Chapter 166 Volume 2 The Sky of Nottingham Goal: League Cup (Part 1)

On February 7th, Nottingham Forest embarked on the journey of the First Division again. After more than ten days of rest, they beat Coventry 1-0 at home. The ten-day pause, although it gave Dunn time to adjust the team's tactics and re-prepare, it also interrupted the forest team's rhythm. In this game, they played very difficult at their home court, and finally defeated their opponents with a goal suspected of being offside. After the game, the head coach of Coventry babbled about the penalty, thinking that his team should be the winner. But Twain, who got a bargain, firmly insisted that the referee was right, and he didn't want to talk about that goal.

To Twain and the Forest team, it didn't matter whether the ball was offside or not. It was the head coach of Coventry, not him, who got into the horns of this issue. He just needs to know that his team has scored another precious three points.

Victory is the most important thing, the process...is just a road to victory, no matter what way you go, as long as you reach the end point.

A week later, Nottingham Forest's winning streak finally stopped. In the 31st round of the league, they were tied 1:1 by Walshal at home. Because they missed a game, they still ranked fourteenth, and even a tie didn't affect them too much, after all, they didn't lose.

This shows that Tang En's insistence on "don't lose if you can't win" is correct.

On February 17th, in the 24th round of make-up matches, Nottingham Forest challenged Gillingham away. Judging from the scene, the Forest team was still at a disadvantage, and the instability of the young players was fully exposed. It can be a winning streak or a winning streak. The final score was 0:0. Dunn relied on the defensive tactics to score a point in the away game with difficulty, and still did not lose. This was the result he was most gratified about.

He has become more and more aware of the pressure of being a coach... Every time he sees the opponent bombing around his goal, his heart will be raised in his throat, and every time he misses Every shot out of the net would stop his heart. It didn't feel good at all.

February 29th is the League Cup final. Before that, Nottingham Forest played three games a day: three league games on the 14th, 17th, and 21st. This was a point that Tang En was quite critical of when he was interviewed. He complained that the league committee didn't know how to be flexible, and arranged such an intensive match before such an important match, leaving his team with no time to rest.

In fact, there is nothing wrong with the league committee's arrangement, because one of the three games is a make-up match, and they also postponed the 33rd round of the league between Forest and Bradford. The game time is February 28th...

On February 21st, the thirty-second round of the league, Nottingham Forest continued their away trip, this time their opponent was Rotherham, and the final score was 1:1. It was another draw, and the Forest team ushered in a tie after a winning streak. Finally, there was no losing streak...

Tang En breathed a sigh of relief, and had to go all out to prepare for the League Cup final against Middlesbrough. There are still eight days before the final, and the media reports have gradually increased.

Because the Forest team is a first-tier team and returned to the final after 12 years, it received more attention. Looking at the media reporters hovering outside the training ground all day long, even Tang En felt a little nervous. But this kind of nervousness can't be shown in front of outsiders, because he is the leader of these people, and the leader can't be nervous, hesitant, or let them down.

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Des Walker gave Twain the new training schedule. Today is February 23, and they still have six days to conduct targeted training. Before this day's training session, the coaching staff will get together to discuss the schedule.

Tang En looked at it, and deleted all the offensive training except the "offensive set-piece drill". Then hand it over to everyone present.

Walker and the coaches looked at the "new plan" and looked at each other.

Seeing their puzzled expressions, Tang En smiled: "It's very simple. We won't play against them in the match against Middlesbrough. We will defend and let them attack. Not only that, but there is also a training item in this form." Plan-increase the number of penalty kick training, and add 20 minutes of penalty kick training at the end of every training day."

"Tony, you want to bet on penalties?" Walker asked.

Dunn nodded: "Yes. From tomorrow onwards, the team's opening time for the media and fans will be shortened to half an hour. This week, we have been practicing defense non-stop. Middlesbrough and Bolton, who were bruised in our semi-final, looked It seems to be the same, relying on loans or buying those balloon stars to support the team. But their attacking ability is stronger. If we press out and play like Bolton, McLaren (Middlesbrough manager) will be very good. Happy. Have any of you followed the media coverage from Middlesbrough?"

Everyone shook their heads, obviously few people would care about those things. But Tang En cared, "I've paid attention to collecting all kinds of news over there recently, although we can't go directly to their team's training ground to see clearly. But from these media reports, I can see that the Middlesbrough team There's an overall sense of optimism. I think the Middlesbrough people will be happy to know they're up against a team that's in the middle of the second tier."

The coaches all understood what Twain meant. Middlesbrough believed that they had a better chance of winning against a first-tier team.

"If they think so, they're making a big mistake!" Tang En said with a smirk, "When they hoped to use an attack to end the battle, we let them hit a wall!" He forcefully He punched his fist into his left palm.

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After this regular coaching meeting, the entire coaching staff started the "wall building project" according to Tang En's request. Even Eastwood, who doesn't usually need to participate in defense, was specifically asked by Walker in training this time: if he loses the ball, he must counterattack on the spot. The midfielder who came up to defend, ran back to replace the midfielder himself.

This is not just a requirement for Eastwood alone, all offensive players must follow this requirement. If someone just stretched their feet symbolically after losing the ball and was passed by, they would immediately hear the harsh whistle and Walker's scolding.

Especially the full-backs, they are almost used as a second full-back. Press down to the opponent's bottom line when attacking, and retreat to your own bottom line when defending.

In addition, Dunn resolutely does not practice offside tactics. For Nottingham Forest, who had to face Middlesbrough's extremely fast wingers, offside was tantamount to suicide.

The key to defense is to compress the opponent's ball possession, passing space and time, making offside is not an ideal choice. The three lines of the Forest team must maintain a tight distance in the game, so it is not surprising that the forwards returned to the center circle.

For the current world football, asking the team to defend like this is tantamount to passive play, which is very annoying. But Tang En knew in his heart that after this summer, the whole world would realize the benefits of this compressed defense. Why? Because the Greek team won the championship. In the World Cup in Germany two years later, the Italian team with better defense had the last laugh. Those teams that refused to compress their defense, but opened their doors wide, played offensive football that people respect and like, but in the end All died horribly.

The players didn't understand that Twain would tell them between training sessions that doing so was the only way to win the championship trophy. Those who want championships and honors do so, those who don't...are you still professional players? Are you still men?

Des Walker has fully learned the true meaning of Tang En's "There is no one-size-fits-all tactic, as long as I can win, I don't care about defensive counterattack or offensive football". In order to enter the final, he can decisively abandon the plan of conceding less goals and defensive thinking in the case of conceding a goal first, and play against Bolton both home and away to score goals. In the end, relying on a valuable away goal, he won the ticket to Cardiff's Millennium Stadium.

And once he enters a decisive final, he throws the "offensive" thing out of the blue and defends with all his strength. He would rather delay to a penalty shootout with a half chance than a fight to the death with his opponent within 90 minutes. Because that would be "more risky" for him.

Tang En once said this to Walker: "Dess, you know that I am obsessed with Chinese culture, their food, their traditional customs, their history...even their art of war. Do you know "The Art of War by Sun Tzu?"

Seeing that Walker shook his head, Tang En expressed his understanding, and then explained, "That is a very famous book on the Art of War in China, which specifically talks about how to fight. It has accumulated more than three thousand years of wisdom, and now it is not just a book on the Art of War Yes, I think football can also be used. Football is war. There is a saying in it: "Water controls the flow because of the ground, and soldiers win because of the enemy. Therefore, soldiers have no constant momentum, and water has no permanent shape."

Walker was puzzled by Tang En's sudden Chinese, so Tang En explained with a smile, "The translation means that 'running water will change its flow direction due to the terrain, and the strategy of winning should be determined according to different enemies. Therefore, it is said that there is no fixed and single situation in war with soldiers, and the flow of water will not have a fixed shape. Wars are the same as football games. I always avoid being seen through by our opponents. Whether to defend or attack depends on what we face. What kind of opponent, what kind of game, what kind of situation... I know that this requirement may be a bit high for the team now. But..."

Pointing to the players who are training on the court, he said proudly: "We train them, and they can do it when they need to do it."

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