On September 10, after the national football team lost to Saudi Arabia with a score of 1:2 at Dalian Barracuda Bay Stadium at home, the round of 18 suffered two consecutive defeats, with a net swallow of nine bullets in the two games, and no points (excluding the Saudi team's own goal), and the scene after the game "Ivan class" resounded throughout the stadium.
At the post-match press conference, the angry media people did not save face for the Croatian coach at all, and directly asked "Will you choose to leave class after this game", after the question was raised, many media people on the scene burst into applause. Such a scene is rare on such an occasion.
What people didn't expect was that Ivan didn't avoid it, let alone kick the ball, but said, "This question shouldn't be answered by me." "On September 11, Ivan was waiting for the media again at the hotel where the national team was staying, and was asked again if he would leave class? He said, "Now no one knows."
Judging from Ivan's answers these two times, he is very aware of his situation, but he will not take the initiative to resign, unless he is fired by the Chinese Football Association, which means that he will not make this decision himself, and directly threw the ball to the Chinese Football Association.
Why did Ivan do this? What is the reason for this? The answer should be twofold. The first is to get more money, and the second is to prove himself.
Why do you want to get more money?
Everyone should be very familiar with Ivan's appointment, when Li Tie's results did not meet expectations, and Ivan, who had made history in the Chinese Super League, became one of the most popular candidates, and took office to become the second oldest head coach in the history of the Chinese men's football team.
According to the information of the Chinese Football Association, Ivan's contract is staged, that is, whether to implement the second phase depends on the results of the first stage.
Ivan's first stage contract is for the Asian qualifiers. If you can lead the team to the top 18, you can execute the second phase of the contract, otherwise you will be dismissed directly. In the qualifying stage, the record of one win and two draws was very unsatisfactory, but Singapore helped a lot, sending China to the round of 18. Ivan's second phase of his contract was continued.
The second phase of the contract execution cycle is the end of the round of 18, and there is no hard and fast assessment criteria at this stage, but there is a reward and punishment mechanism for the performance ranking, such as winning the top two in the group, Ivan's team will receive high rewards, and even have the priority to continue as the head coach.
The Asian Round of 18 is not scheduled until June 2025. In the face of such poor results, Ivan has now become a "hot potato" of the Chinese Football Association, and if he is fired directly, he will have to pay 9 months of liquidated damages according to the contract; If you don't fire, you can't give an account to the Chinese fans.
In other words, as long as the current Ivan does not resign on his own initiative, he will "attack and retreat", and it will not be himself who suffers.
Why didn't Ivan take the initiative to leave in the face of such an embarrassing situation? Is it really like what many media people say, "cheating liquidated damages?" There may be another answer.
Ivan wanted to prove himself
Speaking of Ivan's past resume, except for a few years of highlight moments in the club, he has not made too impressive achievements in leading the national team.
The only national teams Ivan's tenure as head coach are Iran, Oman and now China, and the results have not been satisfactory.
In 2004, Ivan took over the Iran team and successfully brought the Iran team to the 2006 World Cup finals, but he resigned directly because he failed to qualify from the group.
In 2020, Ivan became the head coach of the Oman team, and although he led the team to an upset defeat to Japan, he was drawn and directly dismissed in the game where he could qualify as long as he won.
Now that he is coaching the national team again, the Chinese team has become a knot in his heart, he just wants to prove his ability, bring the Chinese team to the World Cup, and draw a successful end to his coaching career, after all, he is now a 70-year-old man.
Looking at the 6 games he led the team in, it was very different from Lippi back then. At that time, Lippi resigned in anger because the players had no personality and lacked fighting spirit. And now the national football players, although their skills are still rough, they really want to win, and the problem lies in the tactical arrangement and personnel adjustment.
In other words, he is more responsible for the losses in the six games he led. Even after facing Japan's net swallow of 7 bombs, he still insisted on his tactical arrangement and wanted to prove himself, which is another reason why he does not voluntarily resign at present.
Competitive competitions, especially those in which teams work together, cannot win with only thought and persistence, and it requires targeted training and on-the-spot arrangements and adjustments to achieve something.
At present, Ivan has kicked the "ball" directly to the Chinese Football Association, and the next thing can only depend on how the Football Association arranges.
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