[Football] Bad Boy Batty

164
As Christmas approaches, the penalty controversy in the Manchester derby has not yet been completely resolved, but Manchester City has been involved in even bigger trouble.

German media "Der Spiegel" exposed a series of emails circulating within Manchester City last weekend, and published an article accusing its owner Sheikh Mansour of using his own money to falsify accounts in Manchester City's transactions with sponsors in order to evade sanctions under UEFA's FFP policy (Financial Fair Play Act).

At the same time, Der Spiegel also stated that Manchester City was able to successfully facilitate Neymar's transfer in this summer's transfer window not only because it offered a sufficient price, but also because it had "someone above (UEFA/FIFA)".

Hot comments on Twitter:
What else does this imply? You might as well just type out Edmundo's name.
The article caused an immediate uproar as soon as it was published. Unable to withstand the criticism from the public, UEFA publicly issued a statement, demanding that Manchester City give an explanation before Christmas.

Manchester City took a tough stance, saying: "We will not make any comments on materials allegedly stolen from Manchester City Club, Manchester City staff and related persons while the situation is still unclear."

They believe that all the allegations come from "stolen and tampered emails" and therefore refuse to give an explanation. At the same time, Manchester City's leaders believe that UEFA should focus on investigating how the emails were leaked.

On the day of Manchester City's away game against Chelsea, UEFA officially issued a statement on the Financial Fair Play Act and also stated that it would restart the investigation into Manchester City.

Batistuta saw the news on the bus to Stamford Bridge, but like his teammates, he is not worried about the club being punished.

Just the night before, the club president sent a text message to each of them, telling them to put their minds at ease, that UEFA might investigate and intervene slightly in their finances, but that would not have any impact on the team, and not to listen to the rumors on the Internet (that they might be banned from the Champions League).

"Leave professional matters to professionals." Guardiola said in the middle of the locker room, "Don't worry about anything. There is only one thing you need to do, and that is to play well."

Batistuta responded while bandaging his shin guards, while Loach stood beside him holding his sneakers.

"You should change your shin guards, Batty." The black boy smacked his lips and said, "The surface of this is polished. I can even see your face through it."

"Really?" Batistuta raised an eyebrow and looked over. "But this is my lucky shin guard. I wore it when I played against Barcelona two years ago and dribbled past their entire defense."

Loach: "That's because you're strong, not because of the shin guards." He took out a pair of brand new shin guards like a magician, "Try this, Nike just sent it, and it has a photo of you, me, and your godfather printed on it."

Hearing that the group photo was printed inside, Batti hesitated.

Loach struck while the iron was hot and directed the topic to Neymar, who was sitting next to him and looked like he was praying or meditating: "Neymar always changes his shin guards, but it doesn't stop him from scoring goals, right?"

"Hmm?" Neymar subconsciously uttered a confused single sound. After Niu Qi repeated it, he nodded. "Yes, sponsors need advertising. For me, as long as it has photos of my family on it and is comfortable to wear, it feels the same."

Batty rolled his eyes slightly, and finally accepted Loach's advice. He untied the half-tied bandage and replaced himself with new shin guards.

Loach was satisfied. Half a minute later he was called away by the person in charge of the locker room. Batistuta wrapped the bandage on his calf, stood up and jumped to feel the comfort, then turned his head and saw Neymar in a trance again.

"What? Are you worried that the club will find problems and send you back to France to be kicked?" Batistuta gently pushed Neymar's head and teased, "Or do you not believe that I can play in Akun's position?"

"No." Neymar held Batistuta's hand and smiled, "I was just daydreaming."

In fact, he has a lot of worries recently, such as the dispute over the loyalty award when he left Barcelona, ​​he wanted to take on a new documentary but his father didn't quite approve of it, and there was also the matter of his sister Rafina and the real and fake friends around him, not to mention a little bastard who was always teasing him. It was too much.

But Batty didn't need to know that.

Neymar returned to his usual happy self, "I was wondering -" he quietly held the other's fingers, "how I tricked you into going to the tattoo shop."

"Hey! You don't remember anything I said, do you?" Barty's eyes widened. "When you sent me the picture, I said I would like to have that tattoo. It's beautiful."

"I mean - when should we go? There is no Christmas holiday in the Premier League. We have to play games then, right?"

"Any time is fine. If you want, we'll go after the game today."

……

Obviously Batty underestimated the difficulty of this game.

This can't be blamed on him. No one was optimistic about Chelsea before the game.

Ever since the Blues signed Serie A tactician Sarri as head coach at the last minute at the beginning of the season, their results have been unstable. The heat of three consecutive wins at the start has also declined, and blows have followed one after another. After losing to Wolves last week, Chelsea under Sarri suffered two consecutive defeats and even fell out of the Champions League zone in the standings, ranking only 6th in the Premier League.

Sarri's style is somewhat similar to Guardiola's, which is essentially a fast-paced, possession-based, offensive football style, which many people call vertical "tiki-taka".

But last season, Sarri's Napoli faced Guardiola's Manchester City in the European war. Manchester City won with a big score of 10-3 in two rounds. Sarri himself admitted to the media that watching Manchester City's game videos was a torture and he was very tormented.

In this game, Aguero was rested on the bench, but Jesus did not get a chance to start. Guardiola took out the strikerless formation he had treasured for many years and put Batistuta in the center position.

Although his position is center forward, Batistuta actually plays the role of a shadow striker when he actually plays. Guardiola has not given up on training Batistuta to be the core of the midfield and frontcourt and making plans for his future career.

Batistuta played in a similar position last season, but the results were not ideal, but this doesn't mean anything, at least not for Guardiola.

And Batty——

Batistuta had no objection to this, after all, he was "arrogant" enough to think that he could play in all positions in the frontcourt.

Neymar is still on the left and Sterling is on the right.

Rumor has it that Sterling was unhappy with the club for signing Neymar, whose position conflicted with his, without notifying him. This greatly reduced his playing time. If no better solution can be found, then he can only seek a transfer.

However, it is unknown what exactly happened and what Sterling himself thought. At least he did not express it in the locker room and still participated in training as usual.

Back to the game.

At the beginning, both sides seemed cautious.

In the 8th minute, Chelsea midfielder Jorginho made a pass error, Neymar intercepted the ball and sent a cross from the left side of the penalty area. Batistuta seemed not to have expected this to happen. He shot carelessly near the penalty spot, but the shot was not strong enough and was easily confiscated by the Blues' new goalkeeper Kepa.

Damn it!
It would be better if I put a little more effort into hitting the near corner.

Batistuta waved his fist and stood up, giving Neymar a thumbs up. It was his fault and Batistuta never blames others for his mistakes (on the court).

Neymar was a little helpless, as that was a free scoring opportunity. However, he didn't say anything more about Batistuta's mistake.

"Come on! Let's do it again!"

……

But the opposite happened, and the game fell into a stalemate afterwards. Manchester City's pressing caused considerable trouble for Chelsea's midfield organization. Chelsea's defense was also in place, leaving little offensive space for Manchester City.

The two sides fought back and forth, neither finding a good opportunity.

In the 32nd minute, Sterling made a straight pass and Neymar's small-angle shot from the left side of the penalty area was blocked by defender Azpilicueta's foot. Then Batistuta's follow-up shot missed the goal.

Kepa kicked the ball with a long kick, intending to launch a quick break, but unfortunately his accuracy was not high. Fernandinho got the first point, he protected the ball, Lucas pressed forward to receive the ball, and pretended to cooperate with David Silva, and passed the ball to Batistuta.

"Go up, go up! Ney!"

Before Batistuta could even speak, Neymar was already on the left, this is the tacit understanding of the world's top players. Manchester City's textbook counterattack directly broke through Chelsea's midfield defense, with Batistuta and Neymar playing a beautiful two-on-three combination on the left and delivering a high-quality cross.

'broken! '

David Luiz felt a chill in his heart, seeing that Manchester City were about to fall behind at home.

Sterling kicked the ball into the stands.

[Oh! What a pity! Sterling is happy again! If this ball had gone in, it would have been a great example of a teamwork counterattack goal! ]

"Rahim!! What are you doing!"

Watching the assist he had obtained disappear in such a low-level way, Batistuta held his head in pain and was furious.

So he couldn't help but started spraying venom again.

Batistuta: "Did you eat your shooting boots?"
Batistuta: "An 80-year-old grandmother who needs help crossing the road can kick that ball in!"

The broadcast camera thoughtfully gave a replay, and the audience found that at the moment Sterling hit the ball away, Guardiola and Batistuta on the sidelines made the same head-holding action, which was almost exactly the same. The only difference was that Batistuta had hair and Guardiola did not.

Sterling also knew how outrageous his mistake was. He didn't dare to look at Batistuta. He complained quietly about the grass and today's wind, wiped the sweat off his face with his jersey, and quickly returned to his position.

Batty stopped holding on and ended his remaining complaints with a wave of his hand.

At the end of the first half, neither side scored a goal.

……

In the 51st minute, the deadlock was broken.

But not Manchester City.

William's cross from the left side of the penalty area was headed out by Stones, Marco Alonso pressed forward to meet the ball, Hazard made a ghost-like run and passed the ball back from the right side of the penalty area, Kante followed up and pushed the ball into the bottom right corner of the net from 14 yards before Fernandinho.

1-0! Chelsea leads at home!

Manchester City players were a little dejected as this was the first time this season that they conceded the first goal in the second half.

"Hey! Cheer up! Be professional, everyone!" Batty maintained a good mentality. He clapped his hands to encourage his teammates, "It's not time to sigh yet! Run, run!"

……

In the 65th minute, both sides called for substitutions.

Chelsea replaced Barkley to strengthen defense, while Manchester City replaced B Silva with Gundogan and Jesus replaced Sterling to strengthen attack.

Two minutes later, Batistuta created an opportunity near the midfield and made a sharp change of direction to fool one, two, and three defenders. It seemed that he wanted to replicate his previous superb goal.

However, the reason why a miracle is called a miracle is because it cannot be replicated.

Azpilicueta and Luis teamed up to steal the ball from Batistuta. Both sides returned to the midfield to fight for the ball. Lucas made a long pass to the frontcourt, but Neymar headed the ball wide.

Maybe the goddess of luck was not on Manchester City's side today, or maybe Hazard's performance in this game was indeed outstanding. In the 85th minute, Chelsea scored again.

It was a corner kick opportunity for Chelsea. Hazard kicked from the left, Luiz headed the ball from close range, the ball hit the bottom of the crossbar and deflected into the net. Ederson could only watch the ball and sigh.

2-0, Chelsea extended their lead at home.

Now all the Manchester City players were a little anxious. Although Batistuta spoke out to calm everyone, one could clearly hear the impatience in his tone.

But that's how football is, there are winners and losers.

No one can win all the time.

In the injury time, Manchester City won a 22-yard free kick in the frontcourt. Neymar's direct shot was saved by Kepa, and he failed to save face for the team. Manchester City had to leave Stamford Bridge in disgrace with zero points.

At the end of the game, Chelsea won 2 points with 0-3, giving Manchester City their first defeat of the season and ending their 44-game unbeaten streak across the season.

……

[Neymar and Batistuta were both silent, Manchester City suffered their first defeat of the season, sending Manchester United to the top of the Premier League]

Comment area:
1
Oh my god, Manchester City lost? They can lose with this lineup?

2
What's wrong with that? Gua is making trouble again. I felt something was wrong before the game, and I lost.
3
It's obvious that the person above didn't watch the game. Our city played well in this game, but they just lacked a bit of luck. Luiz's header was just a fluke.

4
Wash, just wash hard, BBB plays as the No. 10 and Manchester City's games are bad, can he play? He doesn't have the ability, you know, Guardiola is blind, do you really think he is a Messi?

5
Have you watched a few games of BBB and you are here to give advice? You know more than Gua. Why don't you go coach? It's so funny

6
BBB didn't score again? How many games has it been?

7
It's been about a month, I think. A reporter asked him before, and he didn't seem to be in a hurry.

8
To be honest, Neymar has indeed enriched Manchester City's offense, but since his arrival, the little king's goal efficiency has plummeted.
9
Ha! It was BBB who insisted on bringing in Neymar. What is this? Shooting oneself in the foot

10
Do you know that you are such a dark horse BBB? Let him know and tear your mouth apart

11
Stop arguing, Gua's interview is here, he really loves BBB
[Video-Guardiola’s interview after the loss]

……

[What do you think of Batistuta's performance in this match? What do you think of his goal drought? Can he really become the real core of Manchester City as the fans expect? ]

Guardiola: "He performed very well, in fact it couldn't have been better. Batistuta exceeded my expectations by a lot."
Guardiola: "It's my fault for losing. If you want to blame someone, blame it on my tactical mistakes. (Bati) was not in good shape? We lost, but if you think so, it means you didn't watch the game."
Guardiola: "He is only 19 years old. He has already taken on the responsibility of the team. You criticize him wantonly, but you don't see the changes in him. He is more responsible than any of you here. Don't put pressure on him. In my opinion, he is the best active player."

[The best player in the league? Such a high rating? What about Messi? ]

Guardiola: “…”
Guardiola: "I mean that among players of his age, Batistuta is already at the ceiling level."
Guardiola: "And - when he was his age, Leo didn't have this much pressure, from the media, from you!"

……

12
Laugh
Guagua, you can't let go of Bai Yueguang and try your best to make up for the red roses around you. It's really embarrassing.

(End of this chapter)