Chapter 328: One mountain cannot tolerate two tigers

Chapter 328: One mountain cannot tolerate two tigers

In this game, the Welsh team only started with Ledley as a defensive midfielder, but he was thrown around by Bruno in the first half and could not keep up with Bruno's weird running positions and erratic rhythm.

Bruno appeared in the Welsh penalty area for a while, at the edge of the penalty area for a while, on the right for a while, and then ran to the left for a while. Sometimes he frequently retreated and then plugged in. This caused Ledley to be completely unable to keep up with the trip, and in the end he fell into a situation where he was at a loss.

Poor Ledley... he was a good defensive midfielder.

Now, Coleman is considering adding another person to guard Bruno.

He set his sights on the roster at hand.

The substitutes were all warming up outside, and there was no one else in the locker room except the eleven starting players. He had to find players who could be substituted from here.

Since it is to contain Bruno, it is natural to change defensive players, so Coleman directly set his sights on the midfielder column.

Each team's roster in the European Cup finals is 23 people, which is also the range that each team can choose to play in each game.

Of course, since two players in the Welsh team are suspended due to accumulated yellow cards and two others are injured, the number of players Wales can choose to play in this game is 19. Among them, in addition to the eleven starting players, there are 8 others.

Among them, there are two who can play defensive midfielders, namely David Vaughn and David Edwards. The two played for Nottingham Forest and Wolves in the English Championship respectively. They were the main midfielders of their respective teams, and their performances last season were similar.

However, compared to David Edwards, who is more inclined to attack, David Vaughn performed better on the defensive end.

In particular, David Vaughan is good at stealing, which makes Coleman very optimistic. With him and Ledley guarding Bruno, there shouldn't be any problem.

………………

Thinking of this, Coleman ordered the assistant coach beside him: "Call Vaughn back."

The assistant coach took the order and left.

Taking advantage of this time, Coleman told the players what to do in the second half: "We can't just defend, we have to attack!"

By the time David Vaughn ran back in a sweat, Coleman had already told the other players what to do in the second half. He glanced at David Vaughan, who was returning to his side, and then called him and Ledley aside.

"You two have a very important task in the second half." Coleman said to the two men straight to the point.

He did not criticize Ledley for being outsmarted by Bruno in the first half. He knew now was not the time to blame players.

"The core of the Portuguese team is their No. 8. I hope you will unite in the second half and freeze him completely!"

Although the head coach did not criticize his performance in the first half by name, these words and actions still embarrassed Ledley.

Originally, his task was to defend Bruno, but he failed to defend the opponent at all in the first half. Instead, he allowed the opponent to continuously organize threatening attacks. Now the head coach has decided to replace another defensive midfielder and ask him and David Vaughn to team up to defend Bruno. This is tantamount to admitting his failure in the first half.

Ledley currently plays for Crystal Palace in the Premier League, and is not yet the team's main player and can only be regarded as a substitute. He played 19 Premier League games on behalf of Crystal Palace last season, 8 of which were as substitutes. After all, he is already thirty years old and has entered the decline stage of professional players, especially defensive midfielders.

"His running range is very large. You must follow him at all costs. As soon as he catches the ball, go up and defend him!" Coleman put his hands together and made a "surround" gesture.

The two men nodded, indicating that they understood.

"The Portuguese team's ball will be passed to him most of the time. We must try to steal the ball directly from his feet, and then we use this opportunity to launch a counterattack."

The two men nodded again.

"The key to the second half was on him, remember."

………………

When the Wales coach was deliberately trying to deal with Bruno, Bruno was accepting Ronaldo's words in the dressing room.

"I'm curious, how did you know I was going to shoot when your back was turned to me?"

Although he scored a goal, the doubts in Ronaldo's heart became more and more intense.

This isn't the first time this has happened. , during extra practice that day, the football he suddenly shot was dodged by Bruno.

Is it really a coincidence? But how could a coincidence happen twice?

And Ronaldo always felt that even if he and Bruno were to do it again, Bruno would be able to avoid it.

In order to figure out this problem, just after the first half, he went to Bruno to ask.

Bruno shrugged and spread his hands: "Intuition."

<divclass="contentadv">C Ronaldo didn't believe it. He stared directly into Bruno's eyes, his own eyes full of doubts.

"Intuition" is too imaginary for him, just like a person who wins the jackpot every time he buys a lottery ticket. If you ask him, he will tell you that it is luck - even people will suspect that there is something fishy in it.

Bruno saw that he didn't believe him and couldn't explain it. He can't tell that this is all because of the system!

After four years of continuous training in the system, many of Bruno's abilities have become more and more fantasy-like and supernatural, which is difficult to explain using science and training.

As he trained under the guidance of the system for longer and longer, his control of the rhythm of the game and the situation on the court became better and better. He knew when to pass the ball, when to dribble, and when to move forward. , when to back off.

In the eyes of outsiders, it is remarkable that he made a choice very quickly and accurately in a complicated situation, without thinking or hesitating at all.

………………

"Okay, Cristiano, what do you care about how Bruno did it? Anyway, we are ahead and you scored, isn't that great? Haha!" I saw the two people looking at each other face to face without speaking. , Nani hurriedly came up to smooth things over, holding the two people's necks with one hand and shouting excitedly.

"Nani is right! It was us who took the lead in the first half, and we had the advantage!" Cancelo also said.

If Bruno just joined the Portuguese national team two years ago, Bruno was simply Ronaldo's younger brother. As Bruno's performance has become better and better in the past two years, his role in the Portuguese team has become becomes complicated.

In particular, Bruno defeated Messi and Ronaldo at the beginning of this year and became the winner of the 2015 FIFA Ballon d'Or. Many players in the Portuguese national team felt that Ronaldo's attitude towards Bruno was not as close as before.

Under such circumstances, there have been many reports in the media about conflicts between Ronaldo and Bruno, which further makes the relationship between the two confusing.

Regarding the reports in the media, the players of the Portuguese national team do not think that they are false, but are based on facts. After all, the saying that one mountain cannot tolerate two tigers exists not only in the East, but also in the Western world and Portugal.

Especially Portugal's older generation Tiger King or Ronaldo, a guy who is so strong that he is abnormal. Can he really accept Bruno's rapid rise, or even challenge his status in the Portuguese team?

………………

Under such circumstances, the players of the Portuguese national team have been careful to avoid such topics after the national team gathering.

Now that they saw something abnormal in the situation between the two of them, everyone wanted to change the topic to avoid a real collision between the two.

"It's nothing. It's just a normal exchange between Ronaldo and I. You don't need to be so nervous." Bruno's right hand went around Nani's back and patted Ronaldo on the shoulder. "Isn't that right, Ronaldo?"

He looked at Ronaldo.

Ronaldo was stunned for a moment and then nodded: "Yes, it's nothing."

When everyone heard what the two of them said, they all breathed a sigh of relief, and then dispersed to discuss the first half of the game again.

So far, the Portuguese team has performed very well in this European Cup. They won first place with an unbeaten record in the group stage, and in the first round of the knockout round, they defeated the strongest team in Europe head-on in a strong dialogue. The Belgian team then eliminated the powerful Polish team led by Lewandowski in the quarterfinals. In the first half against Wales, not only did the score lead by two goals, but the situation was also completely dominant.

This made the Portuguese team players very excited to chat. Speaking of their respective performances on the court, they can only be described as dancing with joy and joy.

Cancelo did not get involved, but patted Bruno and Ronaldo hard on the shoulders, and said happily: "It's better now! It's better now!"

He didn't say what made it better, but the teammates on both sides who were constantly patted on the shoulders by him obviously knew it.

………………

Soon, the team's head coach Santos walked in. The voice in the locker room lowered slightly, but everyone was still chatting until Santos clapped his hands.

"You did a good job, gentlemen." Santos first praised the players.

"We will continue to do this in the second half. I want you to remember that a two-goal lead is not safe. There is no safe score in this world. If you can, try to expand the score as much as possible. If you can score, don't be weak. So. We don't care what Wales does in the second half and continue to attack from the beginning of the second half. Bruno, your task is to continue to create scoring opportunities."

"Yes, sir," Bruno replied.

"I know I don't need to say too much to you." Santos laughed, and he liked the little guy in front of him more and more.

After taking over the coaching job of the Portuguese national team two years ago and working with him personally, he discovered how happy it was to be his coach, because he is always thinking and is a smart person, so communication is easy.

Bruno smiled confidently.

Then, Santos turned to the players and said: "The European Cup has reached the semi-finals. I know there are a lot of discussions about us. I also know that everyone does not agree with those discussions. So today is a good opportunity to defeat Wales! Prove to them that we are not joking, we are really going to win the championship!"