All major clubs received news that Gu Ran had recovered from his injury and helped Southampton reverse the massacre.

After two weeks of silence, the clubs began to get agitated again.

In Chelsea's president's office, Emenalo handed Gu Ran's game data and post-match scores to Sister NO.

Emenalo said anxiously, "Marina, look, Gu Ran played for 27 minutes, made 1 shot and 3 assists, and his post-match rating was 8.2! Oh! I thought Gu Ran wouldn't play in the short term, but I missed Gu Ran's game!"

Sister NO frowned slightly. "Isn't his ankle seriously injured? Didn't I tell you not to waste your time on him anymore?"

Emenalo said excitedly: "Marina, don't you understand yet? We have all been fooled! Gu Ran can play such data, which means his injury is not as serious as Southampton claims! Gu Ran is very likely an iron man! An iron man like Lampard who is extremely unlikely to get injured! We will definitely not suffer any loss if we buy him!"

Sister NO couldn't help but take a deep breath and murmured, "Why did the Southampton club publicize the fact that Gu Ran was seriously injured? Maybe they don't want anyone to steal their treasure?"

Emenalo nodded heavily and said, "Yes! Marina! We should take action! I know you once said that we would wait until Gu Ran won at least 8 points in 20 games before considering it, but we didn't think that Gu Ran would become stronger and stronger, nor did we think that more and more clubs would compete for Gu Ran. Moreover, we didn't think that Gu Ran had an iron physique! Marina, Lampard is old, Chelsea must prepare a successor for him in advance!"

Sister NO pursed her thin lips and then said calmly: "Tomorrow, in the name of Chelsea Football Club, send a transfer agreement to Southampton, offering a price of 1 million pounds."

"Finally! Wait..." Emenalo said in shock: "1 million pounds? Marina, Manchester City's previous offer of 5 million pounds was rejected! We can't poach Gu Ran with 1 million pounds."

Sister NO smiled faintly, "Michael, don't be too hasty when it comes to buying players. 1 million is just a test. If Gu Ran is really not injured, then no matter whether we offer 1 million pounds or 6 million pounds, Southampton will refuse. And if Gu Ran is really seriously injured, Southampton will definitely sell him for the money. Although 1 million pounds will buy an injured player, since you are so optimistic about him, it doesn't matter if we spend 1 million pounds."

Emenalo opened his mouth, “Marina, Gu Ran is really strong.”

Sister NO said without looking up as she sorted out the documents on her desk: "Maybe - do you have anything else to say?"

Emenalo sighed, "No more, Marina."

Being able to get Marina to make an offer to Gu Ran, even if it is only 1 million, is a groundbreaking progress.

1 million pounds may not make much of a splash, but... next week's game, Emenalo can go and watch Gu Ran play football again.

After Emenalo left, Sister NO picked up Gu Ran's game data and murmured, "Is this kid really that good?"

at the same time.

Liverpool's Edwards also sent the video highlights of Gu Ran's comeback game to the owner Linda.

After reading it, Linda's face flushed with excitement and she couldn't calm down for a long time.

After finally releasing her excitement, Linda called Edwards breathlessly:

"Gu Ran is really amazing! Isn't he? His ankle has completely recovered, right?"

Edwards quickly replied: "From the perspective of data analysis, it should be like this, Ms. Linda - we were tricked by those scabs in Southampton."

Linda said with a rather resentful mood: "Gu Ran is really a... little scumbag! I ask him about his well-being every day, and he chats with me about this and that, but he just won't tell me that he has fully recovered! Alas, I didn't seize the opportunity to buy him directly on the day Gu Ran was injured... In the end, I'm still not crazy enough..."

Edwards: ...

Not a good review!

Then Linda continued, "Now, the summer transfer window is coming to an end. Liverpool and other clubs have basically locked in their targets and have almost spent all their money. Even though we know that Gu Ran is a treasure, we can't come up with too much money to poach him."

"I'm afraid that's the case, Ms. Linda." Edwards was also in a dilemma. "The transfer funds we can take out now are at most two million. Judging from the current situation, Southampton must have updated the contract with Gu Ran. Gu Ran's value must have increased a lot. Two million can't buy Gu Ran at all."

Linda suddenly chuckled again. "It doesn't matter. We can't poach him in the summer window, and neither can other clubs. Moreover, during the time when Gu Ran was injured, I communicated with him via text messages every day. The relationship between us is closer than that of any other club. We have a great first-mover advantage!"

During this period, Linda showed concern for Gu Ran in various ways, and even almost sent her own photos to Gu Ran!

Edwards took the opportunity to praise: "Ms. Linda is in control!"

Linda said: "Michael, tomorrow morning, you will make an offer to Southampton. Directly offer 5.5 million pounds."

"What? 5.5 million pounds?" Edwards said in astonishment: "Ms. Linda, this transfer fee can buy a 30-year-old Real Madrid or Barcelona player, not to mention... we really can't come up with that kind of money."

Linda chuckled and said, "Don't worry, at 5.5 million, those old scabs at Southampton won't let Gu Ran go. I even think that Gu Ran's minimum buyout clause should be around 10 million pounds. I offered 5.5 million just to let Gu Ran see our Liverpool's attitude in pursuing him. This attitude can't be too exaggerated, but it can't be lower than his expectations. Of course, we don't have 5.5 million in spare money now, but as long as Southampton is willing to sell him, I will sell Torres at a discount to buy him!"

It's really crazy...

Edwards praised: "Ms. Linda, you are the most courageous boss I have ever met."

Being called "boss" instead of "madam boss" made Linda laugh so hard that she couldn't stop. "Hahaha, well, I have other things to do. I'll leave the quotation to you."

After hanging up the phone, Linda untied her robe and replayed Gu Ran's goal highlights...

On the other hand, Manchester United's chief scout Lawler also called Manchester United CEO "San Dezi" Ed Woodward.

After receiving the call, San Dezi said in a rather unhappy tone, "Mr. Lawler, you should know that this is private time, right?"

Lawler said quickly, "Ed, I'm sorry to bother you at this time, but we really have to take action! Gu Ran played today and his stats were impressive. As soon as he came on the court, he kicked out a crescent-shaped scimitar kick—"

San Dezi interrupted coldly, "I remember that you have already flown to Asia. Why are you still worrying about that kid Gu Ran?"

Lawler said earnestly, "Because he will be the future of Manchester United! Ed, listen to me, buy him now while you can still afford it! Otherwise, by the end of the year, Manchester United will have no advantage in competing! If we buy him now, with Ferguson's influence, and find a world-class star to act as a lobbyist, we can pry him away with a transfer fee of only 5 million pounds! Because the offers from other clubs are probably at this level! But by the end of the year, even if we have a world-class superstar as a lobbyist, I'm afraid we can't even get him for 10 million pounds!"

San Dezi yawned and said, "Alright, alright, I got it. I'll take a look at his data tomorrow and I'll consider making an offer."

Lawler said: "Ed, please take him down for Manchester United..."

"Yeah, yeah." San Dezi hung up the phone directly. Then, while combing his hair that was about to fall out in front of the mirror, he sneered, "Let me spend 5 million pounds to buy a Chinese grassroots player? I must be crazy to do that..."

at the same time.

Manchester City head coach Mancini also discussed with assistant coach David Platt in the Manchester City club's office.

"Gu Ran's injury recovered so quickly?"

"It seems to be like this. If the injection is blocked, it will be difficult for any player to achieve the level of one shot and three passes."

Mancini shrugged. "In that case, let's continue with the offer."

David Platt said: "Roberto, I didn't expect you to think so highly of Gu Ran."

Mancini said: "I am not interested in a young player like Gu Ran. After all, I have Balotelli. In this transfer window, I bought Yaya Toure, Milner and David Silva. There is also Carlos Kolarov from Serbia for the left back position. Even if Gu Ran comes, he has no ability to compete with Kolarov."

David Platt couldn't help but ask: "Then why do you still want to buy at a high price? Do you want to reserve talents for Manchester City?"

Mancini said indifferently, "Of course not. David Bernstein, the former CEO of Manchester City and now the chairman of the English Football Association, specifically asked us to poach Gu Ran. The club still has to give him this face. What's more, our current boss, a Middle Eastern prince, gave us a transfer fee of 150 million pounds this season."

David Platt is the boss with the open mouth.

Mancini hugged his head in distress and pulled his lush hair, "I can't spend it all, I can't spend it all..."

On the other side, in the Arsenal head coach's office.

Coach Wenger was wearing a pair of glasses and concentrating on studying Gu Ran's data.

"... This kid, it turns out he wasn't injured at all! What a close call! I almost canceled the friendly match with Southampton!"

"When he was first injured, he should have copied the bottom!"

"Oh, I forgot, I also saved the money I made from buying at the bottom for my death!"

"I have no money... I really have no money..."

"But next week, I will be able to try this kid's abilities myself."

"As long as we can defeat Southampton by a large margin, I think Gu Ran will be eager to play for Arsenal, right?"

"Maybe I can find a bargain and get it for free..."

Coach Wenger smiled with satisfaction.

——Each club has its own calculations! The next day, each club launched a new round of offers to Gu Ran.

The most active was Liverpool, which directly offered 5.5 million pounds, which Southampton club directly rejected.

This was followed by Chelsea's 1 million offer, which Southampton club decisively rejected.

Manchester City made the biggest offer, directly offering a huge sum of 8 million pounds, but Southampton still resolutely rejected it.

Arsenal proposed to loan Gu Ran for one year and asked Southampton to pay all of Gu Ran's salary, but Southampton refused without even thinking about it.

And Manchester United... just used the media to spread the word that Ferguson was very interested in Gu Ran and wanted to sign the second "King Dong".

The transfer market, which had been quiet for two weeks, became exceptionally lively. Major media outlets focused on English League One rising star Gu Ran, and all kinds of news and rumors about Gu Ran were flying around.

The print advertisements for Umbro sportswear endorsed by Gu Ran also began to be released nationwide, and the effect was extremely explosive.

Of course, most of this fame comes from media gossip, not from the football field itself.

This kind of fame and popularity is difficult to maintain by relying solely on gossip.

If you want to become a true football superstar, you still have to excel on the field and win various football honors and awards.

Supermodel Abbey Clancy resumed sending Gu Ran photos, and the photos are getting hotter and hotter.

The focal character, Gu Ran, completely ignored all of this.

He ignored Abbey Clancy and just looked at her portrait with a critical mind.

On the same day, the Advance Saints also published a news: Southampton Club's new season ticket sales have exceeded the same period in previous years, reaching 13,834.

You know, the seating capacity of St. Mary's Stadium is only 32,689. As a mid-tier English League One team that performed poorly last season, they were able to pre-sell more than half of their season tickets before the start of the new season, which is a very impressive result.

In the newspaper, Southampton's financial director Coster also set a season ticket sales forecast before the start of the new season: 15,000 tickets.

To achieve this goal, the next pre-season friendly match with Arsenal will be very important.

Of course, Southampton's strength is several levels lower than Arsenal's, and they are playing away, so it is almost impossible for them to beat Arsenal. But as long as Southampton can play at their best and not collapse, and as long as Gu Ran can start and play the whole game, the Saints' fans will be very satisfied, and the milestone of 15,000 season ticket sales before the start of the season will most likely be achieved.

Driven by the hot season ticket sales, Southampton's jersey sales and peripheral merchandise also reached a new high.

Southampton Football Club is thriving.

Many sponsors also began to seek negotiations.

Sponsors and advertisers are almost wearing out the threshold of Southampton Football Club's business department.

They all wanted to ask Gu Ran to endorse their products and shoot commercials for them.

One pants company even offered Gu Ran 300,000 pounds as an endorsement fee, just asking him to take a photo wearing their pants.

You know, Ronaldo only gets 800,000 pounds for a text ad on social media.

Although Gu Ran is still far from it, the advertising offer of 300,000 pounds is already top-notch in the entire English League One.

Of course, Gu Ran refused it outright.

In the next few days, Gu Ran put all his energy into training.

In particular, training in power confrontation, dynamic passing and receiving has been strengthened.

Gu Ran is always the first to arrive at the training ground and the last to leave.

During this week, Evelin invited Gu Ran to go horseback riding many times, but Gu Ran declined.

Although my body with 81 points of physical fitness really wants to ride...but the match with Arsenal is more important.

When he couldn't sleep at night, Gu Ran would... make a cup of Herba Lycopodii water by hand, and then while drinking the water, he would hand-draw scripts for "Iron Man 3" and other films.

Although Pepper Potts, Black Widow, and Female Thor have not come to toast yet, they will come sooner or later. It is better to prepare the hand-drawn script in advance to avoid being in a hurry when the time comes.

On the day before the competition, Gu Ran had already exchanged 7 talent points.

With these 7 talent points, you will be more confident in dealing with Arsenal!

After the afternoon training, Coach Adkins gathered all the players to the tactical classroom for a pre-match tactical analysis class as usual.

Coach Adkins first used a Premier League game of Arsenal as a teaching video to dismantle Arsenal's tactical style.

Most of the Southampton players were confused.

Even Lambert, a good student, stopped writing from time to time to scratch his head.

Gu Ran, who had 12 years of experience in his previous life, was enlightened by what he heard, and his understanding of football philosophy reached a new level.

After breaking down the tactics, Adkins concluded: "...So, in my opinion, Arsenal's passing and controlling style of play is really difficult to deal with."

"Although when it comes to passing and controlling football, the first thing that comes to mind is Barcelona and Guardiola, but I think the real master of passing and controlling football should be Arsenal's head coach Arsene Wenger."

"You should have noticed in the teaching video just now that after Arsenal got the ball, they would move inwards, move up the flanks, cross positions, and seek multiple attacks."

"Their passing was very decisive and fast. They never passed the ball to control the ball, but to get it into the opponent's goal."

"So, after getting the ball in the backcourt, they often pass it to the frontcourt immediately. The rhythm is very fast and the coordination is quite exquisite. They have a high degree of freedom in the frontcourt. The three attacking players in the frontcourt can often change positions freely. The play is really beautiful and penetrating."

"If we lose focus even a little bit in tomorrow's game, we will be doomed."

"So, how should we deal with opponents who use a passing and controlling style? This is the core issue of our class today."

"First of all, we have to understand that Arsenal's passing and control is unique to the Premier League and is actually more advanced than the European style of play."

As Coach Adkins spoke, he drew the basic positions of the Arsenal and Barcelona teams on the whiteboard.

Arsenal's position is a typical 4231 parallel position, while Barcelona's position is a 433 inverted triangle position.

"Guardiola's passing and controlling style is inherited from Cruyff, the football saint. Guardiola has a strong desire for control. He requires his players to run to the right spot every time they run, and every pass must be made to the right spot. The players must maintain a good triangle formation and the distance must always be kept constant. Moreover, this is not aimed at one or a few people, but requires the entire team to pass the ball according to the running positions he sets."

"To put it simply, Guardiola's Barcelona is a precision instrument. Every part must be synchronized. This is the rhythm of tiki-kata. Note that tiki-tata is not transmitted, but run."

"Barcelona cares about space and coordination. Any kid from Barcelona's youth academy, La Masia, can come up with a perfect set of offensive and defensive coordination with his eyes closed."

"Barcelona's passing is beautiful and accurate, but that is only the appearance. The real core is triangle ball control. Under Guardiola's requirements, Barcelona's players must always maintain the appropriate triangle spacing and must not run around randomly."

"So when you see Barcelona play, there are very few long passes."

"Wenger's Arsenal is different. Wenger's philosophy is freer and more varied. Wenger's passing and control is a mixture of short passes upfield and long passes downfield. It's more like passing and cutting than passing and control."

"Arsenal's style of play is closer to the Dutch style of all-out attack and defense, but it also incorporates the Premier League's own two-wing flying breakthrough. When Arsenal is attacking, the distance between players is also short, but they do not form a fixed triangle spacing to control the ball rate, but compress the formation to maintain the numerical advantage and rely on quick breakthroughs to tear open space."

"So, the core essence of Arsenal is passing and cutting."

"Arsenal are fast, as fast as a pistol bullet, but I prefer to think of Arsenal as a sharp knife."

"Compared, if Arsenal's passing and cutting is tearing, then Guardiola's passing and controlling is piercing. One uses a knife, the other uses a dagger."

"I dare say that in the next 10 years, the passing and controlling style will definitely be the world. Most teams will imitate the passing and controlling style. Even if they don't imitate it, they must learn how to deal with it."

"So, even if we don't meet Arsenal in the league, as professional players we must understand the essential characteristics of the passing and controlling flow."

At this point, Coach Adkins paused and looked around meaningfully. "Perhaps some of you will play under Professor Wenger, and perhaps some of you will play under Guardiola. Are you more suitable for free knife slashing and tearing, or more suitable for being a precision instrument dagger piercing, you should be able to make your own judgment, right?"

Hearing this, Gu Ran's brows twitched slightly.

Will I play under Wenger or Guardiola in the future? Everything is possible.

Maybe this isn't the question to think about right now.

But one thing is certain, we will often play against teams that use passing and controlling the ball in the future.

——Gu Ran put his thoughts aside.

Coach Adkins continued: "If I were to evaluate these two styles, as a coach, I would rather face Guardiola's dagger piercing than Wenger's knife slashing and tearing."

Many players below burst into laughter.

You know, Barcelona now has Habba and Messi. 2010 was the period when the Dream Three Dynasty was at its peak, and Barcelona was also known as a cosmic-class team.

But coach Adkins said he would rather face Barcelona, ​​the Dream Team, than face Arsenal, who don't have 4 looking for 4?

Isn't this a joke to Arsenal? Coach Adkins said calmly: "The reason why Guardiola's Barcelona is strong now is not only because of his passing and controlling style, but also because Barcelona has money and has its own system students. As a team with a fixed tactical style, money and reserve players, they are now at the peak. The reason why Arsenal can't even win the league championship does not mean that Wenger's passing and cutting style is not good enough. A big reason is that the competition in the Premier League is more brutal than that in La Liga, and the bigger reason is that the financial situation of the Arsenal club has held Wenger back."

"If Wenger was given the same transfer budget as Guardiola, no one in the Premier League would be a match for Arsenal."

The players below were all thoughtful.

Coach Adkins added: "God bless, let Wenger remain poor forever."

…

(End of this chapter)