U23 prepares for battle
Mission
At 16:00 local time on March 19, the Chinese U23 national football team went to the training base of the Sharjah Club for the second training after arrival. Since the team will travel to Abu Dhabi for the warm-up match on the 20th, the training on this day began with a certain intensity, and all of it was for this warm-up match.
Before the start of training, the coach distributes the vest directly to the players involved. After a series of preparatory activities for the first 15 minutes, head coach Jankovic arranged a series of confrontations, including group confrontations, for the final rehearsal for the next day's warm-up match. In group confrontations, one side arranges a four-back formation, and the other side arranges a three-back formation. These two formations have also been repeatedly practiced by the U23 national football team for a long time, and they can also be constantly switched according to the situation on the field in actual games.
Judging from the training situation, the side wearing the yellow vest is likely to start the warm-up match with the UAE Wahda team on the 20th, because two central defenders like Wu Shaocong and Jiang Shenglong who supported from the national team are among them, including Tao Qianglong, a 01-year-old "jumper" who participated in the national team training in the Lippi era. Moreover, the players who played in Haikou to participate in the national team warm-up match basically wore yellow vests.
In addition to arranging detachment confrontations, Jankovic also focused on the practice of set-pieces in training. Among them, Tao Qianglong, as the main penalty shooter, constantly takes free kicks and corners at various positions and angles. Jankovic also repeatedly stressed to the players the importance of set-pieces and tried to seize opportunities and try to score.
The entire training lasted an hour and a half and ended at around 18:00 local time. Then Jankovic told the players that from the training situation, everyone has recovered and performed very well, so they must try to play well for the 20th. Yankovic also said that although the outside world believes that this is a warm-up game, he hopes that all players will keep one point in mind: for the national team, any game is very important, and there is no so-called "warm-up". As long as they play, every player has to do their best. Obviously, although Yankovic is a foreign teacher, he has been very "Chinese" to some extent, and he is also very aware of the current situation of Chinese football, so he also hopes to urge the young players in the U23 national football team to realize their responsibilities and missions and strive to play every game.
Since this warm-up takes place in Abu Dhabi, it takes about 1 hour and 40 minutes to drive from the hotel to the race site, so the U23 national football team will depart by bus on the afternoon of the 20th. The team returned immediately after the match and prepared for the first round of the Dubai Cup match against the UAE team on the 23rd.