The thrilling Vietnamese team ushered in the first victory, and the morale of the national football team was greatly improved. At 1:00 a.m. Beijing time on the 13th, in the fourth round of the World Preliminary Round of 12, the national football team will challenge the Saudi team away at the King Abdullah Sports City Stadium. In the face of the opponents who have won 3 games at present, the team's goal is still to "pull teeth out of the tiger's mouth" to continue to grab points.
'As you can see from the first three games, Saudi Arabia is a very strong team, it's a great opportunity for us to prove ourselves, we will work very hard to grab every ball and I believe my players are ready. In the early morning of Beijing time on the 12th, at the pre-match press conference, the national football coach Li Tie said so.
Ha Joon Min can't play
In West Asia, which has been concentrated for nearly a month and a half, and just finished playing the match with Vietnam in the early morning of the 11th, the injuries of the national football team have been continuous. The good news is that after a few days of adjustments, Wang Gang and Zhang Yuning, who were injured in the previous match against Vietnam, have now fully recovered, and the central defender Zhu Chenjie and goalkeeper Wang Dalei, who were absent from the Sino-Vietnamese battle due to injury, have also fully recovered and are eligible to play.
Unfortunately, Arthur Junmin, who came off the bench in the Sino-Vietnamese showdown, did not participate in the team's joint training in the past few days due to some muscle tension, and the coaching team only arranged for him to make individual adjustments and slowly recover. Although left-back Li Lei is currently in good physical condition, he has experienced a relatively long recovery time before this, so after arriving in Jeddah, he is still alone in recovery training accompanied by team doctors.
"Immediately after playing against Vietnam, we went from the UAE to Saudi Arabia. The two games are relatively close, so with the help of these two or three days to give the players a full rest, they also trained for Saudi Arabia. In terms of personnel, in addition to Li Lei and Arthur Junmin, other players are ready to play. Li Tie said this at the pre-match press conference.
The absence of Arthur Junmin and Li Lei will still have a certain impact on Li Tie's platoon deployment. Considering the overall attack of the Saudi team, the national football team will most likely be based on defense tomorrow morning. Judging from the first three games, the problem of the national football team's midfield has not been small. In the midfield, in particular, the defensive hardness is not enough and it is impossible to organize a quality attack. Saudi Arabia's players are flexible, fast and have strong passing ability, and in view of this characteristic, the national football team should be more targeted in terms of back and defensive configuration. Choosing players with as much energy and relative dexterity and speed as possible may be the key to the national football team to grab points.
It's not easy to grab points
If the national football team wants to grab points, it is indeed not easy.
In the first three rounds of this round of 12 matches, Saudi Arabia has defeated Vietnam at home, Oman away and Japan at home. Combined with the game video and other information, the Coaching Team of the Chinese team has done an in-depth study of the technical and tactical characteristics of the Saudi team, and concluded that this team has players with outstanding individual ability on all lines, and the error rate is always controlled within a low range, and the whole team can maintain sufficient physical fitness for most of the game, thus ensuring a high rate of attack and defense conversion.
The opponent of the Chinese team in this game is not only the Saudi team on the field, but also the home team fans of no less than 40,000 people on the scene and the local humid and hot weather. It is understood that as of the 11th, more than 40,000 people have booked tickets for the Sino-Saudi Arabia match through the official channels provided by the Saudi Football Association, and the scene of the game will undoubtedly become the "devil's home" of the Saudi team. Moreover, in the previous eight home matches at the King Abdullah Sports City Stadium, the Saudi team achieved an unbeaten record of 7 wins and 1 draw, and the only draw in this field was Australia.
There is also a referee factor, the referee who enforced the match, the 37-year-old Uzbekistan Tantashev, although in recent years has enforced the AFC Champions League matches of Chinese Super League teams, the 2019 East Asian Cup national football team against Japan and other matches, but compared with the referees of the top 40 and the first 3 rounds of the round of 12. Prior to that, Tantashev had served as referee in the first round of the Round of 12 saudi arabian home match against Vietnam, and awarded two penalties to the Saudi team during the match, one of which was controversial.
Internationals want to "pull teeth out of the tiger's mouth"
It is not easy to grab points, but for the Chinese team whose goal is to qualify for the World Cup, they are ready for "pulling teeth out of the tiger's mouth" in this game.
"Immediately after playing against Vietnam, we went from the UAE to Saudi Arabia. For the Saudi team, we have also strengthened some of the information we emphasized to the players before, and the communication with the players in the past few days is a lot, and I believe that the players are ready. Li Tie said.
The Saudis certainly have shortcomings, and in the first two games, their home offensive is indeed fierce, but it is more dependent on the mistakes of the opponent to score. In the first game against Vietnam, the first team to score is the Vietnamese team, if it is not a consecutive penalty, and the Vietnamese team was sent off by 1 person, the Saudi team may not be able to get 3 points smoothly. In the match with the Japanese team, although the victory was 1-0, the key was that the Japanese defender made a low-level mistake in the return pass, and the Saudi team seized the opportunity. Therefore, as long as the national football team stabilizes its position in this game and does a more ideal job in terms of defensive details, it is not without the opportunity to grab points.
'For the players, we haven't had a lot of home fans cheering in the last two years, but tomorrow there will be a lot of Chinese fans coming to the scene, which will be more motivating for us, and we hope to be able to dedicate a good game to the fans." Captain Wu Xi said so.
Source Beijing Daily Client | Reporter Li Li
Edited by Li Li
Process Editor Liu Weili