I'm 198cm tall. Are you giving me a Maradona template?

Chapter 221 Lippi's Voting Choice
As the buzzer sounded at the end of the game.

The camera immediately locked onto the sunlight.

"Chelsea suffered a far-reaching defeat. After losing this crucial battle, they will lag behind Manchester City at the top by 9 points and Liverpool at the second place by 7 points. This difference makes the defending champions almost lose the hope of winning the championship."

In the commentary booth, Chloe shook his head repeatedly.

"Sunshine scored his 18th league goal of the season. After a four-match suspension, he immediately scored two goals in two consecutive games, once again consolidating his reputation as "Mr. Brace"!"

When facing the reporters' microphone.

Sunshine was praising the Chelsea players' defense.

"Yes, this is probably the strongest defensive team I have ever faced. They are really amazing. To be honest, I almost didn't score the second goal! They only gave me a few chances in the whole game, which fully proves that Chelsea is indeed a very strong defensive team!"

Sunshine gave a thumbs up.

It seemed that he was sincerely praising Chelsea's defense.

But many reporters felt uncomfortable hearing this.

Chelsea's defense is so strong.
Didn’t you score twice?

Especially the second ball.

That was an extreme header performance.
Conte expressed his helplessness in the post-match press conference.

"I think my team has almost blocked all possible routes for losing the ball, but we can't block the sky!"

"In the air, he is unstoppable."

After the game.

The Daily Mail quoted Conte's statement, and their headline was:
[Conte: We met a BIG! ]

14 rounds of league matches are over.

Liverpool scored 35 points and continued to catch up with Manchester City in the standings.

More importantly.

In the first half, Liverpool beat all the strong teams.

How do they perform against strong teams?

In the BIG6 civil war, Liverpool won 5 and lost 4 in 1 games.

As we all know, the reason for the loss was that Sunshine was suspended.
Actually.

After Liverpool lost to Tottenham.

Many media believe that if Sunshine had not been suspended for that game, Liverpool would not have lost with his spirit against strong teams.

In other words.

Liverpool's efficiency in scoring points when facing strong teams is shocking.

In the BIG6 civil war, Liverpool scored a full 12 points.

There are five games left in the first half.

Considering that Manchester City will play against Manchester United, Chelsea and Arsenal in the future.

Once Manchester City loses points in these strong dialogues.

That Liverpool topped the standings.

It's just a matter of course.

The betting agencies even opened the handicap for the [Premier League Half-Season Champion].

Don't be fooled by the fact that Manchester City is at the top of the list now.

But in terms of odds, they are behind Liverpool.

In other words.

These actuaries who specialize in harvesting gamblers believe.

Liverpool after the end of the half-season.

The probability of winning the half-time championship is higher than that of Manchester City, which is currently at the top of the list.

Although, there is no trophy for the half-time champion.

But being able to win the half-time championship at least proves one thing: Liverpool does have the strength to compete for the championship.

In the past twenty seasons.

The probability of the half-time champion winning the final Premier League title is over 70%.

Therefore, winning the Premier League half-time championship is a landmark event for any team.

Liverpool have a good record against strong teams.

After the introduction of Van Dijk this season.

There were no inexplicable goals lost when facing weak teams.

The defense also became stronger.

There are trustworthy cores on both offense and defense.

After the win over Chelsea.

The outside world also generally believes this.

Liverpool has indeed reached a critical juncture again.

Has Liverpool, England's biggest club, regained its aura and is ready to head towards the championship?

Klopp was reluctant to talk more about the topic.

He doesn't want to put too much pressure on the team.

When facing the media, he appears relatively low-key.

"We will try to play every game well and then see what we have at the end of the season."

Although he is very low-key.

But Liverpool's strength can no longer be underestimated.

Time has entered February.

The Premier League has entered the Christmas Express season with the most intensive schedule.

Even if there is no League Cup mission.

Liverpool will also play eight games in December.

Especially in the second half of the month, there is almost a game every three or four days.

Two games in a row.

At this time, it is often the time when the depth of the team's bench is most tested.

After the Chelsea game.

12 month 2 day.

Liverpool challenge Brighton away.

The team rotated some players.

However, Liverpool still defeated their opponents 2-1 away from home.

Sunshine scored a goal, raising the goal tally to 19.

And after this game.

The team had a week-long rest - the weekend is normally the time for League Cup matches, but because Liverpool were eliminated, they had no game tasks.

This also shows the horror of the Premier League schedule.

Liverpool does not have to play in the League Cup and will play 12 games throughout December.

Teams with League Cup missions may have to play 9 or even 10 games!
With such a dense schedule, the Premier League has not yet had a winter break.

After December, January came and the FA Cup matches came one after another.

The schedule is quite tight.

It is no wonder that many head coaches have called on the English Football Association to change this situation and give Premier League players more rest time.

Players are human beings after all, not machines.

But for the league operators in England.

Player health?

More important than money?

If you can't kill him by kicking him, kick him to death.

Christmas.

Such a good opportunity to make money, but they actually gave the players a holiday.

Sin!
have to say.

Da Ying has never been very human when it comes to not being a human being.

Suddenly I have some free time.

Yangguang began to have the opportunity to focus on other things.

"According to reliable sources, the winner of the Ballon d'Or will be announced in three days at most. You will know the result in advance then."

Raiola said on the other end of the phone. "Oh? Will the Ballon d'Or winners get the results in advance?" Yangguang was a little surprised.

It’s not like he hasn’t watched the Golden Globe Awards.

Finally, when the big award [FIFA Golden Ball Award] was announced.

Aren’t the three candidates looking nervous and expectant?

Are the emotions all acted?

Good guy.

"Nonsense, the voting is over, how difficult can it be to count the votes? It's just to maintain some suspense. Think about it, the award ceremony is on the 11th, and only then will the Golden Globe winner know that he or she has won the award. Wouldn't it be embarrassing if he or she doesn't come?"

Raiola said.

"In addition, we have to take photos of the Golden Globe winners and shoot short documentaries and so on. If we wait until after the awards ceremony to do these, it will be too late."

"Okay." Yangguang couldn't help but admire the acting skills of the Golden Globe winners before him.

Good guy.

You all know the outcome of this relationship, yet you are still acting so devotedly.

This isn't in the restricted area.
"So will this be any surprise?"

Sunshine asked.

In his opinion, the 2017 FIFA Ballon d'Or.

Who else would I be?

“Normally there won’t be any surprises.”

"So, the Monday after next, I'm going to win the Ballon d'Or, right?"

"In theory, that's true!" said Raiola.

Media all over the world are paying attention to the Golden Globe Awards.

In November.

UEFA has announced the final three candidates for the Ballon d'Or.

No surprises either.

Messi, Ronaldo and sunshine.

The three most popular football stars in the world today have entered the final stage of the Ballon d'Or selection.

As for who will win in the end.

The suspense will naturally be left until the awards ceremony.

In fact, media all over the world are paying close attention to this year's Golden Globe Awards.

Because since 2008, when Ronaldo won the Golden Ball.

These 9 years.

The Ballon d'Or is monopolized by Messi and Ronaldo.

C Ronaldo won the Golden Ball four times, in 2008, 2013, 2014 and 2016.

而梅西则是五次夺魁，分别在2009年、2010年、2011年、2012年、2015年拿下金球。

and so.

Whether Yang Guang can break the monopoly of the two and become the new Ballon d'Or, and at the same time become the first Asian player to win the Ballon d'Or, is also attracting much attention.

The Chinese media were particularly excited.

On CCTV Sports Channel, you can see Yang Guang’s goal highlights every day.

Raiola is also looking for momentum in Europe.

During this period, Yangguang's wonderful performances have frequently appeared on television, newspapers, the Internet and other media.

The reason for doing this is simple.

Because of the selection rules of the FIFA Ballon d'Or.

"Fame" accounts for too large a proportion.

before this.

There are two top awards in world football for individual player honors.

They are the Ballon d'Or selected by France's L'Equipe and the World Footballer of the Year selected by FIFA.

It is considered to be the most objective and authoritative award in world football.

In 2000, the European Golden Ball Award was awarded to Figo, although L'Equipe was a French media - Figo's competitor that year was Zidane.

The reason why it is believed that the Ballon d'Or Award hosted by L'Equipe is more authoritative than FIFA's World Footballer of the Year.

The reason is that the votes for L'Equipe come from the editors-in-chief of major authoritative football media.

These editors-in-chief are relatively knowledgeable about football and have a deeper understanding of the football events of the year.

The selection criteria for the World Footballer of the Year are voting by head coaches and captains of national teams around the world.

Considering that FIFA has 208 members, more than national teams among these members have lower world rankings than the Chinese team.

Just think about how amateur the Chinese team is.
How amateur are these national teams that are ranked lower than the Chinese team.

Many of their votes are not cast objectively based on the most important selection criteria, which is "performance of the year".

Rather, it is based on "fame" or even personal inclination.

For example, the Nepal national team is an amateur team. Their head coach is a university physical education teacher, and the players come from all walks of life, including bricklayers, chefs, taxi drivers, etc.
The head coach and captain of such a team.

Can you expect them to be as well-informed about the football events of the year as the editors-in-chief of authoritative football media in European countries and to cast their votes carefully and prudently?
They are even fans like you and me.

Some people are fans of Ronaldo, and some are die-hard fans of Messi.

Because the way the winners are selected is different.

As a result, the Ballon d'Or has always been considered a more authoritative award than the FIFA World Player of the Year.

And with the merger of the Ballon d'Or and FIFA World Player of the Year awards.

The selection rules were also merged and expanded.

The FIFA Ballon d'Or votes come from three parts, each accounting for one-third of the vote:

1. France Football, a football journalist from 208 media outlets around the world, counts the votes.

2. The national team coaches of the 208 associations under FIFA - FIFA counts the votes.

3. Captains of the national teams of the 208 associations under FIFA - FIFA counts the votes.

Based on such voting rules.

There were also some controversial years when Ronaldo and Messi won the Ballon d'Or.

For example, 2010.

This year marks the first year that the FIFA World Player of the Year and Ballon d'Or awards have been merged.

When the selection results came out, the whole world was shocked.

As the core midfielder of the Champions League champion Inter Milan and the World Cup runner-up Netherlands team, Sneijder, despite winning three championships and one runner-up as a core in the four major competitions of the World Cup, Serie A, Champions League and Italian Cup, not only did he not win the Golden Ball, he didn't even make it into the top three.

Iniesta, as a dual core player of the newly crowned World Cup champion Spain, although he won the World Cup and La Liga championships that year, he still ranked second and third.

When it was announced that Messi had won the European Ballon d'Or, the media was shocked. Although Messi topped the scoring charts in both the Champions League and La Liga this year, he scored no goals in the World Cup and even lost 0-0 to Germany in the quarter-finals. With such performance, he actually won the award, which surprised many people.

In fact, the reason why Messi won the award was that he received most of the support from the national team coach and captain.

In the media vote, Sneijder topped the list - that is, if the Ballon d'Or and FIFA World Player of the Year awards were not merged.

In 2010, Sneijder will win the Ballon d'Or and Messi will win the World Footballer of the Year.
Considering that there have been cases in history where players have won the Ballon d'Or because they are more famous.
Therefore, even from a competitive perspective, there is no doubt that Sunshine will win the Golden Ball.

But Chinese fans are still somewhat uneasy.

Worried that Sunshine will be like Sneijder in 2010 and Ribery in 2013.

Because he is not as famous as Messi and Ronaldo.

And they always suffer losses in voting.

Some media interviewed Lippi, the head coach of the Chinese national team, and asked about his voting choice.

Lippi said: "My first choice is Yang, the second choice is Messi, and Ronaldo is ranked third."

This statement made Chinese fans very excited.

In September this year, in the final round of the World Cup Asian qualifiers, Lippi led the Chinese team to a 9-2 victory over Qatar away.

The Chinese team finally ranked fifth in Group A with 12 points and missed the 2018 Russia World Cup finals.

Lippi announced his resignation after the game and said that he did not have "sufficient power" - some media interpreted that the so-called sufficient power specifically refers to the power to recruit Yang Guang into the team.

However, shortly after Lippi announced his resignation.

Thanks to the efforts of Hengtai boss Xu Jiaying, Lippi is back.

no way.

Hengtai gave too much.
And now, Lippi has announced his voting order.

He put Yang Guang, who had a conflict with the Chinese Football Association, first.

Many people feel
It seems that Yang Guang is returning to the national team.

There seems to be a slight turn for the better..
(End of this chapter)