A precise long pass followed, with the ball spanning 60 meters, directly from the top of the home team’s penalty arc to the area just in front of Manchester City’s penalty flank!
This was a long pass where Bonucci spotted Manchester City’s formation in the midst of pushing forward and executed a sudden change of rhythm.
Thus, as the ball fell, both Kompany and Mandzukic, who were the last ones back, were sideways chasing the ball!
However, Mandzukic was charging forward all the way, whereas Kompany was turning and rushing backward.
Both of them stand 1.90 meters tall and weigh nearly 90 kilograms, so in terms of confrontation and impact, they are evenly matched;
Yet Mandzukic, with a bit of ferocity, managed to forcefully edge out a body’s width over Kompany in that fifty-fifty duel!
The rapidly advancing teammate Morata arrived just in time as Mandzukic’s pass just bypassed in front of Ranocchia;
Morata took a powerful shot, hitting goalkeeper Joe Hart in the crotch!
Morata rushed in front of Hart, pointed to his own crotch, then turned to celebrate with Mandzukic.
Hart looked bewildered.
He didn’t expect that his first touch in this match would actually be a hit to the crotch!
Ranocchia on the sidelines could also see that Morata had many options for that ball;
But he deliberately used the instep to aim at Joe Hart’s crotch, clearly spotting the goalkeeper’s weakness, and seemingly trying to humiliate him early in the game. Chapters first released on novel(ꜰ)ire.net
They say that seeing Hart makes one want to swing a shot, but Morata’s shot was anything but a guess!
The Juventus Stadium resonated with enthusiastic cheers.
Though the stadium can only accommodate a mere 40,000 people, across Europe, it doesn’t rank at all in terms of capacity;
However, as the only stadium with exclusive ownership by the club, the Agnelli family has invested a lot of effort into it!
The stadium is specially designed with excellent amplification, and the collective cheers of 40,000 people can impart an impact equivalent to that of over 70,000!
"Wow, did it go in just like that?" Materazzi was stunned.
"Yeah, it went in just like that," Trezeget laughed.
But this was merely an appetizer Juventus served to the live fans.
Allegri, having secretly learned from his contact in the United Kingdom that Tang Long would be excluded from the starting lineup of the game, was ready with his strategy.
Astute Allegri knew that Manchester City could miss anyone but not Tang Long!
As a team that relies on ball possession, Manchester City’s midfield actually falls far short compared to Barça’s peak era of Habib.
Playing positional football fears being pressed, and currently only Tang Long in Manchester City’s midfield has the capability to resist pressing.
As long as someone tries to press him, if the press is not tight, he can carry the ball with dribbling out of the encirclement;
If tightly pressed, drawing players towards him, he’ll just pass the ball far to find the gap behind the pressing players!
Who could withstand that?
Look at Manchester City’s current starters, Toure, in his younger days, could perhaps perform at 80% of Tang Long’s ability;
The other midfielder Fernandinho is purely a defensive player with not very strong distribution skills.
And playmaker Silva is too physically frail, so once the opponent body ups, he runs out of options.
After Pirlo left Serie A to play in Major League Soccer in the United States, the ironclad trio of Pogba, Marchisio, and Pirlo transformed into Pogba, Marchisio, and Sturaro.
Sturaro’s technique and overall vision are far inferior to Pirlo;
However, his running ability, interception skills, and the passion he exhibits on the field surpass the 36-year-old Pirlo considerably!
Thus, the three Juventus midfielders in their 4-3-3 formation gradually have shifted from technical to more physical.
Accompanied by forwards like Mandzukic, Morata, and Cuadrado who combine speed and stamina, Juventus’s pressing tactics have firmly suppressed Manchester City’s positional play from the first minute!
In the 25th minute, when facing Pogba’s tall and long-legged defensive pressure, Toure held his ground and passed the ball to the oncoming Fernandinho.
Then instinctively ran forward.
His running is habitual because in the previous two games paired with Tang Long as midfielders, if it were Tang Long, the ball would be a one-touch pass for a one-two.
However, Fernandinho seemed insecure about his footwork because another midfielder, Sturaro, was closely marking him.
Hesitating for a moment, he didn’t pass the ball forward but instead back-passed it to center-back Kompany.
As the ball rolled towards Kompany, Mandzukic had been aggressively charging up.
Captain Kompany didn’t rashly kick long but chose to backpass the ball to Joe Hart, signaling him to spread the opponent’s formation.
The initial thought was to maintain ball possession without blindly kicking long and giving the ball to the opposition, but unexpectedly, this back pass led to a major error!
During the three games Hart served his suspension, he paid close attention to the Argentine goalkeeper Caballero, who started in his place, playing control games with the defenders.
This gave Joe Hart a sense of threat!
After all, starting from the Manci era, Manchester City transformed into a team focused on ball possession;
Yet, footwork has never been Hart’s forte; he has established himself in Manchester City based on his goal-line techniques.
But Joe Hart thought, if the 1983-born Caballero, in his 30s, can control the ball at his feet, how can he, born in 1987 and only 28 years old, not surpass him?
Besides, since the start of this season, he’s practiced footwork diligently, and the goalkeeper coach praised his rapid improvement at the feet!