At 19:35 on April 6, Beijing time, the last game of the 4th round of the 2024 Chinese Super League season will be contested, and last season's dark horse Zhejiang team will play at home against the promoted horse Qingdao West Coast team.
Since being promoted to the Chinese Super League two years ago, the Zhejiang team has been playing the role of a dark horse. In the 2022 season, Zhejiang team beat Shanghai SIPG to win the third place in the Chinese Super League. In the 2023 season, the Zhejiang team continues to rank third.
In the first three rounds of this season, Zhejiang team won 2 and drew 1 and accumulated 7 points, which was the same as Shanghai Port Guoan, and only temporarily ranked 5th due to goal difference. Qingdao West Coast defeated city rival Qingdao Manatee 1-0 at home in the last round and won the first Super League victory in team history. After three rounds, they are in 9th place with 1 win, 1 draw and 1 loss with 4 points. It is worth mentioning that due to the draw between Guoan and SIPG in this round, as long as the Zhejiang team wins the promotion horse at home, it will accumulate 10 points and surpass Chengdu Rongcheng in second place. It's a pity that the Zhejiang team didn't seize the opportunity.
Maybe the opportunity was too good, but the Zhejiang team played a little timid. Qingdao West Coast team is mainly anti-guest, only 5 minutes into the opening game, Nelson Lus is bold to shoot outside the penalty area, shocking the new national Zhao Bo in a cold sweat. In the 10th minute, Qingdao team's foreign aid riascos got a single chance, but unfortunately the shot was high, and there was a storm in front of the Zhejiang team. In the 30th minute, Lyazquez had another one-on-one chance, and then he calmly knocked it over, and Nelson Luz scored an empty goal, and Qingdao West Coast led 1-0. In the 50th minute, Sun Guowen's header was ferried, Owusu scored an empty goal, and the Zhejiang team equalized.
However, just 17 minutes later, Qingdao took the lead again. Nelson Luz, who performed well in this campaign, scored the ball from outside the penalty area and fired into the top left corner of the goal, blasting a world wave, and Qingdao took the lead again. In fact, Qingdao West Coast had a chance to extend the score. In the 4th minute of stoppage time, Qian Jie gave a handball in the penalty area, and the referee awarded a penalty. Qingdao West Coast team was already in control of the victory at this time, so the opportunity was left to naturalized international Alan .
As a result, the penalty kick taken by Alan with high hopes hit a half-high goal, which was saved by Zhao Bofei, the new national goal, and Alan missed the first goal to return to the Chinese Super League. After joining Qingdao West Coast, Alan played 4 times and scored 0 goals, and he still needs to continue to find his form, after all, in the key match between the national football team and the Thai team in June, Wu Lei could not play, and Alan also needed to carry the offensive banner of the national football team.
In the end, the promoted horse Qingdao West Coast defeated the AFC Champions League team 2-1 away, the super dark horse Zhejiang team, which was also the first defeat of the Zhejiang team this season.
So far, the only teams that remain unbeaten after 4 rounds of the Chinese Super League are Shanghai Shenhua, Shanghai SIPG and Beijing Guoan, who are also the favorites to compete for the Chinese Super League title this season.
At present, Shanghai Shenhua has the highest voice, they are very good at both ends of the offensive and defensive ends, and there are almost no shortcomings, while Guoan's midfield has no control in the past, and the hidden danger of SIPG is that the overall age of the back line is too old, and they have failed to keep a clean sheet in 4 consecutive games, which does not seem to be the performance of the championship team.
At the end of the 4th round of the Chinese Super League, Shanghai Shenhua won all 4 games and ranked first in the list, 3 points ahead of the second place Chengdu Rongcheng team. SIPG and Guoan ranked 3rd and 4th. After losing in this round, Zhejiang's ranking dropped to 6th, Cangzhou Lions ranked seventh, Luneng eighth, and Qingdao West Coast ranked 9th after winning this round. (Xiong Yixuan)