With an away win over Portsmouth, the Forest team crossed another hurdle. The relegation team, Portsmouth, did not cause any trouble for the Forest team.
Next, Tang En temporarily shifted his focus from the Premier League to the Champions League.
In the semifinals, Nottingham Forest's opponent was the French Ligue 1 overlord, Lyon.
Although they had always been the champion of the French First Division and fully deserved to be the hegemon of the French First Division. However, this team was recognized as the weakest among the top four teams in the Champions League. Their strength was really not on the same level as Nottingham Forest. It was also luck that they were able to reach the Champions League semi-finals this time.
The direct consequence of Lyon's dominance in the French Ligue 1 was the lack of competitiveness of the French Ligue 1 teams in the European arena. If a league lacked competitiveness, how good could the teams that were nurtured be?
The media was unanimously optimistic that the Forest team would make it to the finals. The English media even gave a ticket to the finals to Nottingham Forest before the game. They had already started introducing the final venue to the readers.
The people in the English football world were also optimistic about Forest. Some people even felt that they did not have to go all out against Lyon and that Tang En should save his strength to deal with the opponents in the league tournament.
Even so, Twain did not dare to let his guard down. On the contrary, it was precisely because of the media hype that he was even more worried — he was afraid that his team would be affected by the public opinion and become arrogant and underestimate their opponents.
Because of this, his face was gloomy all day long, as if he was very worried that his team would be eliminated. When he was interviewed, he also changed his arrogant and condescending style in the past and appeared to be cautious. He never mentioned anything like "entering the finals" or "booking tickets to Bernabéu in advance".
His behavior made people feel unfamiliar, and they wondered if Tang En had been abducted by aliens and had his brain changed.
"… Against a team like Arsenal, he dared to say that he wanted to win before the game. Facing the weakest team in the top four, he doesn't dare to mention the finals … Maybe he's deliberately doubting his opponent? "
Tang En did not care what the media outside thought of his actions. As long as the team did not lower their guard and did not become arrogant and underestimate their opponents, it would be fine.
Under his and Wood's influence, the team did not show any signs of underestimating their opponents. Tang En asked the team to play against Lyon with the attitude that they should have against a semi-final opponent. Wood was very serious about training and preparing for the match, to be an example. Tang En's prestige in the changing room was very high, and the power of George Wood's example could not be ignored. Before the match with Lyon, Tang En had nothing to worry about.
The first round was an away game.
This was the first time in the history of the Lyon club had broken into the top four of the Champions League. They even had hopes of breaking into the final and picking up the trophy. Therefore, Lyon's morale was even higher. With the home advantage, they launched wave after wave of attacks on the Forest team's hinterland. It was like a raging wave crashing against the shore, which made the hearts of the Nottingham Forest fans beat wildly.
Tang En let the team defend and counterattack in the away game because he had calculated that Lyon's momentum was very strong at home. In the art of war, one had to "avoid the brunt of the attack." Tang En was not stupid enough to go head-on with Lyon. If he could get a point in this match, it would be a victory. It would be even better if they could score.
Lyon's idea was simple. It was to use the home advantage to attack the Forest team, strive for a goal, strive for the lead, and finally win the game to lay a good foundation for the next leg. After all, the Forest team's home ground was very difficult to play. If there was a victory in hand, maybe there would be more room for maneuver. In any case, Lyon was tired of being the domestic hegemon. They wanted to achieve a historic breakthrough — to become the European champion.
But Nottingham Forest clearly has more experience playing in the Champions League semi-finals than Lyon. Tang En handled it very skillfully. On the contrary, Lyon appeared too impatient. They attacked fiercely from the start. What if they did not score? What if they overdrafted their stamina?
Tang En let the team defend steadily and slowly wear down Lyon, wearing down Lyon's fighting spirit, confidence, and stamina. The Lyon players were overly excited and sprinted all over the field. The scene was indeed good to watch. The fans who did not understand could also blindly cheer along, thinking that Lyon had the absolute upper hand and that a goal was only a matter of time.
But in the eyes of professionals, it was not the case at all.
The match was being held in France. As a Frenchman, the already eliminated Arsenal manager, Wenger, had accepted an invitation from a French television station to come and comment on the match live. When he saw Nottingham Forest being beaten by Lyon to the point that they could not get out of the penalty area, he concluded that if Lyon continued to attack like this, they would be the unlucky ones in the end.
The French commentator still had some doubts. He thought that based on the situation on the field, it was only a matter of time before Lyon broke through the Forest team's goal. "This is passive defense. No matter how tight the defense is, if the opponent attacks from all sides, there will definitely be loopholes. I don't believe that Nottingham Forest's defense is flawless. If they continue to play like this, the Forest team will be the one under the most pressure, not Lyon … "
Wenger just smiled and did not speak. He could not argue with the commentator during the live broadcast, but he also could not agree with the commentator's words. He could only wait for time to tell who was right and who was wrong.
In the first thirty minutes, it was almost all Lyon besieging Nottingham Forest. The Forest team only had two shots, while Lyon had six shots. The number of times that Lyon had scored into the thirty-meter zone was also far ahead. The Lyon fans sang and danced in the stands in a happy and relaxed mood. They seemed to think that Nottingham Forest was nothing to be afraid of.
Lyon's rear defensive line also pressed higher and higher, and the center backs wished they could dribble the ball into the opponent's penalty area to shoot.
Just when everyone thought that Lyon would be able to break through the Nottingham Forest goal in the next attack, the Forest team fought back.
Like a spring that had been compressed to the extreme, it suddenly bounced up when the pressure on it lightened a little. The sharp thorns at the top flashed coldly under the night lights.
Akinfeev directly took over and threw the ball to launch an attack, and Şahin quickly distributed the ball after he dribbled the ball to break through. After Agbonlahor, the starting right midfielder, used his speed to force a breakthrough, he did not continue to dribble the ball along the flank as the Lyon players thought. Instead, he suddenly cut inside and directly rushed toward the goal. He was going to shoot directly!
Agbonlahor was too fast, and the Lyon players were not prepared for the Forest team's counterattack. When Agbonlahor cut inside, there was only the goalkeeper in front of him.
What happened next could be imagined even with one's knees.
Agbonlahor broke into the penalty area. Just as he was about to shoot, he was shoveled down by the defender who rushed back from the side. Although Agbonlahor's fall was a little exaggerated, the opponent did foul. The referee made a prompt decision and blew a penalty kick to the Forest team. Not only that, he also gave the player who committed the foul a yellow card.
Off the field, Tang En was still unforgiving, thinking that only giving a yellow card was too lenient. At the very least, it should be directly sent off with a red card!
His protest "won" a lot of boos from the stands.
The Lyon players were not mentally prepared for this penalty kick. After being stunned for a while, they surrounded the referee and asked for an explanation. They thought Agbonlahor had dived.
On the other side, Agbonlahor was high-fiving and hugging his teammates in celebration. He did deliberately earn a penalty kick. Otherwise, with his speed, it was impossible for the opponent to shovel him from behind. He only needed to push the football to the outside and accelerate to avoid it. But in this way, he also lost the best angle and timing to shoot. Under such circumstances, it was clear that getting a penalty kick was the most reasonable thing to do. So, he dragged one leg behind and waited for the opponent to shovel him over. Then, he would fall with the momentum and get the penalty kick.
The person in charge of the penalty kick was Şahin. He succeeded in one move and hit the football into the goal. The goalkeeper misjudged the direction. He only realized that the football had fallen from the middle to the position where he had been standing when he pounced.
Seeing the Forest team score, the commentator of the French television station was silent for a while. Wenger maintained his usual smile so that others could not see his smugness.
Finally, the commentator found himself a way out. "This penalty kick is a little controversial, but the referee stands by his decision … The Forest team is lucky to be in the lead in the away game …"
Wenger said in his heart: How is this lucky? You haven't watched Premier League games, Mr. Commentator. This is one of Tony's most common tricks. You think he's passively taking a beating, but in fact, he hasn't been hit in any vital areas … He's just waiting for the most suitable opportunity to counterattack. If I were the Lyon manager, seeing the Forest team play like this, I would tell the defenders to pay attention to defense, then retreat back into the formation and lure them out again.
Unfortunately, the Lyon manager lacked the experience of playing against Tang En and the experience of playing in the Champions League semi-finals. This was completely exploited by Tang En.
The Forest team, who was in the lead, played with more ease. Lyon continued to attack, while the Forest team increased the intensity of their counterattack. Before the halftime interval, they almost scored another goal.
During the halftime interval, Wenger and the commentator chatted about the game. When it came to the second half, Wenger said that if Nottingham Forest was in the lead in such an elimination game, it would be very difficult for Lyon in the second half. This time, the commentator finally agreed with Wenger's view. After all, the manager was more familiar with Tang En than he was.
The trend of the second half of the game was just as Wenger said. Tang En still used defensive counterattack to lead Lyon by the nose.
Lyon desperately wanted to equalize the score, which gave the Forest team more opportunities to counterattack.
However, it was clear that the Forest team's stamina had indeed been affected by the continuous high-intensity battles. Their stamina also began to show problems in the second half, and the strength of their counterattack was not strong. Even though Tang En kept asking the team to attack from the sidelines, the Forest players were powerless. In the end, Tang En also resigned to his fate. He began to change players, replacing the exhausted starting players and substituting for the substitutes. He began to focus on defense.
The last five or six minutes were a severe test for Tang En's heart. They were only in the lead by one goal, and Lyon was still pressing heavily. If Lyon were to score, it would be a waste of his hard work in this game. Ten minutes into the game, he might have accepted a 1: 1 result. But now that he was still in the lead by one goal, he would never accept any result other than victory.
Fortunately, although the scene was thrilling, Nottingham Forest finally held on. After four minutes of stoppage time, the referee blew the whistle to end the game. Nottingham Forest obtained a precious away win and an away goal amidst the boos of the home fans.
With an away win and an away goal, it looked like Nottingham Forest was already one leg into the Bernabéu Stadium. No matter how scary the Forest team was when they returned to their home ground, they believed they would not disappoint Lyon.
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Three days later, Tang En led the team to a home win against Fulham in Matchday 36. A day later, Arsenal also won in an away game. The difference between the two teams was still three points, with two rounds left in the league tournament. The odds of William Hill and other bookmakers still favored Arsenal to win the championship. In the odds of winning the Champions League, Tang En's team was second from the bottom among the four teams. Other than Lyon, the team that was not favored was the Forest team.
Real Madrid's odds were first because they had forced a 2: 2 draw with Barcelona in the Champions League in midweek and obtained two precious away goals. Their chances of entering the finals were very high. And this year's Champions League finals happened to be held at their home ground, the Bernabéu Stadium. Once Real Madrid entered the finals, they would truly gain the home advantage without reservation. By then, half of the championship title would almost be Real Madrid's.
No one could doubt Real Madrid's desire for the Champions League. They had always been one title away from achieving the great feat of winning the Champions League ten times. This time, it was also at their own home ground. Of course, there was no reason to let go of such an opportunity. It could be seen from their away game against Barcelona in the semi-final. Their momentum completely suppressed Barcelona. Even though the score was 2: 2, everyone who watched the game at the beginning, even the Barcelona fans, had to admit that Barcelona was really lucky to be able to force a draw with Real Madrid.
Tang En faced teams of tigers and wolves on both fronts, both teams with an unlimited desire for the championship title. As the former world's number one club, Real Madrid had not touched the Champions League for 12 years. They had won it nine times. Wenger's Arsenal also wanted to win back the championship title that belonged to them in the league tournament. They had already lost the Champions League to Nottingham Forest. Would they lose again in the league tournament?
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Another three days later, Nottingham Forest defeated the invading Lyon 2: 1 at the City Ground Stadium. With a victory, they bid farewell to the City Ground Stadium in the Champions League. They advanced to the finals with an aggregate score of 3: 1, making it to the finals for the first time in five years.
At the same time, Real Madrid also defeated Barcelona 1: 0 at home and eliminated their arch-rival Barcelona with an aggregate score of 3: 2. They successfully made the Bernabéu Stadium, the main venue of this year's Champions League finals, their true home ground.
In the FA Cup, Nottingham Forest made it to the finals. Their opponent was Tottenham Hotspur. In the Champions League, Nottingham Forest also made it to the finals. Their opponent was Real Madrid. In the league tournament, there were two rounds left. They were three points behind Arsenal.
Would Nottingham Forest, who was sprinting on all three fronts, return to Nottingham at the end of the season with three championship trophies, or collapse one after another and gain nothing?
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