On the evening of March 21, local time, the Chinese team conducted the fourth outdoor joint training after arriving in Sharjah. The training was rearranged at the Khalid Bin Mohammed Stadium inside the Sharjah Club base. Since the training is only 3 days away from the 9th round of the Round of 12, China coach Li Xiaopeng has strengthened the technical and tactical content of the drill in recent days to find the most suitable 11-person combination to start in the 24th match. Judging from the situation reflected in the team, "hardness, rhythm, and set-piece" have become the three key words that the whole team emphasized during the preparation for the western expedition. The Chinese team, which has no hope of qualifying, does not want to be the "background board" for opponents to advance.
Since the first training after arriving in Sharjah on the evening of the 18th local time, the Chinese team has focused on practicing techniques and tactics. On the evening of the 20th local time, the Chinese team used the "home team advantage" to go to the China-Saudi Arabia competition venue on the 24th, and the Sharjah Stadium conducted more than 90 minutes of training. It is understood that in the training in recent days, in addition to the large and small group confrontation training aimed at running into the battle front, the drill of set-piece has become the top priority of the national football team's preparation.
For the national football team, the reality of early exit can allow the whole team to completely unload the psychological baggage in the last two rounds of the round of 12. However, objectively speaking, compared with the Saudi team, which is the leader of Group B of the Top 12 competition, there is still a relatively obvious gap in technical ability. It is difficult for the Chinese team to gain an advantage over this opponent by means of ground penetration. Therefore, it is logical that the coaching staff wants to "make a fuss" on set-piece tactics. In fact, during the Haikou training camp, the drill of set-piece tactics occupied a large proportion of the training content. The coaching staff also distinguished between front and back set pieces, corners and other training content, so that players with relatively outstanding footwork such as Arthur Junmin, Zhang Xizhe and Dai Weijun served as handlers.
In addition to "set-pieces", the other two keywords of the national football team's western expedition are "hardness and rhythm". For the "hardness", the outside world can actually be understood by the employment standards emphasized by coach Li Xiaopeng during the Haikou training. What he called "who can fight, who can go on" is the specific requirements put forward by the coaching team for the international team in training and competition at this stage, which is completely consistent with the connotation embodied in the 4 words of "excellent style" in the team's new 16-word slogan. So it is not difficult to understand the fact that during the teaching match between the team and the U23 national football team on the 15th of this month, the international footballers really fought for the "master and disciple", and Tan Long, Dai Weijun, Zhu Chenjie and other international footballers fought until they were injured and left the field.
As for the "rhythm", the coaching staff actually emphasizes that players must have both courage and strategy in the actual combat process. It is necessary to maintain the rhythm that belongs to the team from beginning to end during the game, or the rhythm that the team can master, so as to avoid falling into the opponent's offensive and defensive rhythm as much as possible, resulting in passive beatings.
As of the evening training on March 21, local time, Li Xiaopeng is still considering the main candidates for individual positions. It should be noted that after left-back Li Lei, who played for the Swiss Grasshopper Club, missed the team due to injury, the coaching staff decided not to recruit other players from the U23 national football team, which is also preparing for the Dubai Cup in the United Arab Emirates. In other words, the players who played in the two matches of the Chinese team's top 12 competition will be selected from the 24 players currently in the team.
Since the first captain of the team, Wu Xi, did not have the opportunity to participate in the Sino-Saudi Arabian competition due to the accumulation of yellow cards, the coaching staff needed to find a suitable back candidate to replace Wu Xi at the technical level, and also needed to confirm the first choice of 1 on-field captain for this game. During the coaching period of Li Tie, Arthur Junmin, Yu Dabao and Zhang Linpeng were appointed as the three candidate captains of the team. Then in the absence of Wu Xi, the captain of the field may be selected from the above 3 people.
Some team insiders recently told the Beijing Youth Daily reporter that although the team has no chance to reach the final stage of the Qatar World Cup, after experiencing the unforgettable and humiliating defeat in Hanoi, the whole team is deeply guilty, and they have also expressed their intentions of "knowing shame and then being brave". A team member said that in any case, the team must maintain its dignity in the last home match of this round of 12 and make every effort to avoid giving the opponent a "background board" for promotion.
Text/Beiqing Sports Xiao Zhao