The first half of the game was spent with the Saints lamenting.
There is nothing more demoralizing than falling 1-0 behind a team that has no hope of relegation.
In the player tunnel, the faces of the starting players from both sides were completely different. They were two extremes.
The home team players looked sad, but the visiting team players were chatting and laughing.
A one-goal lead is equivalent to double insurance for Millwall. After all, Southampton is striving to win this game.
A draw means nothing against the Saints.
"Oh oh oh oh! Another one, another one!"
"Oh oh oh oh, kill him, kill him!"
"Oh oh oh oh, I can't advance to the next level, I can't advance to the next level!"
More than 4,000 football hooligans shouted in unison in the stands, nakedly announcing their intentions.
Ha ha!
We were downgraded anyway.
We are here this time just to prevent you from getting into the top six.
How about it?
What can you do to me?
Come scold me!
Come and hit me!
You have the ability to defeat us!
Hahahaha, I just like to see how you can't stand it and can't beat us.
The players who returned to the locker room lowered their heads one by one and remained silent.
Keegan didn't get angry because he was behind. He stood in front with a calm face and explained word by word how to play in the second half.
"The opponent is not strong and plays very rough. So we must seize every opportunity of positional warfare, penetrate into the opponent's penalty area, and then deliver a fatal blow."
"Bell, you have to lean inside when you have the chance. Dribbling and ball control are your strengths, but high-altitude balls are not your weakness. You can use your height to go to the penalty area to meet your teammates."
"Dale, if your teammates pass the ball to your feet at a critical moment, don't hesitate. Just kick it when you need to, and hit when you need to. I will give you a certain right to fire."
"Fernandez, you are a veteran on the team. You have rich experience. You need to coordinate more in the midfield and backcourt. It is not impossible to take some extreme measures at critical moments. Do you understand?"
"Lallana, you are still young and you are very smart. But your body has always been your weakness. You have to be smarter. You can create more offside traps, or use your dexterity to get ahead of the opponent. Remember. , the clearance must be thorough, and don’t always think about controlling the ball. Defusing the opponent’s attack is the primary responsibility of a central defender.”
...
Kevin Keegan methodically arranged the tactics for the second half, and the players sat quietly in their seats and listened quietly.
After a while, there was a slight snoring sound from the corner.
None of the 11 main starting players said they were tired. Who was snoring at this time?
Everyone turned to look. Wang Xiaodong was leaning on the chair, his head resting on the wardrobe behind him, soundly asleep, as if Keegan's tactical explanation of the second half had nothing to do with him.
"Everyone, stop looking and continue to listen to the coach." Jack clapped his hands and drew everyone's attention back.
However, these players who were sitting upright again invariably had other thoughts.
How great it would be if Dong were on the field!
If Dong was on the court, all these problems wouldn't be a problem.
...
In the second half, the two sides changed sides and fought again.
The players worked hard to play according to Keegan's teachings, but the actual situation on the court was not as one-sided as the tactical board.
The player here just used a one-two to meet the tactical requirements explained by Keegan. Before the player over there could move, he was caught, stuck or even tackled by his opponent.
When the tactical plan was dismembered by fouls, those players with less understanding immediately became incapable of playing.
Millwall guys are here to cause trouble today.
After playing for nearly an hour so far, 11 players have received 5 yellow cards. This was a decision made decisively by the referee after seeing their intensification.
boom!
Smoke and dust were everywhere.
Another nasty conflict.
Millwall's fullback Dunn used his legs to stop Harper, who was sprinting at high speed, and tripped him down. Then he raised his hands to show his innocence.
Poor Harper tripped to the ground and rolled around three or four times before being stepped on by one foot.
The camera panned upwards, and Wang Xiaodong's face soon appeared in the center of the camera.
Just opposite him, Dunn was smiling at him with an innocent face.
The opponent's chin keeps moving, as if to say: "Come on, if you have the guts, go for it!"
"Beep!"
The referee's whistle sounded and he rushed to show Millwall the sixth yellow card of the game.
"Oh! What a tragedy!"
The on-site commentator shouted with a sad face: "This was obviously a bad intentional foul, but the instigator only received a painless yellow card."
"Look at Millwall, are they going to leave St Mary's Stadium with a yellow card?"
Harpers fell in front of the Southampton bench. Two team doctors came over to check and shook their heads.
"Substitute." Keegan said solemnly.
Just like this, in the 61st minute of the game, Southampton had already wasted two substitutions due to injuries.
All the Saints in the stands were filled with righteous indignation, clenching their fists and angrily cursing the visiting team players in barren vocabulary.
The Millwall players, who are used to seeing "big winds and waves", simply dismissed it.
You can scold me all you want, but you can't do anything to me anyway!
The louder you boo, the more excited we get!
We are Millwall and none of us care!
After Keegan passively made two substitution adjustments, the players on the field also played more cautiously.
Everyone wants to win, but no one wants to be the next "sacrifice".
On Millwall's side, except for the goalkeeper, there are four players who do not have yellow cards.
When facing these four players, the players became even more timid, fearing that the opponent would come and sweep them directly into the hospital.
Seeing this, the away team played even more aggressively.
The football hooligans in the stands also shouted without hesitation: "Fuck them to death, so they can't get into the top six! Fuck them to death!!!"
There is a lot of foul language in this hallowed football ground called St. Mary's.
Looking at the scoreboard and timer above his head, Dyer gritted his teeth.
If you don't score a goal, it will be too late!
If this game cannot be won, Southampton has only a theoretical possibility of entering the top four.
So what if you win the League Cup?
All these efforts in the league were in vain!
Thinking of the team members' training from early in the morning to late at night, and thinking of the goal they had shouted out in unity before, Dyer gritted his teeth and suddenly jumped out of the crowd.
Fernandez's eyes lit up and he quickly took the free kick.
The ball went over the heads of most players and landed accurately in the Millwall penalty area.
In the blank area of the penalty area, Dyer, who was running and looking back, turned around and stopped the ball with his chest as expected.
The ball landed accurately on his chest. Dyer took a deep breath, let his chest shrink, and the ball naturally fell to his feet.
"Fernandez takes a quick free kick..."
"Dair..."
"Inside!"
"Turn around and shoot!"
"Oh!!!"
The opportunity was fleeting. In order to seize this critical shooting opportunity, Dyer turned around and swung his leg before the ball landed, and used his left foot, which he was not good at, to hit the ball.
The powerful shot did not go straight to the goal as Dyer had expected, but hit the far post with a bang and bounced off the baseline.
Seeing such a result, Dai immediately covered his face and squatted down, regretting it endlessly.
If I had tightened my instep...
If I had pressed down lower...
If I had Bale's left foot...
If the one who just shot was Dong...
Looking at the frustrated Dyer, two Millwall players not far away came together, exchanged glances with each other, and then showed a cruel smile.
Dyer's volley inspired the Saints' fighting spirit. Under the pressure of falling behind, Southampton made several consecutive attacks.
With Bell on the left as the spearhead, most of the balls that hit the frontcourt will eventually be passed to Bell's feet. In contrast, Dyer on the other side began to retreat frequently, and sometimes even retreated directly to the midfield to receive the ball.
In the 69th minute, after several consecutive passes in the backcourt, the ball came to the right again.
As soon as Dyer stepped on the ball in front of the sideline, a black and white figure slid past him.
The alert Dyer stepped on the ball and pulled it back, allowing David Livermore to pass the sliding tackle, then pushed the ball forward and dribbled the ball along the sideline.
While running, he looked up and observed the movement of his teammates.
But before he could take two steps, he suddenly realized something was wrong.
The opponent in front of him had a hint of pride in his eyes, but the faces of his teammates gradually turned into horror.
Walter?
What happened?
Could it be...
Before Dyer could react, he felt a huge momentum coming from in front of his feet, which instantly overturned him.
It's David who just scooped up! ! !
Seeing that Dyer was still controlling the ball, David immediately got up and rushed towards Dyer not far away.
Because Dyer's attention was all on his running teammates, he didn't even notice the crisis coming diagonally behind him.
"ah!!!"
A scream rang through the sky.
At this moment, even Keegan, who had always been calm and calm, instantly jumped up from his chair.
Dyer, who was shoveled to the ground, was thrown to the ground, with an expression of indescribable pain on his face.
"Beep!!!"
Referee Ricardo's whistle sounded again.
He kept shaking his head as he ran.
This ball is not easy to judge!
David tackled from behind, but he was not targeting Dyer's fragile heel. He first fell to the ground to stretch his legs, and then hooked the ball at Dyer's feet with the arch of his foot on the turf.
The reason why Dyer fell to the ground injured was due to tripping, but a large part of the reason was that he did not expect David to get up and catch up so quickly, so he was unprepared.
In fact, if the screams in Dyer were not too harsh, Ricardo would not even want to take out the cards.
This is a standard tackle from behind, where the ball is tackled first and then the ball holder is hit.
But the crux of the matter is that Dyer must have suffered other injuries during the fall, otherwise he wouldn't have been able to show such pain in a moment.
Since the injury was caused by the tackle, no matter how clean and up to standard the previous tackle was, it would still be a foul.
But the question is, whether to give a yellow card or a red card.
The players gathered together in an instant, surrounding Ricardo in the center.
Both sides insisted on their own opinions and refused to give in. There was even a sense of deja vu that a war would start.
"Referee, red card, it must be a red card! What a bad behind-the-back foul. Are you blind?"
"Referee, this is a standard tackle. The first thing we touched was the ball! The guy was pretending to be injured. Can't you tell?"
"Give the offender a red card!"
“Give the flopper a yellow card!!!”
Fans from both sides had different opinions, and the St. Mary's Stadium was noisy.
At this moment, Dyer, who originally fell to the sidelines, gritted his teeth and rolled over on the ground.
While others gathered around the referee to demand an explanation, he endured the pain, gritted his teeth, and used the strength of his upper limbs to crawl toward the sidelines bit by bit.
Dyer just picked up the turf and moved inch by inch to the water fountain.
He raised his head and saw the cold face.
"Winter..." Dyer squeezed out a familiar syllable through his teeth.
Seeing Dale's appearance, Wang Xiaodong couldn't hold his face any longer.
"Dong, the coach cares about you." Dyer grabbed Wang Xiaodong's foot and dug his thumb deeply into the foot socket of his sneakers because of the pain.
"We are football players, not boxers. You should not take the initiative to hit people."
"Don't you understand this?"
"Dair, stop talking." Wang Xiaodong stepped forward and held Dyer's shoulders, "Hey, team doctor, here, here! What are you looking at? Treat Dyer's leg injury quickly!"
The two team doctors not far away were stunned and looked at each other. One was looking for medicine in the medicine box, and the other was calling 120. No one noticed that Dyer had crawled so far behind him.
"Dong, don't blame the boss, he is really good for you!"
He didn't cry when he was injured in the tackle, nor did he cry when the team doctor checked the injury. But when he said this, the seven-foot man finally couldn't help it, and tears burst from the corners of his eyes.
"Winter, Millwall is nothing to be afraid of. Southampton can beat them in minutes as long as you are here!"
"Everyone has worked hard all season, we can't lose at the last moment!"
"Isn't this how we persisted in the League Cup?"
"Dong, since we still have some energy left, why can't we use it?"
"winter..."
Before he finished speaking, Dyer was put on a stretcher by two team doctors and quickly carried out of the stadium.
Looking at Dyer who was wiping away tears on the stretcher, Wang Xiaodong stood up suddenly and came to Keegan expressionlessly.
"Old man..."
A month later, Wang Xiaodong stood in front of Keegan again, looking at each other.
Looking at Keegan's calm eyes, Wang Xiaodong's lips twitched a few times, and finally squeezed out a few words from his throat: "Old man, I was wrong, I shouldn't have hit someone..."
At this point, Wang Xiaodong looked away and gritted his teeth, unable to say a word.
"Okay, I understand." Looking at the veins popping up on Wang Xiaodong's arms, Keegan nodded and said softly: "Go and warm up."
