Football: I am only 16 years old, and you want me to retire and make a comeback?

Chapter 810: The Asian Cup Qualifiers Ended Prematurely, Back to the Champions League to Paid Off Stats
The Manchester Evening News – If TY doesn't play in the final round match against Oman, he will have a chance to play in the second leg of the Champions League Round of 16.

"This is clearly a better option for the player himself, since China has already secured a spot in the World Cup," a Manchester Evening News reporter said.

With qualification for the World Cup already secured, returning to secure the Champions League spot is more important than participating in the qualifiers, and the Manchester Evening News reporter's comments are clearly not problematic.

Even so, he was quickly refuted.

The commentator who refuted him was none other than the familiar commentator, Dawson Jensen from Sky Sports UK.

Commentator Jansen: TY has stayed with the national team for the qualifiers, and Manchester United are already 5 goals ahead in the first leg of the Champions League Round of 16. Ten Hag no longer needs any help.

Ok……

I don't know how to put it, but Jensen always gives people the feeling that he really wants to see Ten Hag make a fool of himself, which is really something else.

However, from an objective point of view, this line of thinking is actually very unreasonable.

For a renowned manager like Erik ten Hag, who has won the Champions League and several Premier League titles, making a fool of himself is obviously not an easy thing.

To avoid any suspicion of targeting Ten Hag, Jansen later in the video analyzed the whole situation from the perspective of the Chinese national team, providing reasons why Tang Ye should stay with the national team.

The most important thing, of course, is the Chinese national football team's FIFA ranking.

A higher FIFA ranking could mean a better group stage draw.

It's difficult to calculate the FIFA points gap between Japan and China at the moment (because the difference is indeed very small). Under these circumstances, winning one more game and getting 3 more points would certainly be good for the Chinese team.

Furthermore, according to estimates from Jansen and several Sky Sports experts, this match against Oman is of great significance to the Chinese national team's FIFA rankings.

Then there's the club.

"From what I understand, TY is not a player who likes to pad his stats. He is different from Messi and Ronaldo. TY does not pad his stats."

Jansen stated confidently: "If someone is willing to open a bet, I'm willing to put down £5000 on TY staying with the team, which is six weeks' salary for me."

……

Ten Hach: TY needs to return to the team, and I will explain the situation to him.

Ten Hag spoke on social media, at which point everyone felt that everything had been settled.

But things are clearly not as simple as everyone imagines.

About an hour and a half after Ten Hach posted on social media, Eskeriva posted a "piggy hero staring" emoji in the comments section, and deleted it about 30 seconds later.

Eskeriva's actions were clearly intentionally staged for the fans and reporters; they were utterly disgusting.

The most interesting thing is that the origin of this "Piggy Hero staring" meme is China.

The Chinese national football team's hotel in Changsha.

We're heading to Oman tonight for the national football team's next Asian Cup qualifier.

In less than 10 hours, there is still one very important matter that the Chinese team has not yet been resolved.

Should we fight to the death with Oman for a possible FIFA ranking?
Will the FIFA rankings be updated before the World Cup?

In the restaurant in the morning, Tang Ye looked at Wu Lei across from him, who indicated that an update was highly likely.

"What if he doesn't update? Won't we just explode?"

"Haha! It's impossible for it not to be updated. When I say it's highly likely, I basically mean it's a done deal."

"Ok."

Tang Ye sighed: "I don't know what to do in the meeting later. If we beat Oman, can we really regain our number one position in Asia?"

"This one……"

Before Wu Lei could speak, Zhang Yuning chimed in: "I think... even if we lose to Oman, it's okay. Japan had a winning streak during the World Cup qualifiers, and their ranking surpassed ours. Isn't the World Cup qualifiers more valuable than the World Cup qualifiers? I feel like our ranking is already higher than Japan's."

"But it seems someone on Dongqiudi (a Chinese sports betting platform) has said that it might not have surpassed Japan, it's still a little short."

Wu Lei made a "little bit" gesture.

"Then I don't know."

Zhang Yuning shrugged.

Okay, so it turns out he didn't know anything at all...

"Then are you leaving?"

Tang Ye asked Zhang Yuning for his thoughts, but this time it was Wu Lei who answered: "Actually, I feel that it's not a question of who leaves or not. It mainly depends on Eskrima. We can either not play together, or just let them go all out. We can choose one of them and do it that way."

"Too."

After breakfast, the national football team players chatted in the cafeteria for a while before heading to the conference room together.

Ultimately, it was Ferran who made the decision.

Let's see what he's thinking.

What I mean is, we still need to fight.

Escriva paced back and forth in front of the tactics board: "Last night, Martí and I calculated the points. If we can get 8 wins and 2 draws in the group stage, we will most likely be able to surpass Japan, so my idea is to take a gamble."

Just as the players were surprised by Escribá's decision, the Spaniard suddenly changed his tone.

"but."

"This is not a request; I am simply telling you my hopes."

Eskeriva's gaze swept over Wu Lei, Zhang Yuning, and Tang Ye in turn: "This is the national football team after all. Many of you come from strong clubs, and club matches are very important to you. In fact... some players are even indispensable to their clubs."

"I hope you stay and play one last game against Oman, as a warm-up for the World Cup."

Escriva glanced at Matti.

Clearly, this decision was made jointly by the two of them.

Escribá and Martí decided to give the decision-making power to the players.

"Hmm... there are two possibilities for you."

Escriva held up two fingers: "One, either all the key players stay, and by key players I mean all the starting players."

"Then the second option is for all the key players to return to the club."

Eskeriva's actions were actually quite extreme.

They either need to use their core lineup to defeat Oman, or they need to simply tank and give up on the final round of matches.

Aren't you going to make a decision?

Tang Ye looked up and suddenly asked a question, but Eskeriva was helpless.

Although they finished first in their group, the Chinese national football team's current situation is indeed somewhat complicated and embarrassing.

In other words.

Ferran really had no other options.

"..."

Crunch!

Several coaches of the Chinese national football team left the meeting room, leaving only the players inside.

Eskreva made a very subtle move here: he kept the substitute players who seemed unrelated to the matter on the field, allowing them to communicate with the starters.

The room was quiet. The Chinese team players looked at each other for a moment, and then all looked at Tang Ye.

Eskeriva's original intention was for the national football players to communicate and interact with each other, but that was a bit too idealistic.

Sports teams are essentially hierarchical "factions." It's practically impossible for starters and substitutes to communicate.

The substitute players want the starters to stay, but they can't bring up anything that would be detrimental to the starters, because they know their status as junior players.

And what about the main player?

Even the key players were helpless; they couldn't say anything.

Above the eldest brother is another eldest brother; the younger eldest brother has little say in front of the eldest eldest brother. After this cycle, everyone looked at Tang Ye, the captain of the Chinese team, who was sitting with his legs crossed.

"..."

"Why...why are you looking at me?"

……

dong dong!

"gentlemen."

Tang Ye nodded slightly and went to Eskeriva and Matti's room, where he found team leader Li Tie and the translator were also there.

After Tang Ye came in, Eskeriva asked Li Tie and the translator to leave first.

Marty also stood up, pointing to his chest: "So...should I go out?"

"..."

Escriva paused for a few seconds: "You'd better go out for a bit."

"most?"

Marty sensed something: "Then let's not go out for now."

Under Eskeriva's shocked gaze, Marty sat down directly: "It's okay, I won't bother you. I'll just use my phone. It's warmer in the room."

Whether the room was warm or not was of no importance; Marty was simply curious about how Tang Ye and Eskeriva chatted.

Helpless, Escriva had no choice but to ignore Matti for now.

Seeing Tang Ye's direction, he asked, "So, what's your decision? Are you going to stay or leave?"

"Well, don't feel guilty. I'm doing this so you can make the decision. You don't need to care too much about my opinion, otherwise there's no point in having you discuss it. We still need to..."

“Mr. Ferran, let’s… go back to the club first.”

Tang Ye touched his nose: "Even if we are ranked first in Asia, our group might not be very good. The difference shouldn't be too big. It's mainly about luck."

"This……"

Eskeriva was stunned: "Did you make this decision? How many people support this view?"

Tang Ye extended his right index finger.

"Only one?" Escriva asked in surprise.

"Uh, no."

Tang Ye shook his head: "This means 100%."

"..."

hiss……

Eskeriva took a deep breath, then squinted and looked Tang Ye up and down: "...Did you force them to do that? I told you not to bully your teammates. I saw what happened to Paul back then!"

"Hey! I didn't bully Pogba! Holy crap."

Upon hearing the topic of "bullying Pogba," Tang Ye immediately became agitated: "Ferland, don't be like that. It doesn't matter if the reporters don't believe me, but why are you like them? I've never hit Pogba, not even once!"

"But I saw you push him into the corner."

"It was just a joke. We were just pushing each other around as a joke. It's not like I'm the only one who does it. Everyone likes to play like this. Whether it's a professional soccer team or high school students, we're all the same."

"No, no, that's not what we're going to talk about today, sir."

Tang Ye steered the conversation back on track: "I didn't force them, but everyone said they wanted to leave."

"Ha ha!"

"..."

Marty accidentally laughed out loud, then quickly covered his mouth, pretending he was watching some funny news.

At this point, Marty already pretty much understood what had happened.

He was 99% confident. All the national football players in the conference room were looking at Tang Ye, and then Tang Ye shared his thoughts.

Tang Ye's idea was to return to the club, and the next second all the other players in the room agreed.

Based on the nature of those players on the team, Marty could even imagine what they would say.

"Yes, yes, I also think we should go back."

"That's right, King Tang, I also think it's time to leave, so let's go together."

"King of Football! I'm coming too!"

"Holy crap, Oman? We're not playing!"

Ok.

Probably that's it.

"..."

"hiss……"

Eskeriva stood up: "What I just said, don't take my opinion too seriously. This..."

"Actually."

"It's okay if you worry about it a little."

"I have considered it."

Tang Ye nodded.

“You said you wanted to be objective, and I guarantee I am. I’ve collected everyone’s opinions, and they all want to leave.”

"how about you?"

"I'm leaving too, so basically all the key players will leave, that's pretty much it."

Tang Ye slowly said, "But Ferran, you don't need to worry too much. Even if we don't have our absolute main players, we might not necessarily lose to Oman. We still have many great players."

"..."

Eskeriva sighed again.

This time, he was truly out of options.

……

The Sun's front-page headline: TY departs for Manchester on his private plane, picking up YNZhang and WuLei, TY's national team teammates from Borussia Dortmund and Villarreal respectively.

Actually, there's not much need for explanation; European fans are very familiar with Tang Ye's two national team teammates.

Especially Zhang Yuning!

He won the Champions League title after playing only 20 minutes in the knockout stage, giving the impression that winning the Champions League was a piece of cake.

It's a bit of a pity that Wu Lei didn't stay on the same team as Tang Ye, but he still won the Europa League title with Villarreal.

It's worth mentioning that Wu Lei didn't win entirely by default; he scored two goals in Villarreal's Europa League match, making him one of the key contributors to their victory.

Tang Ye arrived in Manchester first, signaled to the driver to give his two teammates a ride, and then immediately returned to the base from the airport to report for duty.

"The data manipulation is here."

Dembele squatted on the grass: "Hey, you in the down jacket! This is a professional training base, tourists aren't welcome!"

"Go to hell! You deserve a beating, Ottoman."

……

(End of this chapter)