"Franck Ribéry, who is more flexible in his position, has exploded with amazing energy. Compared to him in the previous two seasons, he is now at the level of the FIFA World Player of the Year!" The commentator was still gushing praise for Ribéry, but the game had already restarted.
"When he first made his debut, he was fixed on the left flank. His first season in the Premier League was amazing and successful. But at that time, he was at most a decent attacker on the flanks. After that, Tony Twain asked him to move a little more towards the middle. The slight adjustment in his position gave us a more complete Franck Ribéry. Whether it's passing the ball on the flank, scoring from the middle, or even organizing the attack, he did a great job! "
Just as Ribéry had the ball, the commentator immediately became excited. "Now it's Franck Ribéry who has the ball!"
Ribéry, who had scored, felt that he was in great condition. He planned to challenge Ramos to a duel. In the end, he was blocked by Ramos and could not cut inside. His speed was also suppressed and he could not get up. The ball under his feet was shoveled out of the sideline by Ramos.
Seeing that the ball was shoveled out of bounds, van der Vaart, who was waiting at the side to receive, was a little dissatisfied and waved his hand. He was next to Ribéry just now and was temporarily unmarked. If Ribéry had passed the ball to him, he would have had a chance to move the ball out and reorganize the attack. However, Ribéry chose to fight alone and ignored his teammates coming up to support him.
Ribéry saw van der Vaart's gesture and hurriedly raised his hand to apologize to him. He had indeed neglected the teammates around him just now. The goal just now had made him a little carried away.
Although the Forest team received an out of bounds ball, it did not pose any threat to Real Madrid. Bale's pass was intercepted and Real Madrid took the opportunity to launch a counterattack. Nottingham Forest quickly retreated to defend – except for George Wood.
The football was passed to Guti's feet again. George Wood did not retreat. Instead, he advanced and went up to meet it.
Guti was still in the center circle, and the Forest team's two flanks were quickly returning to defend. George Wood intended to build the first line of defense in the center circle.
Seeing Wood coming up, Guti was going to pass the ball, but when he looked up to look for someone, he found that there was no suitable way to pass the ball. While she was distracted, George Wood was already in front of her.
Guti flicked the ball to the left and then jerked it back, trying to get rid of his opponent.
However, George Wood didn't fall for it. He just leaned forward and forced Gutti to turn around. As long as Guti turned his body and protected the ball with his back to the offensive direction, the Forest players would have enough time to run back to defend.
In order to protect the ball, Guti had to turn around. In this way, he could not send the football to the most dangerous place in the first place.
That wasn't what annoyed Gutti the most. What annoyed him the most was that Wood kept bumping into him from behind, and his little tricks were annoying. His leg tried to reach in front of him to grab the ball, but he could not reach it, so he could only kick Guti's ankle …
Guti did not want to be entangled with the opponent here. He was not a fool. He knew that this was equivalent to slowing down his team's attacking speed. So he passed the ball to Diarra and glared back at Wood.
He stared at Wood's gaze. That gaze was definitely not "friendly". It was cold, as if the person he was looking at wasn't a human, but a prey. Guti hated that look. He felt insulted.
He ran forward and Wood retreated with him.
He knew he was the kid's target in this game, so he decided to teach the other party a lesson.
※ ※ ※
The Forest team played defensive counterattack in this game, which was different from the Forest team's defensive line against Real Madrid, which was riddled with holes. In the face of Nottingham Forest's compact and overall defense, Real Madrid's offensive players would have to rack their brains.
After a series of passes, the football reached Higuaín's feet. He was going to turn around and break through, but Pepe stopped him. He turned around, but the football stayed.
However, the Forest team's ball was not easily passed out. Pepe's forward pass was stabbed by Raúl from behind because the distance was too close.
Real Madrid continued to attack.
Raúl protected the football under Pepe's close pursuit.
The current Raúl was very different from the young Raúl. He was no longer the simple striker who only needed to be responsible for scoring goals. In today's Real Madrid team, his job was not to score goals, but to defend and make plays.
It was not easy for Pepe to intercept Raúl's ball. Now that the position was very sensitive, he dared not easily foul. He could only interfere from behind. As long as Raúl did not have the idea of turning around and breaking through, he could only do so.
Raúl also found that Pepe's defense was quite tight at the back. He was not confident that he could turn around and break into the penalty area, so he passed the football out.
The football fell at Guti's feet again.
Guti did not even have to look up to know who the black shadow in front of him was.
He was now in front of the penalty area and raised his foot to shoot. Wood did not hesitate to rush up to block. Guti shook his ankle and the shot became a straight pass!
He did not pass it to Raúl in front of him, but to the other side, which was almost his blind spot. He found the path of the pass, and the football passed through the crowd in front of the penalty area and was sent to Robinho's feet.
The stands at the Bernabéu stadium erupted in loud cheers. The popular Brazilian cyclist always made people unconsciously look forward to it every time he took the ball. Real Madrid fans liked this kind of player who was good at performing fancy techniques because it could please them.
Piqué immediately went over to replace the position and called for Robinho to pull the ball away with his foot.
The cheers in the stands grew louder when they saw Robinho start to perform.
Piqué's reaction was fast. He expected Robinho to cut inside as soon as he dodged him, so he quickly turned around and cut across Robinho's forward path.
But this time he was wrong. Robinho did not move after he pulled the ball. Piqué's move made him pounce on thin air and he lost his balance and fell to the ground.
The Brazilian kid easily dodged the fallen Piqué and then did not wait for the other Forest players to come up. He cut inside and raised his leg to shoot!
Edwin van der Sar put all his attention on Robinho after he received the ball. When he saw him shoot, he quickly pounced and blocked the football out of the end line.
Although the attack did not result in a goal, Guti glanced at George Wood next to him with some pride. He initiated the attack from here. The direction in which he took the ball and his line of sight completely deceived George Wood — when he looked at Raúl and Higuaín on the left, who would have thought that he was actually going to pass the football to the empty space on the right?
But when Guti glanced at Wood, what he saw made him even more depressed.
He only saw George Wood's back — Wood was busy returning to the penalty area to defend the corner kick.
※ ※ ※
After falling behind, Real Madrid obviously stepped up their offensive, and a corner kick was not the end. The football was headed out by the Forest defender, and Real Madrid's midfielder intercepted the ball and continued to launch an attack. Real Madrid, unwilling to fall behind at home, had to quickly equalize the score. The longer it dragged on, the more disadvantageous it would be for them.
However, the Forest team's overall defense had been tested in many major games. Until the end of the first half, Real Madrid did not get any good opportunities. In addition to Robinho's shot, Sneijder also had a long shot, which bypassed Edwin van der Sar's ten fingers, but brushed against the goalpost and flew out. Then, Raúl shot from close range again, but Pepe used his body to block the end line.
The three offensive opportunities were concentrated in the ten minutes after they lost the ball, but when they did not attack, the Forest team's quick counterattack forced Real Madrid to temporarily stop the crazy attack — they were worried that the Forest team's quick counterattack would widen the gap in the score.
Seeing this scene, Tang En showed a happy smile on the sidelines. So far, the game had been in his plan. Real Madrid was not afraid of other teams playing against them, or rather, they liked other teams playing against them, because they did not care how many goals they lost at the back, as long as they scored one more goal in front. What they hated most was when their opponents withdrew, stationed their troops near the penalty area, concentrated their defense, and then used a determined and quick sneak attack to settle everything.
However, Nottingham Forest was such a team at its core.
Therefore, the first half was very hard for the Real Madrid players on the field. On the one hand, they had to strengthen their offensive and strive to equalize the score, and on the other hand, they had to always be on guard against their sudden quick attacks. With Beckham, the master of long passes, the Forest team's speed of quick counterattack was a level faster than before — the flying speed of the football was always faster than the speed of human running.
Most of the time, Nottingham Forest's offense was like this — the football was handed to Beckham, then van der Vaart and Ribéry plugged in together, van Nistelrooy pulled to the side, and Eastwood retreated to receive. Beckham then accurately sent the football to the feet of the Forest players with a long pass. Maybe it was Ribéry, maybe it was van der Vaart, maybe it was van Nistelrooy, maybe it was Eastwood. In short, the accuracy of his long passes was eight out of ten, and he could hit the target.
This situation was a headache for Real Madrid's defense. Unless someone could stick close to Beckham, they could not stop him from doing so. The cost of this counterattack was too low. All Beckham needed to do was lift his foot.
Other than that goal concede, Schuster was silent throughout the first half. He was looking for a way to break this tactic. He knew very well that if he could not break it, he could only rely on luck.
It would be a shame if any manager admitted that he had to rely on luck to win.
At the end of the first half, Schuster's expression was not very good. He could already hear the boos coming from the stands. Some people were complaining that the score was behind, and some people were complaining that the scene was ugly. What should he, as a manager, complain about?
I need defenders. I don't need Ribéry and Cristiano Ronaldo!
※ ※ ※
Tang En was very happy in the locker room. He did not hide it at all. He praised everyone. The offensive players played at their level in the process of scoring the goal, and the defensive players were the reason why the team was still in the lead.
"You guys did a great job. We have to play like this in the second half. Unless all the luck runs to the other side, we won't lose, "Tang En said resolutely to boost the players' confidence. In fact, these words were redundant. It was not the first time Nottingham Forest had come to the Bernabéu to play. When they saw the field outside, they would take out their mobile phones and digital cameras to take pictures as a souvenir.
Someone in the Forest team nodded. Tang En was not saying pretty words to boost morale. It was the truth — as long as the Forest team was in the lead, with their style of play, victory was in the bag.
"Guti is the core of their offense." After Tang En said these words that everyone knew, he began to lay out a more detailed tactic. "I think our only problem in the first half was that we didn't provoke Guti enough." The smile on Tang En's face was sinister.
"Don't count on George alone. We'll change our strategy a little in the second half. Find ways to provoke Guti and make him lose his cool. " Judging from the first half of the game, Guti's temper was much more restrained than before this season. Whenever he was knocked to the ground by Wood and refused to be friendly, anyone who faced such a situation would be unhappy. If it had been the Guti from two seasons ago, he might have gotten up and grabbed the opponent's neck. Or he might have committed an unnecessary and nasty foul before the Forest team's offense had even passed halfway through the game. He would have gotten a yellow card or even a red card to vent his emotions and then be sent off the field.
In this game, Guti was able to hold back his anger in the face of Wood's repeated intentional or unintentional provocations, which forced Tang En to look at him in a different light. Was it Schuster's request, or had his own character matured?
※ ※ ※
In the home team's locker room, Schuster pulled Guti aside and exhorted him about something very important. "It's obvious that you've become the first person all opponents want to kill."
Guti drank his water and did not comment on this statement.
"You did a great job in the first half, but I'm still worried … I wonder if Tony Twain will ask more Forest players to besiege you?"
Guti stopped drinking and looked at his manager.
"I believe he can really do that." After saying the first sentence that surprised Gutti, Schuster seemed to be more certain of this idea, so he added another sentence. He added, "He will do anything to win. Now everyone knows you're the core of Real Madrid's offense … "
"That is to say, he wants someone to provoke me and make me play poorly, or simply use force and get sent off?" Guti asked.
Schuster nodded.
Guti recalled George Wood's performance in the first half. It was indeed the intention.
"I won't let them get what they want." He swore.
"You have to stay calm, no matter how they provoke you," Schuster reminded him.
Guti put down his water bottle and nodded. "I know what to do, sir."
Schuster patted him on the shoulder and ended the conversation.
As long as Guti did not lose his cool, Real Madrid had hope of recovering the score in the second half and even taking advantage of the momentum to overtake.
The key was still Guti. His form and play were now the barometer of Real Madrid's results.
But would Twain let Guti off so easily?
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