Chapter 318: Fighting of Gods
In the morning, after having breakfast in the hotel, Su Dong came downstairs, got into the car of Messi's father Jorge, and headed straight for the Camp Nou stadium.
After playing against Racing Santander, the team returned to Barcelona overnight and was disbanded on the spot.
The national team players began to go their separate ways and return to their countries to play for their respective countries, while the players who did not have national team match missions had a two-day holiday. However, Su Dong did not plan to take a holiday. He still wanted to continue training to maintain his form.
As Su Dong's little follower, Messi will naturally accompany him.
After getting in the car, Jorge in the front seat asked with concern about the renovation and decoration of Sudong's villa.
This is another big worry! Decoration is not only time-consuming and laborious, but also very stressful. Su Dong gave it to Mendes to take charge and entrusted it to the design and decoration company. Anyway, the plan they came up with had to be approved by Su Dong.
The earliest move-in time is expected to be November, or even the end of the year.
One small move affects the entire body. Decoration is always like this, which is very annoying.
However, Su Dong suggested that after he moved in, Messi could come and live with him, which would make it convenient for him to train with him, Nuno Cruz and others.
Of course Messi and Jorge would not refuse such a good thing and agreed on the spot.
Especially Messi, he has very few friends, and Su Dong is the best one.
…
"By the way, did you watch the news this morning?" Messi asked with concern.
Su Dong nodded. He saw it last night and this morning, and only three of them really caught his attention.
One is that Barcelona defeated Racing Santander 4-0 away and jumped to the top of the La Liga table with the advantage of goal difference. Su Dong was elected the best player of the game with two shots and one assist, and received unanimous praise from the outside world.
After the warm-up matches, the first few cup games of the season, and the first round of the league, there are fewer and fewer doubts about Sudong's value. Instead, more and more people are beginning to believe that it would be a very wise choice for Barcelona to sign Sudong.
Another one is from Valencia.
The defending champion played a city derby against Villarreal at home in the first round, but Valencia's performance was not ideal. The heavily-invested Corradi and Di Vaio both performed poorly, and Fiore was not even in the starting lineup. In the end, with goals from Marchena and Baraja, they narrowly defeated Villarreal 2-1.
Through the warm-up matches, everyone can see that Valencia’s biggest problem right now lies within itself.
David Silva, Vicente, Aimar and others have always kept in touch with Su Dong, so Su Dong knows a lot of inside information about Valencia and also knows the problems the team is facing this season.
For example, in the European Super Cup, Valencia actually performed very poorly despite winning.
The conflict within the locker room deepened, and something unbelievable happened.
That is, in order to transfer to Arsenal, Angulo refused to play in the Super Cup. The reason was that the Gunners were willing to offer him double his annual salary, which made it difficult for Angulo to refuse.
When Ranieri took over Valencia, he wanted to inject some of his own elements, which is understandable, but he was indeed a bit too hasty, especially after introducing three Italians in succession, which began to arouse resistance from the players in the Valencia locker room.
This is a big taboo! However, this has nothing to do with Su Dong anymore.
The last piece of news should be what Messi is concerned about, that is, Barcelona godfather Cruyff published a column in Vanguard, criticizing Barcelona's new players.
Strictly speaking, it is not a criticism of all the new players, but only of a few Brazilian ones.
What Cruyff meant was that Barcelona had brought in too many Brazilian players, so many that it had seriously affected the unity within the team's locker room. This was not a positive thing because Barcelona had had similar problems not long ago.
That time it wasn't the Brazilian players, but there were too many Dutch players.
Ever since Van Gaal took over as coach of Barcelona, the Dutch team has been criticized. Even Cruyff himself admitted that the Dutch team is the main factor leading to Barcelona's decline in performance in recent years.
The reason is simple. When many players come from the same country, they will naturally stick together, which will affect the atmosphere of unity in the locker room and thus affect the players' performance.
But Cruyff was not only worried about this.
He believes that too many Brazilian players are not good for Barcelona. He cited the national team matches in the past two weeks as an example, and believed that there were too many Brazilian players, which caused them to travel back and forth when they returned to their country to participate in the games. The travel distance was too long, and coupled with the impact of the games, the players were very exhausted.
When the team has multiple Brazilian players, this consumption is enough to affect the team's performance and results.
In addition, Cruyff also mentioned the discipline of Barcelona players, saying that he had vaguely heard some discordant voices coming from the locker room. For example, when Ronaldinho was in Tokyo, Japan, he appeared in a nightclub with a Brazilian group and met with Ronaldo and Carlos, who were playing for Real Madrid at the time. They partied until the early morning and there were even many beautiful women at the scene.
Cruyff believes that Rijkaard should pay enough attention to this and strengthen the management of the team's locker room.
Although Cruyff blasted the new Brazilian players in Barcelona, he is still very optimistic about Barcelona this season.
"Last season, we lacked capable scorers, but now we have Su Dong on our front line. Judging from the pre-season warm-up matches and the first round of the league, Su Dong has almost seamlessly integrated into Barcelona's tactical map. I believe that he can not only make up for the team's offensive shortcomings last season, but also make our center forward a strong point that is difficult for opponents to defend."
But Cruyff also reminded Barcelona's coaching staff and management that the team's lineup is still not perfect and the defense still has shortcomings. "Overall, it is much better than last season."
…
Su Dong remained neutral about Cruyff's remarks.
He couldn't say whether it was right or wrong, because many things did happen, but there was no doubt that it was appropriate for Cruyff to point it out so publicly just after the league started. Cruyff's original intention should be to hope that the club and the coaching staff would pay enough attention, and even to use public opinion to warn the Brazilian players in the Barcelona team, but can such unpleasant advice be accepted?
"Don't get involved in these things! Leo, let's concentrate on playing our football!" Su Dong reminded Messi.
Messi nodded in agreement.
He has no ability to get involved in these things now, so why bother thinking about it? If he has that time, he might as well train hard and improve his own strength.
…
When Su Dong brought Messi to the Barcelona Sports City, he found that not only were the two of them taking advantage of the holiday to practice extra, but Iniesta was also there. The young player, who had just started in the first round of the league and played the whole game, was now also eager to improve himself.
Iniesta was very happy to see Su Dong and Messi, and started recovery training with them directly.
Nuno Cruz and other private coaching team are also happy to have two more people to accompany Su Dong for extra training, which can also share some of their work.
While Su Dong and others were training, Barcelona quickly responded to Cruyff's column.
Head coach Rijkaard said that he had seen Cruyff's column and he also understood Cruyff's football philosophy and knew that Cruyff was protecting the club. They had also discussed this issue before, and technical director Begiristain was also involved. The club's top management also discussed this issue.
"In my opinion, Brazilian players are role models for other players, and they are Barcelona players. Nationality is not important!"
Obviously, Rijkaard was hinting to the Barcelona godfather that it was inappropriate to use nationality as an excuse! Sure enough, the Brazilian players responded quickly.
Both Deco and Belletti responded, and both called on people to put aside the concepts of region and nationality, because there is only one team on the football field, that is Barcelona, and there is only one language, that is football.
Barcelona president Laporta also came out to accept media interviews, saying that he had heard the interviews with Cruyff, the head coach and the players, "I respect their opinions."
After that, nothing.
Barcelona's management intends to cool down the situation, but the media outside are just looking for trouble.
It was soon revealed by the media that the reason why Barcelona introduced so many Brazilian players was that Vice President Rosell tried to expand his influence in the locker room by introducing Brazilian players, thereby shaking the position of President Laporta. Laporta and Cruyff are steadfast comrades-in-arms.
Some media even mentioned Sudong, saying that one of the important reasons why Laporta wanted to introduce Sudong was to counter Rosell's influence in the locker room.
"Barcelona will do its utmost to support Su Dong in the selection of this year's World Footballer of the Year and European Ballon d'Or, with the aim of suppressing Ronaldinho and other Brazilians."
…
In just less than two days, Su Dong was amazed by what he saw.
This was his first time to personally experience the environment of a top team like Barcelona, and also his first time to feel that as a Barcelona player, he had to bear not only the pressure of the game on the court, but also various factors off the court.
The latter is not even inferior to the former in terms of quantity.
Su Dong couldn't tell who was right or wrong, and he didn't want to get involved. He even declined all media interviews and refused to answer any related topics, including the selection of the World Footballer of the Year and the European Ballon d'Or.
Since it is a fight between gods, let them fight! Su Dong believes that as long as he maintains his form and focuses on football in training and games, no matter whether it is the Dutch gang, the Brazilian gang, or the local forces, there will be a place for him, and he will be able to stand firm in this team and this locker room.
Even if we take a step back, he is also a foreign player.
Su Dong couldn't help but recall what Mendes once said to him, that is, after joining Barcelona, he should be mentally prepared. Generally speaking, he should consider leaving after three or four years.
Now, he understood a little.
Of course, maybe this is also true for other top teams.
Who knows?
(End of this chapter)
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