Lippi, nicknamed "Silver Fox", the world cup champion coach, has led Juventus to win the Serie A championship many times, led the team to win the European championship several times, won the World Cup championship, and led Evergrande to sweep Asia, which can be said to be full of strength and popularity. A silver white hair, gold wire glasses, a decent suit, a cigar smoked out of the mind, elegant and easy-going, personable is synonymous with him. However, even a world-famous coach has not been able to get rid of the fate of being pit by the national football team.
Knowing that Lippi was in the 2006 World Cup in Germany, italy was deeply involved in the "phone gate" incident, people are not optimistic about this team, but under Lippi's leadership, Italy defeated Zidane's France team in the final and won the Hercules Cup. It can be said that at this moment Lippi's coaching career reached its peak, perhaps he did not expect that the future would be connected with the distant eastern powers, and the impact was profound.
Lippi, who coached Italy again in 2010, was disqualified after the group stage of the World Cup in South Africa, until May 2012, when Lippi was associated with the word China, starting with Guangzhou Evergrande.
In 2010, Evergrande Group, known for its real estate, entered the football industry, and Evergrande acquired the Guangzhou football team and named it Guangzhou Evergrande, thus opening an era of Chinese football. Evergrande is ambitious, shouting out the slogan of "winning the Asian championship in five years", and hoarding a large number of excellent players, domestic players such as Zheng Zhi, Gao Lin, Zhang Linpeng and other good players, foreign aid has Conca, Muric and other outstanding players, the team strength is strong, but lack of an authoritative helmsman. At this time, Evergrande contacted Lippi, who was idle at home, and Lippi was impressed by Evergrande's sincerity and parachuted into Guangzhou in May 2012, officially opening his legendary moment in China.
2013 is a year worth remembering for everyone, with the addition of Elkeson, Evergrande's last piece of the puzzle was completed. This year, Evergrande won the Chinese Super League championship with the trend of destruction and decadence, and represented Chinese clubs in the AFC Champions League. In the AFC Champions League, Evergrande showed a terrifying dominance, and Lippi also let the Asian people see the strength of his world-class champion coach. In the AFC Champions League semi-finals, Evergrande defeated Japan's Kashiwa Helios 8-1 over two legs, allowing the Japanese team to see the horror of Lippi, and in the final stage Evergrande played against Seoul, South Korea, and finally won the championship with an away goal advantage. Since then, Lippi's coaching career has reached another peak, and Chinese football seems to have become omnipotent, indestructible and invincible under his tutelage. Perhaps, from that moment on, Lippi would not have imagined that his coaching career would be subjected to a huge test, and this test would be the Chinese national team.
In 2014, at the end of the season, Lippi left Evergrande, and perhaps leaving will become a good story, forever passed down in the history of Chinese football, and is admired by people. But fate will always have to joke with you, so that your life seems to be less perfect, this matter has to start from the 2018 World Cup Asian qualifiers. At that time, the national football team performed badly under the leadership of head coach Perrin, especially the two draws with Hong Kong, which made the national football team lose the promotion to the round of twelve, and at this critical moment, Gao Hongbo took over the national football team and won two consecutive victories, and finally became the second place with the best results to enter the round of twelve. At this time, the hope of the national football team to enter the World Cup was rekindled, and fans longed for the national football team to restore its glory. The Football Association was forced by pressure to continue to let Gao Hongbo lead the team, but the strength of the domestic coach was limited, Gao Hongbo lost three and drew in the first four games, only accumulated one point, and the prospect of the national football team entering the World Cup was cast a shadow, and Gao Hongbo was forced by pressure to resign and resign. The Football Association weighed left and right, felt that Lippi has a coaching foundation in China, and understands Chinese football, and as the world champion coach, is the best candidate for the head coach of the national football team, and finally under the joint efforts of the Football Association and Evergrande Group, in October 2016, Lippi's halo of "Chinese football savior" on his head came to China.
Of course, Lippi did not live up to everyone's expectations of him, took over the first game of the national football team, faced the Qatar team to gain the advantage, and finally just bad luck, the two sides shook hands and made peace. Although it did not win, it made people see the strength of world-class coaches, and Lippi also brought confidence to the national football team, and the encouragement of "the national football team is not afraid of any opponent in The Asian scope" is inspiring. Under his leadership, the national team based on Evergrande showed different mental outlooks and strengths. Changsha and South Korea a battle, so that fans are very excited, the team won 1-0 to South Korea, breaking the long-standing "Korean phobia". In the 6 games that Lippi took over, a total of 3 wins, 2 draws and 1 loss accumulated 11 points, if it were not for the pit dug in the early stage, Lippi would have led the national football team to the World Cup.
The Football Association saw Lippi's excellent performance and decided to let him lead the team to continue to compete in the Asian Cup, and Lippi also put forward many constructive suggestions for Chinese football, such as establishing the same set of tactical play from the youth team to the national team, which is beneficial to the national football team. It can be said that Lippi has made a certain contribution to Chinese football, and he is like a preacher who wants to transmit advanced football concepts to this ancient civilization with a large population. However, with the start of the Asian Cup, everything seems to start to change. The national football team successfully passed the group stage at the 2019 Asian Cup, met the Iranian team in the quarter-finals, and now remember Lippi's bold words before the game: "I will take out all the weapons in the arsenal", Lippi drummed up enough energy to compete with the Iranian team, but did not expect that the process was embarrassing. In the first half, due to a careless mistake by the main center defender Feng Xiaoting, the whole team was unbalanced, and the back line failed to withstand the impact of the Persian Iron Horse, the game lost suspense early, and finally lost 0-3, Lippi was furious, immediately resigned after the game, and directly returned to Italy with luggage.
If it ends here, it's a relief, but it's far from simple. In April 2019, at the gracious invitation of China, Lippi returned to the position of head coach of the national football team, and the Football Association also met the requirements of naturalized players proposed by Lippi, who wanted to prove himself again with the combination of foreign aid + domestic players in the Evergrande period. At the same time, Elkeson, Alain, Li Ke and other outstanding foreign aides joined the national football team and wanted to make contributions to Chinese football. However, before the old man could fully implement the new blueprint he had conceived, an accident struck him and led directly to his sad departure. On November 14, the Chinese men's football team lost 1:2 away to Syria in the 2022 World Cup Qualifiers Asian Top 40, basically losing the initiative to qualify, Lippi was dissatisfied with the mental state and on-the-spot performance of the national football team, and in the speech "No desire, no courage, can not reflect the training of things, that is the responsibility of the head coach." We beat weak teams like Guam and maldives, but the Philippines, a slightly stronger team, drew, Syria played better than us, and we lost tonight. My annual salary is relatively high, and I bear the responsibility for all the losses, so I announce my resignation to everyone, and I will no longer serve as the head coach of the national football team. After some testimonials, Lippi turned and left on the spot. At this point, Lippi ended his coaching career, the wrinkles on the old man's face did not make him feel wandering, the growing age did not make him feel remorse, the back of the rickety did not stop him from loving football, but in the face of the national football team, his mood must be complicated, helpless, disappointed, regretful, resentment, etc., may be more regret. He wanted to use his ability to change the status quo of football in this ancient civilization, he looked at the eager eyes of tens of thousands of fans who loved football, he told himself that he could not be indifferent, what he had to do, he wanted to bring the joy of modern football to this country with a thousand-year-old civilization, but in the end he found that he had failed, and the failure was complete. As a world-class coach, he can't turn himself out of the mire of Chinese football, and he realizes that maybe leaving is the best choice for him. This old man broke his heart for the national football team, and the gradual increase in wrinkles, stagnant eyes, and panicked steps were telling people about his heartache and helplessness!
Recently, someone saw this old man on the romantic streets of Italy, and the people who saw him said that he was much younger than when he was in China, yes, it can be seen from his smile that he is much more relaxed, but the experience brought to him by Chinese football is like a wrinkle on his face, forever engraved on his face! After all, he also sent blessings to the national football team! May you be all right, the white-haired man who smokes cigars!