I build a giant in the Premier League

Chapter 13 He's a bit like Ferguson!
From mid-July to the end of July, in just over half a month, Yang Cheng arranged a total of 7 warm-up matches.

The opponents are all teams from surrounding areas.

2 amateur teams, 1 League Three team, and 2 League One teams.

As a result, Bayswater Chinese embarrassingly achieved an "impressive" record of 5 win, 1 draws and 2 losses in 2 games.

Both games against League One teams ended in miserable defeats.

One game was 2:5 and the other was 1:4.

The poor results in the warm-up matches almost destroyed all the good atmosphere brought by the training camp.

The players were originally very confident in the head coach's style of play, thinking it was very advanced and the scene was very good.

Moreover, they have already mastered this style of play through two weeks of training.

But when they actually got to the game, they found that they were still playing in a mess.

Even when facing amateur teams, they find it difficult to perform as well as they did in training.

Not to mention facing a strong English League One team.

Yang Cheng and the coaching staff were not surprised by this result.

This was what he had guessed when arranging the warm-up match.

Because this time the two English League One teams are West Ham United in the same city and Reading in west London.

The Hammers are a relegated team in the Premier League.

Although a number of famous players such as Defoe, Joe Cole and Kanoute were sold in the summer transfer window, the Hammers are still strong.

Carrick, the midfielder whom Yang Cheng admires very much, is now in the Hammers.

Reading is also a strong team. They ranked 4th in English League One last season and entered the promotion play-offs, just a little bit away from getting the promotion right to the Premier League.

Moreover, fans familiar with the Premier League will certainly remember that a few years later, Chelsea was defeated twice in a game, and Cech, who was once qualified to challenge the world's best goalkeeper, fell.

The opponent is Reading.

This team plays in a rough and aggressive style.

Yang Cheng deliberately arranged these two opponents in the hope of using them to test the team and expose more problems.

It's a warm-up match, so winning or losing and the result are not important.

The key is still the upcoming English League Two.

But after every warm-up match, Yang Cheng would arrange for everyone to review the game and make adjustments and improvements based on the problems exposed in the game.

After five warm-up matches, the Chinese team's main lineup has gradually become clear.

The goalkeeper position belongs to Joe Hart.

Although he is only 16 years old, he has grown physically and performed well.

There are some changes in the defense line.

The left wing belongs to Tony Capaldi, the right wing belongs to Steve Jenkins, and Koscielny occupies one of the central defenders.

There is no doubt about it.

But the other central defender was a little beyond Yang Cheng's expectations.

From a technical and tactical point of view, Yang Cheng prefers Luke Chambers, who is better at passing the ball, or even the younger Alex Baptiste.

But after several warm-up matches, it seems that the partnership between Roger Johnson and Koscielny is the best.

Roger Johnson's technique is relatively rough and he makes many passing errors, but he is very good at physical confrontation.

This is truly a killer weapon in lower-level leagues.

In midfield, Huddlestone fell back, with Modric and Martin Roland in the middle, which was the least controversial.

Andy Holdsworth and Lee Williamson both performed well but were limited to substitute duties.

Here, Modric's promotion was a bit forced.

The Croatian has excellent skills and his passing is quite accurate, but his body is too thin.

Whether playing against Reading or West Ham United, he performed terribly.

But Yang Cheng still has full trust in him.

Among the three midfielders, Huddlestone was the one that lagged behind, while Martin Roland and Modric were both able to move up and down, pressing forward when attacking and retreating when defending.

But at the tactical review meeting after the games against West Ham United and Reading, Yang Cheng made adjustments.

Martin Roland took on more offensive tasks, and Modric moved relatively further back.

This allows Modric to avoid getting into hand-to-hand combat with his opponents as much as possible.

On the front line, Jonathan Steed gained the advantage in the competition with Lambert.

But Yang Cheng was a little surprised by how the two flanks were arranged.

According to his previous life, Ribery was most effective when playing on the left.

But the current French winger has not yet fully matured, so Yang Cheng prefers to put him on the right, hoping to use Ribery's speed and breakthrough on the right to tear open the opponent's defense.

But after playing five warm-up matches, Yang Cheng found that something was not right.

Ribery didn't work well with Steve Jenkins.

Steve Jenkins is slow, has a limited range of movement, and spends more time in the backfield defending.

In the 433 formation, the distance between the wingers and full-backs is relatively large.

Ribery once again took on the burden of the team's offense.

Therefore, it was difficult for Ribery, who played on the right, to cooperate with Jenkins, especially in defense.

In the match against West Ham United, the Chinese players of Bayswater were turned into a sieve on the right side by England international Sinclair on the left side of West Ham United. Four of the five goals were scored from this side.

Martin Devaney moved to the left and also had many problems cooperating with Tony Capaldi.

The two have very similar characteristics.

After the warm-up match, Yang Cheng reviewed the game with Brian Kidd.

The English suggested that Ribery return to the left and move forward a little, and Martin Devany go to the right and retreat appropriately.

Yang Cheng deeply agreed with this.

……

June 8, afternoon.

In the first round of the 03/04 English League Two season, Bayswater Chinese played at home against newly promoted Grimsby Town.

Not only have the north and south stands of Bayswater Stadium not been started, even the east and west stands have not been completed.

Therefore, the capacity is only 5000 people at most.

When Yang Cheng walked into the stadium, the East Stand opposite was empty. It was a rare sunny day in London today, but the empty East Stand was somewhat embarrassing.

There are quite a lot of people sitting in the west stand.

According to the information obtained by Yang Cheng, the number of fans present today reached 2500.

This is also thanks to Brian Kidd.

He is now the team's nominal head coach, and British fans still buy into his thinking to some extent.

In addition, the summer transfer window is quite strong, so fans still have expectations.

Yang Cheng also has high expectations for this game.

He hopes that the team can beat the newly promoted team at home and get off to a good start.

Moreover, he fielded his strongest lineup.

Goalkeeper: Joe Hart;

Defence: Tony Capaldi, Laurent Koscielny, Roger Johansson and Steve Jenkins;
Midfield: Huddlestone dropped back, with Martin Rowland and Modric in the middle;

Forwards: Ribery, Jonathan Steed and Martin Devaney.

Yang Cheng's tactics look like 433, but in fact they are irregular.

Devaney is positioned further back, a bit like a right halfback, closer to Jenkins.

The entire left road is pressed forward and the position is more forward.

But this also poses great hidden dangers.

Koscielny and Roger Johnson are both central defenders who stand relatively forward and are more aggressive.

And midfielder Huddlestone is not a purely defensive midfielder.

In addition, the Bayswater Chinese had just undergone a reorganization, and the players did not cooperate well with each other, especially in terms of counter-attacking and positioning after losing the ball in the midfield.

So, when the game reached the 27th minute, the Grimsby Town midfielder sent a long pass behind the defense line and landed in front of the Dutch center forward Lawrence ten Hof.

Although Koscielny reacted immediately and chased back desperately, despite his fast speed.

But Hoff took the initiative. After catching up with the landing point, he headed the ball directly to Michael Budin who was behind Koscielny.

Pudding didn't stop the ball and directly pushed the ball into the goal, scoring the first goal for the newly promoted team!

……

Snapped!
Yang Cheng clapped his hands vigorously, feeling very disappointed with the first goal conceded in the first game of the new season.

Before this goal, the Chinese team had complete control of the game and the ball.

"Koscielny is trustworthy most of the time. He has excellent physical strength, close marking, fierce tackling and, most importantly, great speed and excellent tracking ability."

Brian Kidd was also a little disappointed with the loss.

"But he was so aggressive, especially when he was playing with Roger Johnson, it was just..."

Yang Cheng smiled bitterly helplessly.

He suddenly remembered Ramos and Pepe in his previous life when he just coached Real Madrid.

A magical combination of two reckless men.

"The two of them are too close to form an effective complementary pairing," Yang Cheng said.

But there was nothing he could do.

He had already realized this problem before, so he wanted to arrange Luke Chambers or Alex Baptiste to partner with Koscielny.

But the effect is not even as good as Roger Johnson.

If possible, Yang Cheng would be willing to find a calm partner for Koscielny.

But for now, Roger Johnson is Yang Cheng's best choice.

"Give them some more time."

Yang Cheng turned around and laughed at Brian Kidd, "The growth of a central defender is always accompanied by pain and torture."

Brian Kidd couldn't help but smile.

Sometimes, he is also weird.

Yang Cheng is obviously so young, but what he says gives people the feeling that he has rich coaching experience.

Sometimes it even feels a bit like... Ferguson.

……

Just five minutes after Grimsby Town opened the scoring, the Chinese team started to pose a threat from the left wing.

After Ribery tried to break through with the ball, he passed it to Tony Capaldi who came from behind.

Capaldi made a cross from the left, and Jonathan Steed followed up in the middle and broke through the opponent's defense line, heading the ball from close range and successfully equalized the score!

After the second half, in the 51st minute, Martin Roland assisted French center back Koscielny to score a header from a corner kick, redeeming himself and reversing the score.

2 is better than 1!

If we say that the goal conceded just now made Koscielny a background figure.

Now this goal ignited the emotions of the fans at the scene.

Throughout the game, the Chinese players in Bayswater took the initiative.

It’s just that because the team was just starting out and we weren’t familiar with each other yet, there were a lot of mistakes during the passing and cutting process.

In the 84th minute, there was a pass error near the center line, and the midfielder had no time to counter-attack, and the defense was penetrated again.

Striker Ryan Anderson scored the second goal for Grimsby Town.

2 is better than 2!

The game ended with both sides shaking hands and making peace!
After the game, Yang Cheng greeted the players walking off the court with applause.

This took the players by surprise.

Being tied at home by a newly promoted team was not a good start in any way for Bayswater Chinese who were aiming for promotion.

But Yang Cheng knew it very well.

This is a good start.

The league is long.

He believes that his team will gradually get into a good situation as the games accumulate, problems are improved one by one, and the players become more and more tacit in their understanding of each other!

By that time, no one can stop the Chinese in Bayswater!

　I am working hard on writing, and I will update twice a day before the book is released. Please bear with me for now, and I will definitely write a lot of articles when the book is released! During the period of the new book, I beg for collections and votes. Thank you very much!!

　　
　
(End of this chapter)