for nearly 20 minutes, but in the end we got nothing.

After the start of the second half, the opponent still maintained a tight defense.

However, the Celtics were really lucky, or it could be said that their striker Dembele was just unlucky in this game.

After the start of the second half, their defender's long clearance turned into an assist by accident.

Dembele stretched out his long legs, exerted all his strength, and ran for his life. He finally caught up with the football before the defender. Without even looking at the goal, he kicked in the general direction based on his intuition, and the ball went in again!

This guy completed a hat trick against Manchester City and also created an own goal.

After this game, this guy will probably become famous.

Guardiola and Manchester City players were stunned and looked at each other.

Is this possible? We used all our skills and techniques to attack, but we still couldn't score a goal.

You scored another goal just by running around like that?

Where can I go to seek justice?

Guardiola couldn't hold it anymore and started making substitutions without even waiting for the usual time.

De Bruyne comes on, replacing Sane.

Lin Quan came on to replace Son Heung-min.

Kante comes on for Fernandinho.

After the three main players all appeared on the field, anyone with a discerning eye could see that Manchester City would go all out in the next game.

At this time, in another stadium far away in Germany, Barcelona players were celebrating the goal.

In the 65th minute of the second half, Barcelona's attack finally paid off.

Arda, who came on as a substitute, received an assist from Messi and scored the key goal to equalize the score.

Borussia Mönchengladbach is much more difficult to deal with than Barcelona players imagined. It is really not easy to break the opponent's goal!

Next, it was Barcelona’s turn to counterattack.

As long as they can score one more goal in the remaining time, the victory will belong to them! (End of this chapter)