Green Field Eunuch

Chapter 373 Guardiola's Transformation

The new season is about to begin, and Manchester City's competition starts with the Community Shield.

However, with the arrival of the new coaching staff, Manchester City's training has also changed significantly.

The new coach brought about new changes, and new changes inevitably bring joy to some and sorrow to others. Shan Yongzhuo was one of the more sorrowful ones.

"Single, I hope you can participate more in the attack and have more coordination with your teammates, instead of always relying on your individual ability to score goals."

These are the words that Guardiola said to Shan Yongzhuo himself.

However, Shan Yongzhuo's performance in training was quite different from Guardiola's requirements.

According to Guardiola's idea, he wanted to transform Shan Yongzhuo into a player like Messi, who could drop back and not only break through with his own abilities, but also connect with his teammates and organize attacks from the attacking midfield position.

Guardiola hopes to build a central axis at Manchester City consisting of players like Hakimi, Shan Yongzhuo, and Aguero.

Therefore, Guardiola fielded a 3-4-2-1 formation in several warm-up matches.

Let's leave aside the three-defender formation for now.

In midfield, Guardiola even tried placing Shan Yongzhuo in the central midfield position.

The four defensive midfielders, Yaya Toure, Javi Garcia, Nasri, and Milner, lined up in a row.

Shan Yongzhuo and David Silva were placed in the attacking midfield position, while Aguero was positioned at the very front.

According to Guardiola's requirements, this formation can be switched to 3-4-3 at any time. When attacking, Aguero and Silva can also move to the flanks, while Shan Yongzhuo can push forward into the middle.

However, after two warm-up matches, Guardiola discovered a significant problem.

The most important point is the issue of Shan Yongzhuo.

In the past, Shan Yongzhuo has always played the role of a free agent in the frontcourt, making runs and seeking goals according to his own ideas, thus maximizing his personal abilities.

However, after fixing Shan Yongzhuo in the attacking midfield position, Guardiola's tactic of relying on Silva and Shan Yongzhuo as the core to control the ball did not work.

He discovered that neither of these two players was suited to a possession-based style of play.

Silva is a breakthrough player who is good at combining play on the wings and in the middle, rather than a player who controls the tempo like Xavi.

Shan Yongzhuo is even more outrageous. He is a player who rarely occupies the ball, but waits for the right moment to deliver a fatal blow to the opponent.

As a result, neither of the attacking midfielders is used to controlling the tempo through ball possession, and Javi Garcia is only a sweeping defensive midfielder.

Needless to say, Yaya Toure ignored Guardiola's words and continued to push forward at his own pace.

Mancini's 4-2-2-2 formation was actually more of a defensive counter-attacking, fast-paced offensive tactic.

More often than not, it is even somewhat similar to the British 4-4-2 formation.

This group of Manchester City players is not well-suited to controlling the tempo of the game.

In the end, Manchester City's style of play on the field unconsciously reverted to their usual wing play and individual performance by Shan Yongzhuo.

Guardiola is having a bit of a headache about this, but he doesn't have a good solution for the time being.

Moreover, he discovered that many key players clearly did not trust him much. They obviously trusted Shan Yongzhuo more and liked to surround Shan Yongzhuo during training, and did not pay much attention to his tactical lessons.

"Is this the influence of Shan Yongzhuo...?"

Guardiola was utterly helpless about this. He was unwilling to rely entirely on Shan Yongzhuo like Mancini did. He came to Manchester City partly because of Shan Yongzhuo and Manchester City's high salaries, and partly because he wanted to prove his tactics. He believed that his tactics could make Manchester City and Shan Yongzhuo invincible.

However, Guardiola is also under considerable pressure. After all, Manchester City didn't experience any major personnel changes this summer, and the core players have largely remained. This group of key players is the same group that just won five titles with Mancini; they are the championship-winning squad. As the new head coach, he wants to build the team according to his own philosophy, so the pressure is considerable.

Now, he finds the problem a bit tricky.

Within the team, Shan Yongzhuo is clearly more influential, and the players generally prefer to listen to him and play the game in the way he is familiar with.

He even began to believe that if he clashed with Shan Yongzhuo, many players would definitely side with Shan Yongzhuo.

Also.

Guardiola was also surprised by Shan Yongzhuo's attitude towards training.

This guy's training can be described as completely undisciplined. He only does his own thing and basically doesn't participate in things he doesn't consider important, or if he does, he's half-hearted.

For example, during his own tactics lessons, this guy slept most of the time and barely listened.

This training attitude is really quite bad.

Guardiola wanted to make an example of Shan Yongzhuo, but he found that his teammates seemed to have already gotten used to Shan's attitude towards training.

Moreover, Shan Yongzhuo...

He needs to think this over carefully; after all, he's a newcomer, while Shan Yongzhuo is already the king of Manchester City.

The Community Shield is coming soon.

Manchester City will host Manchester United.

This is a very important test for Guardiola.

However, Guardiola is considering another issue: he is not planning to field Shan Yongzhuo in this match.

Although it's the Community Shield, it's still the first title of the new season, and everyone at Manchester City is really looking forward to winning it.

The same applies to Guardiola; as the new head coach, it is very important to win a championship first.

However, Guardiola had a different idea. He wanted to gradually reduce Shan Yongzhuo's influence in the team. He wanted to instill in the other players the idea that even if Shan Yongzhuo didn't play, they could still win championships by training and playing according to his tactics.

"In that case, Shan Yongzhuo will definitely accept my tactics!"

Guardiola was secretly pleased, so Shan Yongzhuo sat on the bench for this match.

Manchester City's players were somewhat surprised by Shan Yongzhuo's substitution, but since Guardiola is the manager, they had no reason to question it.

Only Yaya Toure whispered in Shan Yongzhuo's ear, "See, Shan, he's going to suppress you. That guy says one thing and does another!"

Yaya Toure seemed indignant, but Shan Yongzhuo didn't take it to heart, knowing that the guy had a deep grudge against Guardiola.

However, Shan Yongzhuo was actually a little depressed and angry inside.

The first match of the new season, and it's also a Community Shield match.

Although it was a meaningless championship, it was still a competition for the title.

Moreover, you can't score goals if you can't play...

He could naturally see that Guardiola wanted to reform him, and that Guardiola was trying to suppress him after he went his own way.

"Damn it, if all else fails, I'm going back to Granada! Let's see who dares to try and reform me then!"

(End of this chapter)