Chapter 1020: Defend!
Before coaching Chelsea, Di Matteo's coaching record was not impressive.
In 2008, he coached Milton Keynes in English League One and finished third in that season's English League One, but lost to their opponents in the play-offs to the Championship and missed the chance to be promoted.
Although he failed to lead Milton Keynes to promotion to the Championship, Di Matteo got the opportunity to coach Championship team West Bromwich Albion, a famous team in the Premier League that has been promoted and relegated, thanks to his good performance in one season.
The so-called elevator means that West Bromwich Albion frequently travels between the Premier League and the Championship.
Di Matteo led the team to successfully enter the Premier League in his first season as coach, which won him praise. Even after being promoted to the Premier League, although there were sad memories of a 0-6 defeat to Chelsea away in the first round, the team quickly adjusted and once occupied the sixth place in the Premier League, defeated Arsenal, and drew with Manchester United away. The performance was outstanding.
During that time, Di Matteo became very famous and won the attention of the entire British and even European football world.
But the good times did not last long. West Bromwich Albion's relatively open style of play but seriously inadequate lineup made the team seriously lack stamina. Di Matteo was sacked in February 2011 after coaching West Bromwich Albion.
Last summer, after failing to apply to coach Birmingham, Di Matteo accepted Villas-Boas' invitation to serve as the Portuguese's chief assistant coach at Chelsea, officially returning to Stamford Bridge.
What no one expected was that Di Matteo, who was not favored when coaching Birmingham, was fired by Villas-Boas half a year later and became the head coach of Chelsea, leading the team to the Champions League final.
This thing called fate is really completely confusing.
Although Di Matteo's coaching record is not impressive, his career can be regarded as top-notch in Europe.
From Lazio to Chelsea, the Blues even offered a sky-high price of 6.8 million US dollars for Di Matteo, which created the highest transfer fee in Chelsea's history in 1996. Even in the Premier League at that time, this was considered a very high transfer fee, which shows how much Chelsea values Di Matteo.
Having played for big teams for a long time, Di Matteo is knowledgeable and experienced, and he has a deep understanding of the survival rules of the head coaches of big teams.
As the head coach of a big team, especially a top team, professional ability has never been the most important thing, because these can be handed over to assistants, just like Ferguson has not even taken care of training and preparation for many years.
What is the most important thing for a head coach of a top team? Management!
You have to be able to keep the players stable on and off the court, and you have to be able to deal with the boss.
There is no problem with Boas' professional ability, and he can also get the boss on his side, so he became the head coach of Chelsea at a young age, but the problem is that he couldn't keep the players stable, so he was fired.
As for whether it was the so-called veteran team committee within Chelsea that was targeting him, does it matter?
Di Matteo knew this very well, and he had even experienced it all personally, so after he took over as Chelsea's head coach, the first thing he did was to stabilize several core veterans on the team committee and convince them to support him.
The results that followed were clear to see. When the players gave their all, Chelsea made rapid progress in the Champions League.
Of course, in the knockout stage of the Champions League, Di Matteo also has his own set of tactics, which is defense and counterattack.
Since the knockout stage, Di Matteo's Chelsea has basically adopted this set of tactics, and the result was really effective. They made it all the way to the Champions League final and faced Manchester City directly.
How to play against Manchester City? As an Italian, Di Matteo decided to continue what he does best.
…
"Guard!"
On the morning of the game, in the conference room of the hotel where Chelsea was staying, Di Matteo solemnly announced his tactics for the night. The core of the tactics was not surprising: the team still had to defend closely.
This is Chelsea's only way out.
Strictly speaking, this was not surprising, so there was not even any surprise in the conference room, and everyone took it for granted.
Today's Manchester City is no longer the Manchester City of two years ago. It is natural to adopt a defensive tactic when playing against Manchester City.
"When we played against Bayern Munich, we had a lot of problems in the midfield. The main reason was that Bayern adopted a double defensive midfielder tactic, which is 4-2-3-1, which is the same as us. So Lampard had some difficulty facing two defensive midfielders alone, which resulted in one of our double defensive midfielders having to go up."
Heynckes is an old fox. He saw through this during the game, so he asked Robben and Ribery to adopt the inside-cut tactic and let Thomas Muller take the ball more often to transition. He saw whether it was Mikel or Meireles who went up. Whoever went up, Thomas Muller would pass the ball to that side, and Bayern would focus on attacking that side.
This put Chelsea in a very passive position and the scene was extremely embarrassing.
But now, Manchester City's tactics will basically not change. Busquets will definitely stay back, and David Silva and Toni Kroos will team up in the midfield, which is in line with Chelsea's midfield layout.
Lampard stood forward, responsible for suppressing Busquets, Mikel and Meireles fell back, responsible for dealing with David Silva and Toni Kroos, three against three, plus Chelsea will adopt a tight defensive tactics, the situation is favorable for Chelsea.
"Mata is responsible for assisting Ashley Cole in marking Sanchez. The Chilean winger is quite strong. He can go down the crease and cut inside. He has excellent footwork and is very fast. Ramirez and Ivanovic on the right are responsible for marking Di Maria. He is faster and sharper, and has excellent dribbling ability. At the same time, they must be careful of Marcelo behind him."
Judging from the lineup configuration, Di Matteo's thinking is very clear. On his right side, Ramirez and Ivanovic are mainly defensive, withstanding the offensive pressure of Marcelo and Di Maria, while on his left side, they will counterattack when they find an opportunity, so he put Mata on this side.
Everyone knows that although Manchester City's right-back Zabaleta has offensive capabilities, he is not as strong as Marcelo.
There are actually a lot of things that need to be arranged for defense.
For example, Manchester City's two central midfielders, David Silva and Toni Kroos, are very flexible in their positions and have a large range of movement. Many times they even appear directly on the wing, which creates trouble for Chelsea's two deep midfielders in their defense.
Chelsea had Mikel and Meireles practiced this before, and now they are just waiting for the actual test. After all, no matter how well they practice, who knows who will win without a real fight on the field? Since they are using intensive defense, Chelsea's compact positioning is crucial, which was practiced repeatedly before the game. As the Italian head coach, Di Matteo has a good knowledge in this area, and what he emphasizes most now is mentality.
"We will not get the ball for a long time and will be in a passive state, but we are not too unfamiliar with this situation, because we played like this in the two games against Bayern Munich and even in the previous game against Barcelona. We can adapt to this situation."
From Ranieri to Mourinho, and later to famous coaches such as Hiddink and Ancelotti, although Chelsea has played very well in this round, it has always been inseparable from the solid defense inherited over the years.
This is the foundation of Chelsea's foothold in European football and also the team's magic weapon.
"I believe everyone knows that the more we are in this situation, the more we need to maintain a calm mentality and patience. In the previous game against Bayern Munich, we left too many gaps for the opponent. Although this was due to tactical factors, we also had problems with execution, which we need to pay attention to."
"Manchester City is a team that is stronger and more terrifying than Bayern Munich, with stronger attacking power and more deadly penetration ability. We should not be fooled by their so-called background. They are one of the most combative and best-formed teams in European football and even world football this season. In fact, they can be completely eliminated."
Whether it is Di Matteo or others, they basically all praise Guardiola's Manchester City.
Even Ferguson, the sworn enemy of the team, and Arsenal, which was humiliated by Manchester City's many victories, basically gave a thumbs up when mentioning Manchester City. This was achieved through real results.
Chelsea players did not object to what Di Matteo said, because they knew very well that Chelsea was no longer at its peak.
Why did Villas-Boas want to clean up the old players? Isn't it because Chelsea is no longer at its peak?
Didn't Drogba, Lampard, Terry and other veterans know about the team's problems? No, they knew.
The reason they opposed Boas was that he was unwilling to give respect to these veterans.
Since you, the head coach, don't give us respect, then we will give you respect.
In the end, Villas-Boas was basically unable to change the situation. Being fired was only a matter of time, and was also due to cost considerations by the club management.
Now, Di Matteo told the players how terrible Manchester City is, just to warn the players that Chelsea can only have a chance to defeat Manchester City, a powerful opponent, if it is united and the players and the head coach work closely together.
You know, Chelsea has never beaten Manchester City in the past two seasons.
Although the Champions League final has never been superstitious about past results, Manchester City does have an advantage on the psychological level, and Chelsea will only have a chance if they fight hard.
The entire meeting lasted for more than an hour, and Di Matteo kept emphasizing defense. As for how to counterattack and attack, he just mentioned it briefly and did not explain it in depth.
Whether it is for Di Matteo or Chelsea, the most important task in this Champions League final is defense. As for how to counterattack or how to attack, this is not something that can be considered before the game.
Di Matteo has already arranged several targeted counterattack routes in previous training. It will depend on the players' on-the-spot performance and what tactics Manchester City will deploy in the game.
The two teams are very familiar with each other and basically won't have any surprise attacks. The key lies in targeted tactics.
(End of this chapter)
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