[Football] Bad Boy Batty

When there are two tiki-taka teams on the field, and they both want to suppress the opponent and seize the situation, the situation will become very heated.

There was even a near-miss of a goal within 50 seconds of the start of the game.

Manchester City's goal.

The Blue Moon Army was not losing momentum in the away game. Guardiola did not use the traditional tiki-taka, but combined it with high pressure and quick attack and defense transitions (the latter two were learned from Bayern). Although it is not enough to be called offense instead of defense, they are also seeking to make up for it from another aspect.

Manchester City's entire defense line was pushed very forward, as was the front line. Aguero was infinitely close to the Barcelona goal, acting as a fulcrum to put pressure on the opponent's goalkeeper Ter Stet, not giving him a chance to think about the passing route.

And it was such a conventional tactic that almost resulted in a goal.

43 seconds into the game, Barcelona passed the ball back to the goalkeeper. The little lion king made a soft pass. Aguero was not far away from him and immediately accelerated and rushed over.

Fortunately, Pique was close to the ball, so Aguero was unable to easily kick the ball into the goal.

"Come on, little lion king!" After kicking the ball back to the midfield, Pique shouted to Ter Stegen, "Pass the ball faster, don't let Manchester City's No. 9 and No. 10 seize the opportunity!"

Ter Stegen raised his gloves and gave his teammates a thumbs up, indicating that he would not be so reckless again.

"This is their loophole." Batistuta ran from the wing to Aguero and whispered, "There is a problem with the coordination between the defender and the goalkeeper. I was there just now, and Alba was obviously slow to start."

Aguero nodded. "We can start from here."

……

In this game, Guardiola basically used the main lineup in the league, but Barcelona made many changes. Compared with the previous league games, the defense line seemed to be disrupted and reorganized.

Enrique re-activated Mascherano, Pique and Umtiti as central defenders, Bartra was replaced, and Alba, who had recovered from injury, replaced Roberto in the starting lineup.

As a right winger, Batistuta happens to be opposite Alba.

Before the game, he paid close attention to the data of the Barcelona full-back, but when it came to the actual game, he found that Alba's awareness was indeed good, but his turning speed was much worse than the data.

Guardiola also noticed this and gestured to his players to focus on attacking the right side.

Soon, Manchester City's tactics took effect.

In the 12th minute, Batistuta received a long pass from the backcourt and attacked on the right. Barcelona did not mark him closely, giving him space to run, and the teenager quickly dribbled the ball to the front of the penalty area.

Alba chased after him and tried to make up for his mistake with a tactical foul, but Batistuta was one step faster and the ball was passed horizontally in front of the goal.

Ter Stegen opened his arms and stared at Aguero's movements to predict the position of his shooting, but the next second, Aguero easily missed the ball, and the attention of the goalkeeper and defender was diverted. Sterling rushed out from the back point, and he was left unattended.

"Rahim!"

[Exquisite cooperation, Batistuta's operation on the wing showed maturity far beyond his age, Barcelona's defense made a mistake! They missed the target! ] The commentator in the studio raised his voice, [Sterling——]

The home fans' hearts were in their throats.

however--

[Oops, this ball,] the commentator's voice dropped back to its original height, [Sterling didn't seize the opportunity, the ball hit the net and bounced out of the bottom line, this should have been a sure goal.]

Yes, it was a sure goal.

"What are you doing! Rahim! That's almost an open goal!"

Batty got up from the grass and angrily attacked Sterling.

For this cross, he fell to the ground and his right arm still hurts. But what did he get in return?
A sure goal that was missed, and the ball possession was transferred to Barcelona.

"It's so close that an old man with a cane in the park can score a goal!"

Sterling himself was also very annoyed, so he didn't say anything in response to Batistuta's complaints. With his brain-wrenching talent of "missing an empty goal", the happy boy waved his fists twice and walked back muttering to himself.

“The goalkeeper didn’t have time to save the ball, this should have been our chance to take the lead!”

Amid the cheers of Barcelona fans, Batistuta became even more annoyed and stomped hard on the grass twice.

"No one can ever say I have trust issues again. Look, who can believe me when I play like this?"

The ball didn't even enter the goal area. Considering the opportunities just created by Batistuta and Aguero, such a result is unacceptable.

"Stop talking, Batistuta." Aguero went over and hooked Batistuta's shoulders. "Look forward, we still have a chance."

"I wanted to look forward, but if he had scored, we would be ahead now." Batistuta said angrily, "If I had known this would happen, you should have kicked the ball just now... I don't want to pass the ball to him anymore, he can't score anyway."

"Okay, I won't pass it to him." Aguero comforted him, "Just pass it to me. We're in a good offensive situation now. Let's do it again later."

Batty's long and sullen face recovered a little. He ruffled his hair on his forehead and snorted in Sterling's direction.

"Well, come again."

……

The idea is good, but opportunities don't always come.

A few minutes later, Alba's old injury seemed to have relapsed and he could no longer continue and was substituted. Barcelona's already weak left-side defense was now even tighter, and the home fans couldn't help but start to worry.

It looked like Manchester City had their chance.

But no, failing to take advantage of the first ten minutes of the game to score a goal, Manchester City's momentum was gradually weakening.

[From the data, Guardiola's Manchester City has had nearly 50% ball possession from the start to now, which is not common in Camp Nou. The goal that Sterling spit out is enough to show that they have the strength to compete with Barcelona. ]

But Barcelona is not a pushover, they are gradually taking back the game.

De Bruyne's pass to Aguero was intercepted and Barcelona quickly took control of the midfield.

Batistuta on the wing started to get anxious and complained several times to his teammates who lost the ball. The camera kept focusing on him.

[Bati is very imposing, but he needs to calm down. Football is not a one-person sport. He can only be anxious there.]

Five minutes later, Manchester City finally regained the ball in the backcourt. Aguero drew the attention of the defensive players by running, and De Bruyne passed the ball to Batistuta on the wing.

"Go underneath!" the Belgian midfielder shouted.

Of course, Batistuta would have done the same without him saying anything.

Manchester City's No. 9 player stopped the ball with his instep and turned around to start.

Umtiti cut into the penalty area diagonally from the wing and could not guard both Batistuta and Aguero at the same time. Pique behind him was too aggressive in the attack and had not returned yet. If Batistuta succeeded, whether he shot the ball himself or passed it to Aguero, it would have been a powerful attack.

So Neymar chased back and helped with the defense.

In Barcelona's offensive system, Neymar was not responsible for the defense on the wing, and it was rare for him to cross the center line to assist outside his own penalty area in the league. But this time it was different, as the one facing him was Batistuta.

The harsh words have already been said before the game, and I have to show them off in front of the opponent.

Neymar blocked his position and surrounded Batistuta with Busquets. He knew Batistuta's habits, so it was not too difficult to defend against him.

[Haha! It seems that not only Messi gets excited when facing Manchester City, Neymar is also very active today. In order to block Batistuta's overlapping, he has returned to the same line as the defender. ]

Facing the double-team of Neymar and Busquets, Batistuta wanted to use an instant change of direction and a lob to get past them, but Busquets saw through his fake move and Neymar kicked him to disrupt his lob. Batistuta got anxious and failed to execute the move properly.

[beep——]
The referee blew the whistle and the ball went out of bounds.

Batistuta raised his hand and pushed the hair back from his forehead. He shouldn't have been so anxious, otherwise the ball would have had a chance to pass.

But fortunately, the ball hit Neymar's ankle and went out of the sideline, and the ball was still on Manchester City's side.

"Kevin! Come here!"

The position of the throw-in was good, Batistuta passed the ball to De Bruyne and moved closer to the penalty area.

It would be great if we could use this throw-in to form an attack, but if not, then it would also be good to create an opportunity for their defender to get a yellow card.

but--

It happened that the person who came up to defend was not a defensive player. Batistuta pushed Neymar who was about to stick to him from behind and said: "Don't stick to me, stand further away, otherwise you will commit a foul."

"This is normal defense." Neymar smiled at him and said, "You can call the referee, go ahead."

That's right, this level of restriction is far from the limit of a foul. Even if Batty called the referee, it would be useless and would only waste their offensive time.

Batty stuck out his tongue at him.

He noticed Pique approaching from the corner of his eye, so he adjusted his position, spread his arms to expand his space, and then signaled De Bruyne to throw the ball to Gundogan who was making a run.

De Bruyne kicked the ball out of bounds, and Gundogan immediately made a short pass back after receiving the ball, seeking cooperation in a small space.

As soon as Neymar left behind him, Batistuta immediately turned around and made a diagonal move to the ribs.

"Here!" He raised his hand for the ball.

De Bruyne used a fake move to fool Neymar and passed the ball directly to Batistuta.

[Good opportunity! Batistuta takes the ball into the penalty area——]

It’s not a good opportunity, but it’s not a very good one.

The goalkeeper blocked Batistuta's possible shooting position, Messi ran back a long distance to mark Aguero, Sterling at the back post was too far away... Feeling the defender coming up from behind, Batistuta made a decision at that moment.

He lowered his center of gravity, pulled the ball with his right foot, did a bicycle kick with his left foot, and after going around the ball, he pulled the ball back with his right foot and changed direction to break through.

[Ohhh! Batistuta used Ronaldo's classic pendulum-like pass! Beautiful, let's see if I can get past him——]

No, no, no, Batty's goal is not the past.

For him, Ronaldinho's dribbling is the most difficult to imitate, because Ronaldinho not only has exquisite skills but also a strong physique. In this regard, Batistuta cannot achieve it even if he spends a whole summer in the gym.

In comparison, 'that man's' bull tail dribbling is more suitable for him.

But why choose the most difficult one? The reason is very simple——

Cheat foul.

If you can't shoot, I'll make you commit a foul.

A foul in the penalty area, a yellow card and a point package, this was enough for Manchester City to turn the situation around.

Looking at Pique's broken leg, Batistuta revealed a barely perceptible smirk.

Then he controlled his body to stop suddenly, pretending to be fouled, and fell inside.

However, in the next second, Pique retracted his legs, and the Barcelona defender stopped the action just before the tackle.

Oops!

Batistuta realized something was wrong, but it was too late to retract his action. He rolled twice on the grass in the penalty area and then immediately got up.

As expected, he was booed by the fans behind the home team's goal.

"Go away you liar! He didn't touch you!"

"Don't try to cheat for a penalty! We've used this trick too many times!"

"Referee, referee! Diving! Give him a yellow card!"

Batty still held out a glimmer of hope. He looked at the referee and said, "Sir! This is a foul!"

However, the referee saw it clearly and indicated that Batistuta had not committed any foul.

"Don't do that again. This time it's a warning," the referee told him. "If you do that again, I'll give you a yellow card."

……

After sending the referee away, Batistuta's face almost turned red, and it was unknown whether he was angry or what. Neymar wanted to say something, but because he couldn't hold back his smile, Batistuta glared at him several times.

"Okay, you tried to flop, but I figured it out." Pique, who had succeeded in his plan, walked up to Batistuta with a smile and pinched the kid's face. "Don't you think about it? How could I have committed a foul in the penalty area in that situation?"

What is this called? This is called fishing enforcement.

I’m so angry, but there’s nothing I can do.

Batistuta snorted at Pique, then shook his hair and turned away.

Of course the Barcelona defender was not willing to let him go easily. Pique chased him and slapped his butt in a teasing manner.

"you!"

Batistuta stepped back and bared his teeth at Pique.

Pique grinned, not feeling threatened at all.

"Children are still children," he said with a smile, "Go back and practice more!"

Batty: ...

I want to hit someone.

(End of this chapter)