Chapter 491 The end of the second child is too tragic

As in the previous life, in the 2018 World Cup in Russia, Argentina was placed in Group D with Croatia, Nigeria and Iceland.

On June 16, Argentina played its first game against Iceland.

Di Maria's goal gave Argentina a 1-0 victory over Iceland.

While getting off to a good start, Chen Ran also got a "Level One Chicken Blood Card" from the system.

In another match in the same group, Croatia defeated Nigeria 2:0, beating Argentina on goal difference to rank first in the group.

Five days later, on June 22, Argentina faced the strongest opponent in this group, Croatia, led by Modric.

Modric is 33 years old this year, but because he maintains good competitive condition, he is an indispensable and important member whether at the Crystal Palace club or the Croatian national team.

Croatia this time can be said to have a strong army. In the previous life, they reached the finals of this World Cup, and finally lost to France and finished second.

In addition to Modric, there are many good players in the Croatian team such as Rakitic, Perisic, Mandzukic, Brozovic, Lovren, Djorduka and so on.

Chen Ran attaches great importance to this opponent. He regards Croatia as a touchstone. As the World Cup runner-up in the previous life, it can be used to test the quality of the current Argentine team.

To this end, Chen Ran made adjustments to Argentina's starting lineup, putting center Higuain, who started the game against Iceland, on the bench and focusing on defensive counterattacks.

Forward Aguero

Messi

Left midfielder Di Maria, central midfielder De Paul, central midfielder Paredes, right midfielder McAllister

Left back Acuña, center back Otamendi, center back Mascherano, right back Molina

Goalkeeper Emiliano Martinez

On the Croatian side, facing Chen Ran, a famous champion coach, head coach Dalic naturally formed the strongest lineup and prepared to give Chen Ran a good showdown.

Center Mandzukic

Left midfielder Perisic, midfielder Modric, right midfielder Rebic

Midfielder Brozovic, midfielder Rakitic

Left back Strinic, center back Lovren, center back Joel Luka, right back Vrsaljko

Goalkeeper Subasic

"Boss, long time no see, you are still so handsome."

Before the game started, Modric specially ran to Argentina to say hello to Chen Ran.

"Hahahaha, little Luka, your skills are getting better and better now."

"Boss, I'm 33 years old this year, and you still call me little Luca?"

Looking at Messi, Mascherano and others who were snickering on the side, Modric protested helplessly to Chen Ran.

"Haha, no matter how old you are, you are still the ignorant boy I brought to the Crystal Palace from Croatia."

They are friends off the field, and we can talk and laugh together. But on the playing field, no one, whether it is Modric, Messi or Mascherano, has any intention of letting them go.

Since the Argentina team led by Chen Ran now focuses on defensive counterattack tactics, Croatia easily took the initiative on the court.

However, the three-person counterattack team composed of Messi, Aguero and Di Maria also posed a great threat to Croatia's defense, forcing Dalic to leave enough manpower to prevent Argentina's counterattack.

As a result, Croatia, who had scruples, did not dare to attack with all its strength, so the pressure on Argentina's defense was not very great.

Led by two veterans, Mascherano and Otamendi, a group of young Argentinians managed to withstand Croatia's attack by running and scrambling as hard as they could.

Until the referee blew the whistle to end the first half, the score on the field remained at 0:0 without any change.

"I didn't expect that Chen Ran's transformation of Argentina was successful, and the defensive counterattack was actually impressive."

"However, there are still loopholes in Argentina's tactical play. Mascherano is only 174cm tall and Otamendi is only 183cm tall. The air defense ability of such a central defender combination is worrying."

"It's okay. I checked and found that the center backs on Argentina's bench are all pretty tall. Some are 185cm and some are 188cm. They are enough to handle most teams."

"Those guys you mentioned are only in their early twenties. This is the World Cup. Do you dare to use central defenders in their early twenties to play the game? If their ability is no problem, then Chen Ran will not remove Mascherano from the game.

The defensive midfielder position is withdrawn to play as a central defender."

"What you said upstairs makes sense. It seems that lack of height is indeed a major flaw in Argentina's defense."

"Hahahaha, when Chen Ran was coaching Belgium, he used high-altitude bombing tactics crazily because there were many tall players in the team. I would like to see what the outcome will be if this Argentine team encounters Belgium."

"Damn, that would be really fun!"

During the halftime break, Chen Ran, who was very satisfied with the Argentina team's performance in the first half, did not make any substitutions except giving the players a shot of blood as usual.

On the Croatian side, head coach Dalic was extremely troubled.

Reason told him that facing a strong team like Argentina, it would be a good result for Croatia to get a draw.

However, the situation on the field where Croatia took the initiative in the game made him a little unwilling to just get one point.

After hesitating for a long time, just as the intermission was about to end, Dalic finally made up his mind to take a gamble.

Subsequently, he replaced the defensive midfielder Brozovic with Kovacic, who has better organizational ability.

At the beginning of the second half, I felt happy when I saw Chen Ran making substitutions in Croatia.

After replacing Brozovic, Croatia does not have a purely defensive midfielder on the field, which is more beneficial to Messi and Di Maria in defensive counterattacks.

As Chen Ran expected, after Kovacic came on the field, he frequently rushed to the frontcourt to participate in the attack, leaving the defensive task of the Croatian midfielder to Rakitic alone.

But Rakitic himself is not a full-time defensive midfielder, and he can't take care of it alone.

When the game reached the 62nd minute, Argentina goalkeeper Emiliano Martinez firmly held Mandzukic's header in his arms, then quickly got up and threw the ball with a strong hand.

Arrive at midfield.

At this time, Messi had retreated to the center circle, and before Rakitic could destroy the ball, he used the outside instep of his right foot to pass the ball directly to Di Maria on the left.

Di Maria first passed the ball with a man, past Croatian right midfielder Rebic, and then ran all the way along the left sideline.

Seeing that the barrier in front of him was passed by Rebic, Croatia's right back Vrsaljko rushed forward to intercept Di Maria.

Di Maria did not choose to continue passing this time, but pushed with the arch of his left foot and passed the ball to Aguero who was advancing at high speed in front of him with a through ball.

Aguero took advantage of the situation and received the ball, but at this time, Croatian center back Joel Luka kept close to him and blocked the inside line, preventing Aguero from cutting inside and hitting the goal.

Seeing that the shooting angle was getting smaller and smaller, Aguero simply gave up the idea of ​​cutting inside and directly hit the goal with his left foot from a small angle.

"Bang!"

This shot was of high quality, and the ball flew quickly to the near corner of the Croatian goal.

However, since Joelluka was not out of position, Aguero had very few shooting angles to choose from.

Croatian goalkeeper Subasic had moved to the near post in advance and directly blocked Aguero's shot.

Fortunately, Aguero's shot was powerful enough that Subasic did not dare to hold the ball directly, and the ball did not bounce off the baseline, but bounced towards the center of the penalty area.

Suddenly, a small figure jumped out from behind.

It's Messi!

I saw him using the toe of his right foot to poke the ball towards the Croatian goal before another Croatian centre-back Lovren could make a clearance.

At this time, Subasic was still in position at the near post and had no time to make a second save. He could only watch the ball roll into the unguarded goal.

"GOAL!!!!!"

With Messi's clever follow-up shot, Argentina led Croatia 1:0.

"Chen Ran is really awesome! Now this Argentina team has been trained by him to be able to play defensively and counterattack smoothly."

"The goalkeeper launched a counterattack by throwing the ball with his hand. Messi retreated to distribute the ball. Di Maria dribbled the ball and then passed through. Aguero hit the goal from a small angle. Messi followed up and scored with a supplementary shot. The whole counterattack kept moving forward, without any

Any extra movements may not take up to ten seconds in total."

"Indeed. In the past, who could have imagined that Argentina would play such a beautiful defensive counterattack?"

"Croatia will definitely make a crazy counterattack next. It depends on whether Argentina's defense can withstand it."

Just as the fans judged, Dalic couldn't sit still after seeing Argentina's counterattack.

The goal he set for himself was to take at least one point from Argentina. Losing was definitely not the result he wanted to see.

Soon, under the command of Dalic, Croatia launched a massive attack. Even the two full-backs who had stayed in the backcourt to contain Argentina's counterattack now began to frequently provide assists.

However, this is exactly the result Chen Ran hopes to see.

As Croatia pressed forward aggressively, the holes in the defense became wider and wider.

In the next game, Di Maria and Aguero also took advantage of counterattack opportunities and scored a goal each.

In Croatia, Mandzukic scored a face-saving goal only after Chen Ran began to replace young players to gain game experience.

In the end, with the goals of Messi, Di Maria and Aguero, Argentina easily defeated Croatia 3:1, and Chen Ran also got a "level one blood recovery card" from the system.

In another match in the same group, Nigeria defeated Iceland 2:0.

As a result, Argentina ranks first with six points after winning two games, while Croatia and Nigeria both have three points and still have hope of qualifying from the group.

Moreover, because the rules of the World Cup are that when the points are tied, the goal difference and number of goals will be looked at first, so Argentina still has the possibility of being eliminated.

Four days later, on June 27, Argentina ushered in the last game of the group stage. As long as they did not lose to Nigeria by more than three goals, they could ensure the right to qualify from the group.

For this game, Chen Ran of course continued to use defensive counterattack tactics. In order to avoid an own-goal incident that capsized in the gutter, he still sent out the entire main lineup.

On the Nigerian side, they have no retreat.

In this game, they not only have to defeat Argentina, but also have as many goal differences as possible, so that they can have hope of qualifying from the group.

Obviously, such a Nigeria team that is eager to attack is exactly suitable for Argentina's defensive counterattack tactics.

When the referee blew the whistle at the end of the first half, Argentina's Di Maria and Aguero had already scored goals through counterattacks. Argentina led Nigeria 2:0.

One characteristic of African teams is that no one can stop them when they play crazy. But once they fall into adversity, they can easily be defeated.

With a 0:2 deficit, Nigeria needs to score at least five goals to qualify for the group.

Facing a strong team like Argentina, this almost impossible task immediately caused the morale of the Nigerian players to plummet.

Seeing this situation, Chen Ran also replaced the main players one after another to save energy for the next knockout round.

In the end, with goals from Di Maria, Aguero and Dybala who came on as a substitute, Argentina defeated Nigeria 3:0.

As a result, Argentina successfully advanced to the top 16 with a beautiful three-game winning streak and ranked first in the group. At the same time, Chen Ran also received a "first-level sight card" from the system.

In another match in the same group, Croatia defeated Iceland 2:1 and secured another qualifying spot as second place in the group.

Except for Chen Ran, no one knows how big the difference is between the first and the second.

In a previous life, Croatia beat Argentina and ranked first in the group. As a result, they avoided the subsequent champion France and reached the final all the way.

Argentina, which failed to live up to expectations, had to face France in the quarter-finals.

Although they played one of the most exciting games of the 2018 World Cup with the French team, the 3:4 score could not conceal the fact that they were eliminated and went home just after entering the top 16.

Now, because Argentina has grabbed the first place in Group D, their opponent in the quarter-finals becomes Denmark, which is second in Group C.

Croatia, on the other hand, had to face a strong opponent, the French team.

In this regard, Chen Ran could only say sorry to Modric in his heart. He might have lost his World Cup runner-up medal.

Of course, Chen Ran also looks forward to Croatia performing a miracle.

If they can kill the French team in advance, then the difficulty for Argentina to compete for the World Cup championship will be greatly reduced.

At this moment, Chen Ran felt that he was a die-hard Croatian fan for twenty years!
Chapter completed!