Chapter 757: Divide the Forces and Attack

While the Champions League draw was going on, Manchester United had split into two teams. One team, led by assistant coach Faria, took the team's special plane to Qatar in the Middle East to participate in the 2019 Club World Cup. The other team, led by another assistant coach Carrick, stayed in the UK to play in the fifth round of the League Cup.

在今年的9月6日，国际足联决定2022年世界杯东道主卡塔尔获得2019、2020年两届世俱杯举办权，作为2022年世界杯前的测试赛。

In addition, FIFA is also planning a new Club World Cup, which will expand the number of participating teams to 24, and plans to implement a new Club World Cup system starting in 2021. However, the existing system will still be implemented this year and next year, with the six continental champions + the host league champions participating.

The reason why Manchester United made such a decision is that they could not stagger the schedules of the League Cup and the Club World Cup, so they had no choice but to make such a choice.

However, Manchester United has a good bench, and there are currently no injuries in the first team. With some players drawn from the youth team, they can form two strong teams.

The main lineup will naturally go to Qatar to participate in the Club World Cup. Most of the first-team players, including Bruno, are in this team. There are also three youth team players in this team.

That is to say, the Manchester United team going to Qatar only has fifteen first-team players.

The team that stayed in the UK to play in the League Cup was composed of the remaining twelve players of the first team, plus six players from the youth team.

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卡塔尔当地时间2019年12月18日晚，2019年世俱杯一场半决赛在多哈哈里发国际体育场打响，由欧冠冠军曼联对阵2019赛季中北美及加勒比海联赛冠军杯冠军蒙特雷。

Since Manchester United is owned by Qatari Prince Jassim, the club was treated as a host country in Qatar. On the day of the match, the Khalifa International Stadium, which can accommodate more than 45,000 fans, was completely packed, almost all of them were local Qatari fans wearing Manchester United home jerseys, and only more than 1,000 Monterrey fans came to the stadium to watch the match.

Amid the cheers of more than 40,000 Qatari fans, Manchester United firmly controlled the game from the very beginning.

In the 15th minute of the first half, Bruno passed the ball to the right, Cancelo who came in from the right made a cross, Monterrey defender Montes headed the ball, Harry Kane in the penalty area stopped the ball with his chest, dodged two Monterrey defenders, turned and shot low, Monterrey goalkeeper Barlovelo made a save but still failed to stop the ball from entering the net.

1:0, Manchester United broke the deadlock first.

In the subsequent game, Manchester United's offensive gradually increased. In the 2th minute of the game, Papon's pass was seen through by Kante. Manchester United launched a direct attack after intercepting the ball in Monterrey's half. Mbappe's shot after cutting in from the left was saved by Barlovelo. Manchester United launched a second attack and finally Bruno scored with a low shot in front of the penalty area, 0:.

Before the end of the first half, Bruno pulled the ball horizontally from the left side outside the penalty area and scored with a left-footed arc shot to change the score to 3:0.

The score of the first half was 3:0, and Manchester United temporarily led Monterrey by three goals.

However, the course of the game was far more dominant than the 3:0 score would indicate, with Manchester United possessing percent of the ball in the first half, while Monterrey only had percent. The European champions had shots, with Monterrey only having one shot, a long shot outside the penalty area.

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After the half-time break, Mourinho made a substitution adjustment, with Bellingham, a young player from the youth team, replacing Kante. The 16-year-old and 172-day-old player made his debut for Manchester United's first team, and he also broke the record for the youngest player to appear in Manchester United's first team.

A few minutes into the second half, Manchester United scored their fourth goal. Bellingham, a young substitute, passed the ball past several players and crossed it to the goal. Mbappe easily got out from behind and shot the ball into the net, 4:0.

Afterwards, Mourinho continued to adjust his troops. Harry Kane was replaced by McTominay.

Even the team captain Bruno was replaced by another young player, Chong Tasi, who was selected from the youth team.

Everyone understood that Manchester United was giving face to Monterrey by calling off the battle early.

Even so, Manchester United still scored another goal afterwards. Bellingham's long-range shot was saved by Barlovelo and hit the raised arm of the Monterrey defender, giving Manchester United a penalty kick.

Mbappe scored the penalty kick, locking the score of this Club World Cup semi-final at 5:0.

Their opponent is the Brazilian giants Flamengo, who won another semi-final a day ago.

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After the Club World Cup semi-final, Manchester United quickly returned to the hotel where they were staying. Everyone sat in front of the TV to watch Manchester United II's League Cup quarter-final against Colchester United at home.

Carrick deployed a 433 formation at home, with Romero as goalkeeper, four defenders namely Dalot, Lindelof, Tuanzebe and Brandon Williams, three midfielders namely Mata, Fred and Ashley Young, and the forward trident namely Lingard, Greenwood and Rashford.

Manchester United's young team played very actively at home.

In the 3rd minute, Rashford's direct free kick from the left flew out of the bottom line.

In the 7th minute, Rashford took another free kick, causing the opponent's goalkeeper to lose the ball. Unfortunately, Lingard, who was covering Manchester United, was a little slow to follow up and failed to make a follow-up shot.

In the 13th minute, Rashford's powerful shot from outside the penalty area was slightly above the crossbar.

In the 31st minute, Rashford's shot went wide of the left post.

Two minutes later, Rashford's shot from the left side went wide.

Neither side was able to score in the first half and the game entered the halftime break with a score of 0:0.

In the 51st minute, Romero threw the ball to start the attack, Fred made a straight pass, Rashford dribbled the ball from the left and broke into the penalty area and shot, the ball flew into the upper right corner of the goal, Manchester United led Colchester United 1:0.

After wasting almost a dozen chances, Rashford finally scored.

In the 56th minute, Ashley Young passed the ball, Lingard made a cross from the right, and Greenwood made a shot in the small penalty area, and Manchester United expanded their lead to 2:0.

In the 61st minute, Mata made a wonderful pass from the top of the arc, Rashford calmly passed the ball across from the left wing of the penalty area, and Greenwood fell to the ground and shot into the upper right corner in the small penalty area. While scoring his second goal, he helped Manchester United change the score to 3:0.

This was also the final score of the game. Manchester United defeated their opponents and advanced to the League Cup semi-finals.

Dividing their forces and fighting on two fronts, and achieving great victories on both fronts, this Manchester United team is so strong in all aspects!

In the other three matches before, Liverpool, who strategically gave up the League Cup and also sent out the youth team to compete, was slaughtered 5-0 by Manchester United, which was in sharp contrast to Manchester United.

This is also the reason why Liverpool is still not optimistic despite its very good performance this season. Their bench is too thin!

曼城则是在客场3:1击败牛津联队，埃弗顿和莱斯特城在九十分钟里战成2:2，点球大战中莱斯特城取胜，以4:2的总比分淘汰埃弗顿。

In the subsequent semi-final draw, Manchester United again drew Manchester City. This was the first time the two teams met in the League Cup semi-finals after two years.

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Three days later, on the evening of December 12, the third-place match of the Club World Cup kicked off at the Khalifa International Stadium in Doha. Monterrey and the AFC Champions League champion Al-Hilal were tied 21:90 in 2 minutes. In the subsequent penalty shootout, Monterrey won 2:4.

About an hour after the third and fourth place final ended, the Club World Cup final continued at the Khalifa International Stadium in Doha, with defending champions Manchester United facing Brazilian giants Flamengo.

At the beginning of the game, Flamengo adopted a defensive counterattack posture. Their formation retreated, and when they gained possession of the ball, if it was a positional battle, they did not deploy many troops to attack, appearing to be quite cautious.

"We saw that Flamengo seemed to be willing to concede possession in order to try to counterattack United," Lineker said.

"This is a wise choice. Although Flamengo eliminated Al-Hilal with a big score of 3:1 in the semi-finals, their strength is indeed much worse than that of Manchester United. Their head coach Jorge Jesus was not carried away by the victory of that game. Jorge Jesus has coached in the Portuguese Super League for a long time and only returned to Brazil this summer to become the head coach of Flamengo. He naturally knows how strong Manchester United is that dominates Europe." Rio Ferdinand, the commentator of this game, said.

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The game had been going on for more than ten minutes and Flamengo was completely suppressed in their own half. They couldn't even get past the half. In these ten minutes, Manchester United had already completed three shots. If it weren't for the outstanding performance of Flamengo goalkeeper Diego Alves and the help of the post, Flamengo would have lost at least one goal.

"We played a little too conservatively, Jorge was too conservative. Ballard, a local commentator in Rio de Janeiro, criticized, "Now that Manchester United is pressing them in the penalty area, it is only a matter of time for Flamengo to lose the ball. The team should be braver and push the formation forward a little."

"It's not that Jorge is conservative, it's that the strength gap between the two teams is too obvious." Ballard's commentary partner said something fair for Jorge Jesus.

Mourinho glanced towards Flamengo's coaching bench. Since the opponent was so polite, he would not be polite.

Of course, Mourinho is also very familiar with Flamengo's head coach Jorge Jesus. When he was the head coach of Porto, Jorge Jesus was the head coach of another Portuguese Super League team Guimarães. The two sides have been dealing with each other since then.

Mourinho was not surprised that Jorge Jesus adopted a defensive counterattack tactic in the final, as he was mentally prepared for it.