From the man behind the football king to the football king.

Chapter 949: Manchester United is exhausted
When Bruno won the World Footballer of the Year trophy for the fifth time, Manchester United suffered another draw in the Premier League.

In the 24th round of the Premier League, Manchester United challenged Burnley away.

Although Manchester United scored a goal in the 18th minute with Luke Shaw assisting Harry Kane, and although Manchester United launched a fierce attack throughout the game, Burnley goalkeeper Pope made an amazing 16 saves to ensure that Burnley did not concede a second goal.

Burnley made a quick counterattack at the beginning of the second half, with striker Rodriguez scoring the equalizer in the 47th minute.

In the end, Manchester United drew 1:1 with Burnley away, which was also Manchester United's third draw this season.

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It is late January and the 1rd round of the Premier League has begun.

In this round of the game, Manchester United will host the Hammers West Ham United at home.

In the current standings, West Ham United ranks fifth, but there is a 5-point gap between them and Liverpool ahead of them, so the pressure to compete for a Champions League spot is very great.

Before the game, Manchester United held a ceremony for Bruno at the new Old Trafford Stadium, where five-time World Footballer of the Year Bruno showed his five World Footballer of the Year trophies to the 100,000 Manchester United fans on the scene.

In the subsequent games, Bruno started without any surprise.

Manchester United took the lead in the 20th minute of the game.

The goal was scored by Bruno, and the assist was given by young player Diallo.

In this game, Manchester United made a large rotation, and Diallo was also able to start.

In this attack, Diallo, who was outside the penalty area, passed a good ball to Bruno, who calmly shot the ball in the penalty area, and the ball flew into the far corner of the goal along the grass. West Ham United goalkeeper Areola was unable to save the ball.

"Bruno! This is his 9th goal in the league this season! In the scorer list, he is 19 goals ahead of Salah! And Bruno is not only leading by a large margin in the scorer list, but also in the assist list. He has contributed 20 assists so far. If he makes one more assist today, it will be goals and assists!" He Wei introduced excitedly.

After scoring the goal, Bruno took the initiative to run over and hug Diallo, not only to thank him for the assist, but also to give him encouragement and support.

Neither side scored in the first half and Manchester United went into the halftime break with a one-goal lead.

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In the second half, the two sides changed sides and in the 69th minute, Mourinho made the first substitution. He replaced the midfielder Gundogan with Rashford instead of Diallo. This may also indicate that Mourinho is satisfied with the performance of the young player in this game.

As a result, Rashford just came on the court and received an assist from Bruno and scored a goal, helping the team take a two-goal lead!
Bruno's number of assists also increased to the twentieth. With only 24 rounds of the league, he achieved the honor of 20 goals and assists.

Before Bruno, only Henry in the Premier League had scored 2002 goals and 2003 assists in the 20-20 season. He was also the first and only person in the Premier League to achieve goals and assists before Bruno joined Manchester United.

In fact, it is very difficult to get 20 goals and 20 assists. Looking at the five major leagues, there are not many people who can get goals and assists.

哟西在西甲赛场有1次取得进球+助攻双20，2019-2020赛季，阿根廷人在33场西甲比赛里打进25球助攻21次。

Apart from Bruno, these are the only two players in the top five European leagues who have achieved 20 goals and assists in a single season.

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However, for others, it is almost impossible to achieve a double 20 goals and assists, but for Bruno it is commonplace.

自从2014-2015赛季，布鲁诺首次在乌迪内斯取得进球+助攻的双20以来，其后每个赛季都是这样的表现：2014-2015赛季25球20助攻，2015-2016赛季39球29助攻，2016-2017赛季38球21助攻，2017-2018赛季41球23助攻，2018-2019赛季39球26助攻，2019-2020赛季43球23助攻，2020-2021赛季35球25助攻！

Adding his 25 goals and 20 assists this season, he has achieved the double 20 in single-season league goals and assists for eight consecutive years!
It is only the 23rd round of the league. Even if Manchester United plays one more round, there are still 14 rounds left in the league. No one can predict how many goals and assists he will get in the end.

It is very likely that he will break the record of 39 goals and 29 assists in a single season that he created when he was in Udinese, and become the first player in football history to score 40+ goals and provide 30+ assists in a single season.

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After leading by two goals, Mourinho used his last substitution and replaced Bruno with Fred.

It was obvious that after taking a two-goal lead, he was already thinking about the 25th round match next week.

Due to the Club World Cup in early February, Manchester United's 2th and 24th rounds of the Premier League were moved forward. This is undoubtedly very difficult for Manchester United. After all, playing two games in a row in a week is a great test for any team.

Even though Mourinho rotated the players to the greatest extent possible, the players did not actually get any rest time due to training needs.

In such a situation, even the most physically fit players may run out of energy at the last moment.

For the purpose of protection, of course Bruno had to be replaced. Besides, they were already two goals ahead, which was a relatively safe score.

Manchester United's midfield control declined after Bruno was substituted.

In the final moments, West Ham United, unwilling to accept defeat, took the initiative at the new Old Trafford Stadium and launched a fierce attack on Manchester United's goal.

However, Manchester United's defense, which had been trained by Mourinho for many years, withstood the test at the critical moment. Until the end of the game, West Ham United failed to score.

In the end, Manchester United beat West Ham United 2-0 at home thanks to a goal and an assist from Bruno.

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In another match that followed, Manchester City was tied 1:1 by Southampton away from home.

As a result, Manchester United's lead in the standings expanded to 12 points with one more game to play.

However, Manchester United's good form did not continue. In the 1th round of the Premier League on the evening of January 26, Manchester United was tied by Southampton at home. Although Bruno scored his 25th league goal of the season, Adams' goal in the second half helped Southampton equalize the score.

In the games played during the week, the Saints drew consecutively with the two Manchester City giants, and before that they even defeated Tottenham, which gave them the title of giant killer for a while.

In this game, Manchester United was already showing signs of fatigue.

Since the international match day in November last year, Manchester United has maintained an ultra-high-density schedule of two games a week. Starting from November 11, in just 11 days, Manchester United played a total of 20 games!
During this period, although Mourinho has been rotating Manchester United's lineup, Manchester United's main players have basically played about 15 games. Bruno, who played the most, played 17 games!
However, Manchester United's high-density schedule did not stop there, but had to continue.

As a result, the tired Manchester United was tied by their opponents again in the 1th round of the Premier League on the evening of January 30.

In this game, Manchester United's attacking group, including Bruno, was collectively silent, and eventually drew with Watford.

As a result, Manchester United has had three draws in the last four Premier League games!

This is a very bad signal!

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Manchester United's first game in February was the fourth round of the FA Cup at home against Middlesbrough.

This is also Manchester United's last domestic match before heading off to the Club World Cup.

As Manchester United was about to go to the Club World Cup, most of the main players of Manchester United were replaced in this game.

It can be said that Mourinho strategically gave up the FA Cup.

However, Bruno still started the game. As a physically fit person, playing two games a week is not a problem for him, so Mourinho did not rotate him when he could.

Although he has thought about giving up the FA Cup, Mourinho still hopes that the team can continue to play in the oldest tournament in football history as long as possible.

Bruno is the absolute core of the team. If he can play, Manchester United's chances of winning and advancing will be greatly increased.

Finally, with the help of a goal from Bruno, Manchester United defeated Middlesbrough 3-1 at home and advanced to the fifth round of this season's FA Cup.

In the subsequent FA Cup fifth round draw, Manchester United was hit by bad luck again and drew their strong rival Tottenham.

Fortunately, the fifth round of the FA Cup is still about a month away.

According to the schedule, the game will be held on the evening of March 3st.

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In fact, none of Manchester United's first-team players, including Bruno, and the coaching staff paid attention to the draw ceremony for the fifth round of the FA Cup. The draw ceremony was attended by club CEO Giarretta.

Manchester United, led by head coach Mourinho, has traveled to the United Arab Emirates to participate in the upcoming Club World Cup semi-final.

In 2019, before the epidemic, FIFA planned to reform the Club World Cup and expand it into a large-scale club competition with 24 teams participating, targeting the Champions League.

The 2021 Club World Cup will be the first tournament after the expansion and will be held in China.

However, due to the epidemic, FIFA finally gave up the expansion of the Club World Cup, and China also gave up this Club World Cup. Then in October last year, FIFA announced that the UAE would become the new host, and the competition system would still be the same as before with 10 teams participating.

(End of this chapter)