Green Field Eunuch

Chapter 88 The Frenzied Greek Fans

With the Europa League knockout stage approaching, the entire Roma team flew to Greece to play an away game against Greek team Papašinnaikos.

The coaching staff had studied their opponent, Papashinnaikos, early on and made some adjustments to their training accordingly.

The Europa League matches are quite important for Roma.

On the one hand, this is the first Europa League since the UEFA Cup was reorganized. If they can win the title, it will be a historic achievement. Moreover, Roma has never won a European competition before.

The consecutive defeats in the Champions League have made the team accurately assess its own strength.

If Roma performs normally in the Champions League, they should be able to reach the knockout stage or even the quarterfinals, but that's basically it. Reaching the semifinals will be very difficult and will depend on the luck of the draw.

However, Roma's strength is still outstanding in the Europa League, placing them in the top tier alongside teams like Liverpool, Atletico Madrid, Juventus, and Hamburg.

If we can win the Europa League, then even if we lose the league title race this season, it seems like it would be acceptable.
Of course, the primary task is to win the league title, which is Roma's most important priority. They also put a lot of effort into the Europa League. As for the less important Italian Cup, Spalletti is considering giving up on it.

This is Spalletti's current thinking.

Therefore, despite the opponent being only a Greek team, Spalletti still gave them full attention.

Shan Yongzhuo naturally agreed with Spalletti's idea.

If you can reach the Europa League final, or even win the trophy, you'll play a total of nine matches from the knockout stage onwards, which is quite a lot.

Nine matches, assuming you score 1 to 2 goals per match, let's say that's an average of 1.5 goals per match.

That's 13.5 goals. Round it up to 14 goals, which would bring in 2.8 points!
This is already pretty good.

Moreover, Shan Yongzhuo believes that the opponents in the Europa League are all amateurs, and scoring goals might be easier than in Serie A.

Therefore, he values ​​the Europa League far more than head coach Spalletti.

With the match approaching, the entire team flew to Athens, Greece, checked into a hotel, and rested.

Rome and Athens are not exactly close, and the journey was quite tiring. When the team members arrived at the hotel in Rome, they were all a bit exhausted.

However, the Papashinnaikos fans were not going to let them off the hook.

Greek football fans are quite famous worldwide. Perhaps their fighting spirit can't compare to Russian fans, and their trash talk can't match that of English fans, but Greek fans are the most adept at using all kinds of weapons, making them far more dangerous than the trash-talking football hooligans of England and Italy.

During the 06 World Cup qualifiers, Albania defeated Greece, and excited Albanian fans held a large celebration. In a fit of rage, a Greek football hooligan named Krakis pulled out a dagger and stabbed a 20-year-old Albanian fan to death.

Burning down stadiums and assaulting police officers are child's play for Greek football hooligans; they're commonplace occurrences.

Right now, the fans of Papasinecos are giving Roma a welcome ceremony that they consider quite gentlemanly.

The sounds of fireworks, explosions, and noise continued throughout the entire night, and the entire Roma team did not get a proper rest.

Shan Yongzhuo was in the same boat; the noise outside was so loud that even the blanket couldn't block it out, making it impossible for him to fall asleep peacefully.

"Damn it, those Greek bastards!"

"I only slept for less than 4 hours."

“Me too, I feel like the hotel’s soundproofing is completely useless.” “I don’t think it’s a problem.” Vucinic laughed carelessly, “I slept very comfortably.”

Tony, standing next to him, gritted his teeth and said, "That's right, you're sleeping very comfortably because your snoring and teeth grinding are louder than the fireworks outside!"

The others laughed, but in reality, none of them were in good condition; even De Rossi had bloodshot eyes.

Dan Yongzhuo was also very angry. "Damn it, I'm going all out. Today I'm going to run 10,000 meters and score five goals!"

"It seems... a bit difficult?"

"Forget it, let them off the hook this time. Let's repay evil with kindness. Three goals!"

"We need to score at least two goals!"

Shan Yongzhuo silently made a vow in his heart.

……

In the afternoon, the whole team arrived at the Athens Olympic Stadium by bus and immediately felt the atmosphere of the intimidating home ground.

Standing in such a home field, Shan Yongzhuo couldn't help but think of the base in the large desert in the movie "Resident Evil 3", where a large number of zombies surrounded it.

The current situation seems somewhat similar, and these fans are even more ferocious than the zombies in Resident Evil...

The players from Papashinnaikos seemed quite used to it and didn't seem to care at all. Playing in Greece, it's hard for them not to adapt to this situation.

Small-scale, small-scale.

As soon as the two teams stepped onto the field, the Athens Olympic Stadium erupted with a deafening roar, like a volcanic eruption.

Shan Yongzhuo couldn't help but think that it would feel great to play here as a Papashinnaikos player and score a goal. Compared to these Greek fans, the Italian fans were so gentlemanly that they could even be voted the most civilized fans.

With the referee's whistle, the game officially began.

Totti passed the ball to Shan Yongzhuo, who then passed it back to Pizarro and immediately charged towards the opponent's half.

However, the Papašinnaikos players pressed Roma with incredible intensity, as if they were on steroids. Pizarro passed the ball across to De Rossi, who attempted to pass it to Baptista on the wing but made a mistake. Baptista failed to receive the ball properly, and it went out of bounds.

After gaining possession, Papašinnaikos immediately launched a fierce attack on Roma, which affected Roma's performance and caught them off guard.

For the first ten minutes, the ball remained almost entirely in Roma's half, as if they were conducting a half-field practice.

Papašinnaikos' midfield was not weak; the partnership of Simão Júnior and veteran Carragheri showed considerable ability, suppressing Roma's midfield. Fortunately, striker Cissé wasted a very good chance, which prevented Roma from conceding an early goal away from home.

Spalletti on the sidelines looked anxious, but there was nothing he could do; the players' performance was clearly affected.

This was something he couldn't do anything about. All he could do was keep shouting from the sidelines to keep the defense steady. After defending against the opening attack, he would wait for the opponent's momentum to drop, and then he could start a counterattack.

Papasinecos launched wave after wave of attacks, while Roma made frequent mistakes in midfield and were constantly counter-pressed, making the game somewhat unsightly.

Standing at the front, Shan Yongzhuo had no better options, and he had to temporarily put aside his goal of running 10,000 meters.

(End of this chapter)