After defeating the biggest dark horse in this season's Champions League at home and not allowing their opponents to score away goals, Tottenham can be said to have stepped into the semi-finals with one foot, and the promotion situation is excellent. Villarreal has to face a serious problem, that is, who can take over the important role of the playmaker when Riquelme is physically exhausted?
As mentioned before, Villarreal's current offensive and defensive system is almost entirely built around Riquelme's characteristics. Because Riquelme has a historical level of personal skills and top-notch passing vision, the passing and control system built by Villarreal with him as the core can not only find opportunities on the offensive end, but also help the team relieve defensive pressure. !
Now, Tottenham is accelerating the consumption of Riquelme's already insufficient physical energy by increasing physical confrontation and accelerating the pace of the game, leaving Villarreal in a dilemma - if the next round continues with With Riquelme as the absolute core, Tottenham are bound to repeat their old tricks, and they will definitely be dead by then; if Riquelme is given a substitute or helper to share the pressure on his shoulders, not to mention Villa's current situation. Whether Real can find such a player in the team may also cause Riquelme's dissatisfaction.
The reason why Villarreal in the previous life shined in the Champions League was, on the one hand, the whole team was in great shape and united as one, and on the other hand, it was also because they had not faced an opponent of Tottenham's level in the knockout stages—— Needless to say about Glasgow Rangers and Inter Milan, Arsenal was able to achieve a breakthrough in the European competition mainly because Wenger was finally willing to let go of his body and play defensive counterattack. Facing submarines who are also based on defense, it is difficult to consume Ricker like Tottenham. May's physical ability.
Excellent skills, broad vision, good scoring ability, not involved in defense, withdrawn personality, slow pace when on the ball... The advantages and disadvantages are extremely clear, which is the key reason that restricts Riquelme from gaining a foothold in the top clubs. Especially after Porto won the Champions League and the Greek miracle the year before last, the entire world of football refreshed its understanding of team combat and overall defense. In such an environment, Riquelme, who still adheres to the classic attacking midfielder style, naturally becomes the one who doesn't fit in, and naturally no wealthy clubs will pay more attention to him.
It is true that there are still a few classical attacking midfielders playing in wealthy clubs in international football, but they are generally veterans over 30 who have been famous for a long time and have already established their status in the locker room. The head coach designs tactics specifically for them. There is nothing wrong with that. As for Morfeo and Riquelme, a group of classical attacking midfielders who were born at the wrong time, it is naturally impossible for them to get such preferential treatment from wealthy families. What's more terrible is that Riquelme's withdrawn character prevents him from quickly integrating into the locker room - as the absolute core, both Zidane and Platini are able to unite their surrounding teammates and twist the team into a rope. Riquelme needs the trust of the head coach to establish his position in the team. This is why after the peak season of 2005-06, Pellegrini, who acquired Pires and discovered Cazorla, was able to quickly abandon Riquelme. Because there are not many players in the locker room who are willing to support Riquelme!
Time came to April 1, 2006, the 32nd round of the Premier League, and Tottenham came to St. James Park for a duel with Newcastle United. Faced with the Magpies, who were sending their main players to ensure their qualification for the European war next season, Tottenham, which sent out a mixed lineup of almost all substitutes + young players, unsurprisingly fell into a hard battle!
Fortunately, Alan Shearer's retirement last summer had a bigger impact on Newcastle United than imagined. After losing Shearer, the Magpies' newly introduced players such as Owen and Boumsong this season were either injured or performed poorly, causing a huge decline in the team's level on both offense and defense. Coupled with the rigid thinking of Magpies head coach Souness, who ignored the actual situation of the team and insisted on pursuing the traditional British 4-4-2 two-wing tactic, this allowed Tottenham, who was at a disadvantage on the scene, not to be scored by the home team, but instead scored. Able to seize the opportunity to launch a quick counterattack that scares the home team fans!
Before the end of the first half, Klose seized the opportunity of Bumson's distraction on Tottenham's side and cut into the penalty area from Diego's through ball and scored with a powerful shot. He also withstood Newcastle in the following time. A crazy counterattack, barely holding on to a 1-0 victory!
If Klose hadn't had an idea and stole a goal, this game would have been in doubt. There are still six rounds of the league to end, and there are still Manchester United and Arsenal... It seems that it is time to adjust the rotation tactics. On the way back to the visiting team's locker room, George secretly wiped the cold sweat on his forehead and thought to himself.
It can only be said that the negative impact of Birmingham's previous killing tactics on Tottenham is much greater than it seems, causing Tottenham to face the embarrassing situation of insufficient manpower on the league battlefield. Coupled with Chelsea's hot pursuit behind Tottenham, Tottenham's pressure in the league at this time has not actually been reduced much.
Different from the situation in the previous life when they dominated the standings and lost a few games in the final stage of the season, Chelsea, as the pursuer, went all out this time. After losing the crucial game against Tottenham, Chelsea won all three of their next three league games without letting the six-point gap widen further.
Four days after defeating Newcastle, on April 5, the Tottenham team came to the Love Song Stadium to welcome the second round knockout match with Villarreal!
Building a stadium with a capacity of 30,000 people in a small city of only 50,000 people, and almost every venue was full... This is evident from the fanatical football atmosphere of Villarreal.
Learning from the experience and lessons learned from the first round, Pellegrini made adjustments to the starting lineup: Vieira, Venta, Pena, Quique Alvarez, Arua Barena, Senna, Tachi Nati, Guayre, Riquelme, Solin and Diego Forlan became the starting eleven for the Yellow Submarine in this game!
Obviously, through observation of the previous round, the Chilean engineer has discovered that it is extremely dangerous to arrange only two full-backs to deal with Tottenham's wing impact, and whether it is Vieira or Barbosa There are obvious problems in judging the high ball and the timing of the attack, so he would rather remove a forward and reduce a defensive midfielder, and change from 4-4-2 to 4-5-1 to strengthen Billy. Yarreal's defensive strength on the wing - if Ronaldo, Robben and others are allowed to roam freely on the wing, coupled with forwards such as Drogba and Klose who are excellent at heading the ball or grabbing points, it will be worse than Liarreal is afraid that it will repeat the mistakes of the first round between the two sides.
The same goes for Gonzalo Rodriguez not being included in the starting lineup. Although the Argentinian central defender escaped the fate of being injured in the Champions League knockout round and eventually turning into a glass man, it is too much to ask him with average physical fitness to fight against a monster like Drogba.
Looking at Tottenham again, despite winning by two goals in the first round, George had no intention of underestimating the opponent or retaining his strength - otherwise Tottenham would not have been so passive in the match against Newcastle four days ago - except for using Stephen ·Karl replaced Maicon, who was suspended due to accumulated yellow cards. Tottenham's starting lineup for this game was exactly the same as in the first round!
With the referee's whistle, the second leg of the Champions League quarter-final between Tottenham and Villarreal finally started amid the cheers of more than 30,000 fans at the scene!
