Starting with playing defensive midfield for Evergrande

Chapter 48: The ball control value actually doubled and upgraded?

3 month 16 day.

The national football team's crushing defeat has once again stirred up the emotions of fans across the country.

Even CTV1, for the first time ever, broadcast the news of Camacho's dismissal and the Chinese Football Association's launch of a new round of coach selection during its evening news program that day.

As Evergrande is currently the only fig leaf for Chinese football, the astute CEO Xu naturally convened a meeting within the team to rectify its work style.

In accordance with General Manager Xu's important instructions at the meeting!

From now on, any national team player affiliated with Guangzhou Evergrande will be fined more than 100,000 yuan by the club if they fail to perform well or fail to contribute in national team matches.

Conversely, if a player scores a goal or provides an assist in a national team match, Guangzhou Evergrande will reward them according to the AFC Champions League reward scheme!

A 1-5 defeat made Zheng Zhi and others among the first victims of this policy.

Zheng Zhi, the team captain, was fined a whopping 30 yuan by coach Xu, and even Sun Xiang, who didn't play, was inexplicably fined 10 yuan.

Sun Xiang tearfully recounted his grievances in Evergrande's internal group chat.

Su Hao, who had narrowly escaped punishment due to injury, chuckled and teased his older brother before entering the control panel.

Su Hao originally wanted to check how far his passing stat upgrade had progressed.

But upon closer inspection!
To Su Hao's surprise, for some reason, the ball control value he had unlocked by unlocking the card had also shown an upgrade progress bar below it.

Moreover, the progress was more than twice the passing value!

what's the situation?
Could it be that because my ball control stat is relatively low, it levels up faster than my passing stat?
It's even more than double the passing value?

This means that what used to require more than 100 days of training and 10 games to get one passing point can now be upgraded to ball control with only half the effort.

Su Hao was excited.

Keep in mind that the maximum ball control talent value on the panel is an astonishing 89.

If he could raise his ball control to 89—a world-class player's rating—in a very short time, plus his passing ability to 95, it would be a huge improvement.
Su Hao even felt that he could actually make it at Real Madrid or Barcelona?
Thinking about this
Su Hao, who was originally thinking of going to sleep, immediately got up and started doing sit-ups!
Yeah, sit-ups are even counted as training points!

3 month 17 day.

Su Hao appeared alone at the first team's training ground.

Because of the red card suspension for his flying kick against a Japanese player, Su Hao was not included in Lippi's roster for the trip to South Korea.

And just one day later in South Korea.

Having grown accustomed to having Su Hao share the burden, Conca was unable to secure a victory for Evergrande amidst the fierce attacks from the Koreans.

Muriqui scored Guangzhou Evergrande's only goal of the match.

The 1-1 scoreline also caused Guangzhou Evergrande to slip to second place in the group standings.

The national team suffered a crushing defeat, and even Guangzhou Evergrande, their only hope, was held to a draw by South Korea.

In an instant, the hearts of football fans across the country sank to the bottom.

也就是在这种动荡不安的情况下。3月18日的早晨，中国足协在自己的官网上发布了3月26日国足亚洲杯预选赛的23人大名单以及傅博暂代国足主帅一职的消息。

After contacting Evergrande, Su Hao's name reappeared on the list.

Furthermore, officials from the Chinese Football Association revealed to reporters that Su Hao has recovered from his injury and is fully capable of playing in the crucial match for the national team's qualification on March 22.

The Football Association's plan is excellent. With Su Hao able to play, fans will naturally forget about the 1-5 defeat and shift their attention to Su Hao's historic debut.

However, perhaps the 1-5 scoreline really hurt the fans too deeply.

The fans didn't buy it at all, and continued to organize people to stand by the building opposite the Football Association all day long, shouting for the Football Association and the national team to disband together.

"Xiao Hao, don't overthink it. The Asian Cup qualifiers are different from friendly matches. Anyone who dares to throw the game in the Asian Cup qualifiers will be drowned in the spittle of the fans!"

Around noon, on a flight to Changsha, Zheng Zhi patted Su Hao on the shoulder and said...

It's no wonder Zheng Zhi was suspicious. After all, he was the one who made that phone call to Su Hao, and he knew very well how much information was in that call. He was just afraid that Su Hao was too young and might not understand it right away.

"Brother Zhi, I wasn't thinking too much about it. I was just calculating the national team's chances of qualifying!"

"Damn, this group draw is really disgusting. Saudi Arabia and Iraq are both tough opponents. We've already lost to Saudi Arabia. If we lose to Iraq in Changsha, we might not even qualify for the Asian Cup. At that point, the fans will probably really explode!"

Speaking of the current situation in the Asian Cup qualifiers, Zheng Zhi, who was already preoccupied, sighed deeply.

"This 1-5 defeat has had a huge impact! Not just on the fans, I think..."

During the two-hour flight, Su Hao chatted with Zheng Zhi the whole way.

From the national team's glory days in 02 to their current dismal state!
As a witness, Zheng Zhi knew far too many secrets that Su Hao had never dared to imagine before.

What was the real reason Gao Hongbo was dismissed?
Some players in the national team also bought them back then.
However, the sentence Su Hao remembered most clearly was Zheng Zhi's words: "I'm already 33, I don't have time!"

"Old Zheng, tell me, how should we play this match?"

That night.

After arriving at the base and settling Su Hao in, Zheng Zhi knocked on the door of acting head coach Fu Bo.

Because they had known each other for a long time, Fu Bo didn't hold back and directly asked Zheng Zhi, the old captain.

The Football Association got rid of Camacho and then put him in charge of this Asian Cup qualifier. Everyone knows how important this Asian Cup qualifier is. If they win, there won't be any problem, and he can continue to act as the acting manager. But if they lose, Fu Bo will be the Football Association's scapegoat. So Fu Bo didn't want to take the job at all.

However, under the current football association system in China, he wouldn't dare say no at all.

There was no other way; having been forced into this situation, he could only pin his hopes on Zheng Zhineng, who held absolute authority within the team, to pull him along.

"Brother Fu, if you trust me, just build the team around our Evergrande squad. Play a 4-4-2 formation, with Su Hao and me in midfield, and Gao Lin, Han Peng, or Yu Dabao as forwards."

Zheng Zhi was speaking, while Fu Bo was taking notes in his notebook.

Although this scene is indeed a bit against the rules, Fu Bo has no other choice right now!

He has no right to decide on the 23-man roster, nor does he have the prestige to keep these old men of the national football team in check!

He can only rely on Zheng Zhi to bite the bullet and get this crucial Asian Cup qualifying match sorted out!
(End of this chapter)