novelraw Chapter 571 - 391 Good News: Arsenal’s corner kick tactics are indeed invincible Bad News: That seems to be all they know! 2
Chapter 571 - 391 Good News: Arsenal’s corner kick tactics are indeed invincible Bad News: That seems to be all they know! 2
So occasionally during training, Pellegrini would also discuss the team’s tactics with Tang Long.
Tang Long often provided some constructive suggestions.
Although Pellegrini didn’t always agree or adopt them entirely, Tang Long’s innovative thinking and advanced football mindset often provided new inspirations for a traditional coach like Pellegrini.
Previously, when teammates responded to Pellegrini’s call in the locker room and offered their opinions, Tang Long remained silent;
It wasn’t because he had nothing to say, but because he was constantly replaying Arsenal’s corner kick tactics in his mind during those few limited minutes.
Meanwhile, another part of his mental space was analyzing the match videos he regularly fed into the AI system.
Among these, there were quite a few images of goals scored from corner kicks.
[Searching and analyzing...]
Tang Long nodded to himself knowingly.
Then he got up and walked over to Pellegrini, sharing his ideas with him.
Listening to Tang Long’s suggestion, Pellegrini initially nodded slightly.
But the more he listened, the stranger it seemed, until his eyes widened in disbelief.
The other teammates who were intently listening to Tang Long’s suggestion were even more shocked!
What kind of tactic is this?
You’ve got to be kidding, right? How does this sound weirder than Arsenal’s rogue corner kick tactics?
The key is, we’ve never practiced such a unique tactic in training.
Assistant coach Rein immediately flew into a rage!
"Tang! The boss let you speak to give constructive suggestions. If you don’t understand tactics, you can shut up instead of talking nonsense here, okay? Halftime is very precious!"
Facing Rein’s accusation, Tang Long was not annoyed, he just calmly said to him:
"You say my tactic doesn’t work, fine, if you think you can do better, why don’t you propose some constructive ideas?"
How could Rein come up with any constructive ideas?
Initially, when Pellegrini asked him, he actually said he needed to call the team’s set-piece coach. This action made Tang Long quite disdainful—when the situation is this urgent, you still want to consult the set-piece coach remotely over the phone? Isn’t that a joke?
Everyone’s eyes turned to Pellegrini, waiting for him to make the final decision.
Pellegrini pondered for a full minute, his gaze fixed on the tactics board, then suddenly glanced at his watch, realizing they only had one minute left to rest!
He no longer hesitated, slapped his thigh, and declared loudly, "Okay, follow Tang’s plan!"
...
The second half of the match begins!
In the 52nd minute, Arsenal repeated their old trick.
Welbeck dribbled to the left wing, facing a one-on-one with Kolarov.
Since the previous one-on-one defense against Welbeck had inadvertently resulted in a corner kick, this time, Kolarov was not careless, quickly calling Gundogan over for support.
However, Welbeck clearly came with a mission, and this time he did not plan to break through the two-man defensive line but rather drove the ball along the sideline;
When Kolarov closed in, Welbeck aimed and struck a full instep shot at Kolarov’s ankle!
With a bang, the football bounced off the end line.
Kolarov watched as Welbeck joyfully picked up the football and tossed it to Cazorla, realizing with alarm, "Damn, fell for this kid’s trick."
Arsenal earned another corner kick!
In the first half, Arsenal had only two shots, but both resulted in goals, and both came from corner kick attacks.
Such efficient corner kick attack was making the Arsenal fans at Wembley Stadium cheer with joy;
When they saw Welbeck forcing another corner, many had already begun to shout.
"Score another! Get one more!"
"Defeat Manchester City with corner kicks!"
"Hahaha, let’s go for a corner kick hat trick!"
"Oh my God, all these years and Arsenal has never been this eager for corners!"
As usual, Giroud, Koscielny, and Welbeck, the three tall players, stepped into Manchester City’s penalty area, waiting for the close marking by Toure, Ranocchia, and Otamendi.
But this time they were dumbfounded!
The ones marking closely weren’t the tall Manchester City opponents from the first half.
They were Klichy, Sabaleta, and Sterling!
The average height of these three players was only about 1.75 meters, with the shortest, Sterling, just slightly over 1.7 meters.
While Giroud, Koscielny, and Welbeck all stood over 185 cm, with Giroud even surpassing 190 cm.
But now standing in front of Giroud was Klichy, in front of Koscielny was Sabaleta, and Welbeck was matched against Sterling.
No matter the angle, these three Arsenal players were half a head taller than the three close-marking Manchester City players.
"Hey, buddy, you’ve come to guard me, are you sure you want to mark me?"
Welbeck pointed to his neck, laughing and taunting his national team colleague, Sterling.
Veteran Giroud felt something was off.
His eyes scanned the area around the penalty box, and when he saw Ranocchia, Toure, and Kolarov—these three tall players—were not marking closely but instead using zonal defense inside the penalty area, he couldn’t help feeling puzzled.
Tiny players doing man-marking, while big players were using zonal defense, isn’t this reversing the usual way?
And what left people most puzzled was Tang Long, standing near the penalty spot.
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