Chapter 360 Asian Cup
When Hu Lai trained under the hot summer sun for a month, the 18th Asian Cup in South Korea opened.
Twenty-four teams determined through the qualifiers gathered in South Korea, and they will decide the final champion in eight stadiums in six cities in the country in nearly a month.
The Chinese team went through some changes after last year's World Cup qualifiers. Many senior players retired and some Mesozoic and young players were added.
In this Asian Cup, the average age of the Chinese team is 27 years old. They are neither the oldest nor the youngest among the 24 participating teams.
Before the game, Marcel Wilson, the head coach of the Chinese team, said in an interview that the mission of the Chinese team in this Asian Cup is to reach the semi-finals. In the last Asian Cup, the Chinese team finally reached the semi-finals, but Many players from the Chinese team at that time are no longer in the national team. The two teams have different personnel configurations and different levels of experience, so there is no way to make a simple comparison.
The top eight can be considered a very pragmatic goal.
The Chinese team successfully entered the top 16, and then met the host South Korea team in the quarter-finals.
The game was scheduled at the Seoul World Cup Stadium.
For a while, online marketing accounts began to circulate a theory that the Koreans did this deliberately to avenge their 0:3 loss to the Chinese team in the East Asian Cup at the beginning of the year.
Many Chinese fans followed up and cursed the Korean stickman for being petty.
But this time they really wronged the Koreans.
The schedule and competition venues have been determined long ago, and we don’t have to wait for the top 16 to be announced before temporarily arranging the competition venues, so how to prepare for the game?
The South Korean team is the host, and their home stadium must be the Seoul World Cup Stadium where the opening ceremony of the World Cup was held.
In the end, who said that the Chinese team only finished second in the group, so they could only go to the Seoul World Cup Stadium to face the South Korean team?
This is not a deliberate arrangement by the Koreans, but an arrangement of fate.
Three months ago, the Korean Olympic Team, known as the "Korean National Team", was defeated 0:3 by the Chinese Olympic Team, known as the "Chinese National Team" here.
Three months later, fate arranged for the real Korean national team to take revenge on the real Chinese national team here.
Before the game, some Korean media clamored, "Let them see the real Korean national team!"
To this end, the South Korean team, despite its already superior strength, put together its strongest lineup and fielded all overseas players, including their number one star, main forward Park Soon-tae. The shooter who plays for Sevilla Navigators, a traditional team in La Liga, is currently one of the top stars in Asia.
In the Qatar World Cup that ended at the end of last year, he scored two goals for the South Korean team. Although he failed to help the South Korean team reach the knockout round, he was already the top scorer in the South Korean team.
Now 28 years old, he is in his prime. He has participated in three World Cups, two of which were the main force, and scored a total of four goals in the World Cup. He is the second scorer in the World Cup finals in the history of Korean football. Many players. Now all South Korea has high hopes for him, hoping that he can lead the South Korean team in the World Cup to reproduce the glorious results of the 2002 World Cup.
But to be honest, after knowing that there was such a number one figure, Hu Lai felt that unless the South Korean team hosted another World Cup, it would be almost impossible for Park Soon-tae to lead the South Korean team to repeat the Korean team's World Cup semi-finals that year... After all, That achievement is not achieved solely by performance in the arena.
Of course, it may be difficult for Park Soon-tae to lead the South Korean team to repeat the semi-finals of the 2002 World Cup, but they are still one of the top teams in Asian football.
In the three games of the group stage, Park Suntae scored three goals and currently leads the Asian Cup scorer list.
For this Asian Cup being held locally, the South Korean team has one and only one goal, which is to win the Asian Cup again after 12 years.
If they win the championship, all players on the team will be exempted from military service. Of course, Park Soon-tae doesn't need to, because he has already been exempted from military service by winning the Asian Games championship.
Compared with the star-studded Korean team, the Chinese team's lineup is much shabby. Not only are there no overseas players, but after Qin Lin retired from the national team, there is also a lack of a big brother who can support the scene.
This makes them look a little weak and not very confident when facing the South Korean team led by players like Park Soon-tae.
After all, the Korean team used to bring up Park Soon-tae, and the Chinese team also had players like Qin Lin who won the Asian Footballer of the Year come out to face off.
And now...even the Chinese football media are very embarrassed. What is their reporting angle? "The 'Light of Asia' Park Soon-tae is worth more than the entire national football team combined"...
Before the game even started, morale was gone.
"Our media is also weird enough." Hu Lai complained to Wang Guangwei after seeing the news. "How can anyone use this method to enhance others' prestige and destroy their own ambition before a game? It is simply collaborating with the enemy and treason!"
The two of them watched this game in the restaurant of the training base.
In addition to them, there are all the players of the youth team, and Xia Xiaoyu is among them - this is a special request from the youth training director Shi Jisheng, so that everyone should stay in the restaurant after dinner in the evening and wait to watch the live broadcast of the game.
With Hu Lai and Wang Guangwei as the core, everyone gathered behind them and watched the China-South Korea war through the projection in the restaurant.
"I just habitually complain about the national football team. It may not be as serious as you said..." Wang Guangwei shook his head.
"Gao Chen is on the bench..." When the TV broadcast swept across the Chinese team's bench, Xia Xiaoyu recognized one of them.
Hu Lai was stunned for a moment before he remembered the story behind the name.
It was on this court that he was injured by the Koreans. After he was kicked out by Sun Haomin, domestic public opinion repeatedly mentioned this matter.
And what was the name of the man who injured Gao Chen in the first place... a prostitute?
While Hu Lai was searching for this name in his mind, Wang Guangwei next to him said: "Park Chengxing started the game..."
There was a commotion among the youth team players: "He still has the nerve to start!"
"Maybe Bangzi did it on purpose? He deliberately came to disgust us and affect Gao Chen's state at the same time..."
"So Wilson didn't let Gao Chen start..."
"It's useless to start the game. Gao Chen has long been tortured by that serious injury and is no longer what he used to be. Alas, he was originally a forward with great promise, but in the end..."
After hearing everyone's indignant discussion, Wang Guangwei said to Hu Lai beside him: "It seems now, Hu Lai, you were really lucky back then. If Sun Haomin really hurt you, then all your performances after this season will be lost." ”
Hu Lai nodded: "Yeah, I'm so lucky..."
He sincerely thanked Xianyu System in his heart.
After using it, the [Broken Bear Shin Guards] also entered the official mall. Hu Lai later went in to check it out and found that this shin guard could be purchased again for 30,000 points. Compared with [Lover's Red Rope] which only costs 10,000, 30,000 points are not cheap. But compared with my future career, 30,000 points are definitely not expensive.
Hu Lai even felt that as long as he had enough points, he should buy one and keep it to be prepared.
So after he received the reward from the East Asia Cup mission, he found that the points system alone awarded him as much as 100,000 points. He immediately spent 30,000 points to buy a [Broken Bear Leg Guard] and put it in the warehouse for ready use. .
Then he would go into the system space from time to time and take a look. As long as he saw the leg guards with the giant bear pattern placed neatly in the system space, he would feel as safe as if he saw an eight-digit balance in his bank account.
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Back to the game itself, the Chinese team is lagging behind the Korean team in all aspects. In addition, this is the Korean team's home court, so everyone knows how to operate and it is normal.
So although the players of the Chinese team are working very hard, this fighting spirit is still difficult to shorten the gap between them and South Korean football strength.
In the end, the Chinese team lost to their opponents 0:2 amidst the deafening cheers and boos of Korean fans. They were eliminated in the first round of the knockout round, ending their journey to this Asian Cup.
After the game, the depressed Chinese players sat on the court and looked at the cheering and celebrating Korean players with disappointed eyes.
CCTV commentator He Feng is saying: "...Chinese football has owed too much debt in the past. Although we have begun to reform and catch up, the debt we owed in the early stage was so huge that it has taken only a few years to catch up. It’s not enough for us to catch up with opponents like Japan and South Korea... But after the failure, please let us have hope for the future. Just hope... Think about how our boys from the Olympic team defeated the Korean Olympic team on this court in the East Asian Cup in March. Those young people... they are the future of Chinese football, theirs. This victory makes me believe that Chinese football should be on the right path this time..."
Listening to the commentator's voice, the Shining Star youth team players in the restaurant all turned their attention to Hu Lai and Wang Guangwei, of course mainly to Hu Lai. Because the protagonist of that 3:0 victory was right in front of them!
While everyone was looking at Hu Lai, Xia Xiaoyu puffed up his chest and sat up straight, feeling proud of Captain Hu.
Shi Jisheng, the club's director of youth training, stood up and clapped his hands: "Okay, okay, if you lose, you lose, there is nothing to say... What should I do if my skills are not as good as others? Practice! Now go back and rest, and train normally tomorrow morning!"
Everyone then left the restaurant one after another. As they walked towards the youth team dormitory, they couldn't help but start talking.
"...If Hu Lai were here, maybe the result would be different?"
"Hey, the gap between our national team and the South Korean team can't be made up by just one fool? It's an all-round backwardness..."
Someone turned their attention to Xia Xiaoyu: "Xiaoyu, aren't you the most familiar with Hu Lai? What do you think?"
"Ah? Me? I don't know..." Xia Xiaoyu said, "And there is no point in discussing this topic. Let's train hard. The national team is too far away."
"Xiaoyu is right, it will be good if we can do our own thing well."
"That's right, you guys are too impatient! Didn't the commentator say it all? We owe too many debts, and we have to pay them back bit by bit, not so fast...right, Xiaoyu?"
"Yeah." Xia Xiaoyu nodded, but clenched his fists where others didn't see. Only one year...only one year!
(End of chapter)