I believe that many fans are well aware that the biggest problem faced by the national football team before is that the talent is broken and the green and yellow are not connected. But most of the time our feelings are not very strong, because although the results of our national football team are declining, they are not too outrageous. A very important reason is that in our key position, several veterans can still hold on. But just after the 2019 Asian Cup, the fading out of a veteran made us feel a strong talent gap, and this player is Zheng Zhi, who is about to turn 42.
As we all know, Zheng Zhi plays in the back position, and he wears the No. 10 shirt in the national team, which is the position of the offensive core. Because Zheng Zhi's ability is placed there, the defensive intensity of the back position is there, and the defensive area is large. In terms of attack, Zheng Zhi can also hold the ball and can push the ball forward to help the team organize the attack. So he is the core of the national football team. But after Zheng Zhi left, the national football team lacked such a player who could attack and defend, and the back position could either only be defended or only tandem. No one can be a core member. Even if the No. 10 shirt was given to Beijing Guoan's midfielder Zhang Xizhe, it is clear that with zhang Xizhe's current state and ability, he cannot support the midfielder of the national football team in the round of 12. This is also an important reason for the poor performance of the first 6 rounds of the national football team, the lack of core, the lack of the main backbone.
But finding a player with the ability of Zheng Zhi is not easy. In our league, the position of the central axis is occupied by foreign aid, so local players, especially the midfielder, basically play auxiliary, and those who have skills do tandem, and those who have bodies and defenses do defensive backs. Therefore, without such soil, it is difficult to cultivate talents like Zheng Zhi. Just like in recent years, the Guangzhou team has introduced many Zheng Zhi successors, but these Zheng Zhi successors have almost no success in Evergrande. The reason is simple, there is Paulinho and Zheng Zhizai, they do not have a stable playing time at all. The team is under pressure from performance and it is difficult for them to have continuous playing time. Just like the youth storm of Evergrande in the 2019 season, at the beginning, all the young players were allowed to play, but the results were not good, and finally it was the mode of foreign aid + veterans and then bringing new people. And the key positions with newcomers are often played by foreign aid and veterans.
However, in the 2019 season, the Guangzhou team really tried a good seedling, when the player can be said to have turned out to be a big surprise. This player is 23-year-old Yan Dinghao. At that time, Yan Dinghao was poached back from Europe by Evergrande, who played for the echelon of Portuguese Super League giants Porto, and also had good goal statistics in the echelon. Later, Hiddink coached the national Olympic team, and Yan Dinghao soon became the core of the national Olympic team's midfield, and his ability was also highly recognized. When I came to Evergrande, everyone didn't think that this young player would set off any kind of storm, but after the game began, everyone would find that this player was amazing.
The young Yan Dinghao has a calm and atmosphere that surpasses his peers in the midfield, and his insight is very strong, he can always be one step ahead in the selection of positions when defending, and when attacking, he can always observe the running line of his teammates in advance, pass out good balls, watch him play, and feel that this player is very confident and very spiritual. Yan Dinghao scored four goals in 9 of the 15 appearances for Evergrande that season. At that time, many people thought that with Yan Dinghao, Zheng Zhi could really rest, because someone could play the No. 10 position.
But unfortunately, Yan Dinghao was injured in the game against Beijing Guoan just after the start, and was confirmed to have a ruptured anterior cruciate ligament after the game, and the season was reimbursed. As a result, veteran Zheng Zhi had to re-enter the front and become the core. Yan Dinghao's injury recuperated for nearly 1 year. In the 2020 season, Yan Dinghao did not play many games, starting only 4 of 11 games and receiving 1 assist. From the data, it can be seen that his state still needs to be restored. However, Yan Dinghao was not discouraged, and he soon broke out in the 2021 season.
Due to serious financial difficulties, Paulinho left and the naturalized players left in the second phase, so the burden on the team shifted to the local young players. Yan Dinghao also shouldered the responsibility at this time, and throughout the 2020 season, he played 20 games for the team and started 6 assists, ranking third in the Chinese Super League assist list and the first place in the local assist list.
And in an interview with Football News, when asked whether the injury had a great impact on him, Yan Dinghao replied: "I think it is a small turning point in my career. In fact, for me, that injury I have seen very lightly, because I have looked back at the game and the current game, I think now I play more mature and stable, at that time our team had Paulinho, can play with us, at the beginning I played in a more advanced position, the degree of freedom is relatively high, but really with my own best passing, ball control organization ability, in fact, now I play more mature and stable, fewer mistakes, passing more accurate, the success rate is higher. This answer is very wonderful, in fact, from this it can be seen that Yan Dinghao has a clear understanding of himself, IQ and emotional intelligence are online, very remarkable.
It is precisely because of this season's outstanding performance that Yan Dinghao has also been successfully selected for the 52-man roster of the new national team. Everyone is also very much looking forward to Yan Dinghao's selection, and they very much want to see if the combination of him and Xu Xin in the back position can burst out a new spark. Are you optimistic that Yan Dinghao will eventually stand out and enter the final World Preliminary Round roster? Who do you think Yan Dinghao and he can cooperate better? Friends are welcome to discuss together in the comment area!