Fox in the Penalty Area

Sitting in the visiting team's locker room at the Red Roof Stadium, Hu Lai couldn't help but sigh in his heart. It really deserves to be a UEFA five-star certified football stadium, and even the visiting team's locker room is much more luxurious.

Some stadiums have very basic visiting locker rooms, with no extras other than basic cabinets and stools. To exaggerate, there is not even hot water, and you can only use cold water to take a shower. Even the stools are uncomfortable, making your butt hurt after sitting for a long time.

Of course, these little tricks are all to do everything possible to add trouble to the visiting team and interfere with their game, so as to help the home team win the game more easily.

The Red Roof Stadium, home of the veteran Premier League giants Tramed, does not have such a problem. Their visiting dressing room is comparable to the home dressing room of some smaller clubs.

At least compared with the locker room of Leeds City's Flanders home team, it is only slightly inferior.

Of course, the Leeds City Club will renovate the home team's locker room after the end of this season to improve the level. For example, adding facilities such as jacuzzi to help players recover-this is said to be a request from head coach Tony Clark.

So the premise of this project is that Leeds City must ensure that they can successfully relegation. Otherwise, after relegation, it is hard to say whether Tony Clark can still coach in Leeds City, let alone the package of reconstruction plans he proposed to the club.

Tony Clark was standing in the middle of the visiting team's locker room at the Red Roof, saying loudly to his players:

"Everyone thinks that we can't beat Tramed in the away game. They have some truth in what they say. In terms of strength, we are indeed far inferior to Tramed. This is still their home court, in their 'red house' , They are almost invincible. But let me say, if football always depends on these paper strengths to determine the outcome, then what is the point of the game? The most fascinating part of the football game is that we fight hard on the field and blow the final whistle Before the ringing, no one knows who will lose and who will win!"

Having said this, he paused and looked around at his players.

He still remembers how most players looked at him when he first came to this team.

With suspicion, disgust, and disdain.

But now, after more than half a season of cooperation, those eyes have basically disappeared completely.

Especially after the three-game winning streak, even if the next away game was lost to Warship Harbor, the players didn't seem to doubt his authority as the head coach.

Selling disobedient players who obviously do not meet the team's tactical requirements, introducing players he likes, passing a series of disciplinary requirements including forcing players to take naps... the seeds he planted in this team,

After putting in so much effort, there are finally signs of breaking ground.

He raised his voice, and continued: "So put aside the strength gap between us and our opponents, and forget how the damn media outside predicted this game! Do your best! Show our courage to the giants! And the home team Compared with the Tramed who fought, we have nothing to lose, after all, everyone thinks we will lose, so isn't the worst result just a loss?"

Listening to what the head coach said, Hu Lai thought that he had rich relegation experience, but he had never seen such a head coach of a relegation team. It's completely different from Zhao Kangming and Director Zhao of Shining Star. He doesn't care about every penny, but clamors "I just want to kill you, or be beaten to death by you"...

Is this for relegation? Is this Nima a lunatic who got sick?

Run, the lunatic is beating someone! Being beaten is all for nothing!

But let alone, after being so tidied up by the head coach, Hu Lai actually had a surge of pride in his heart-the head coach doesn't care about the result, what else do we want to do so much? Just do it!

Not only him, but other players in Leeds City can't wait to scream.

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The red-roofed stadium, the home of Tramed, a veteran football club in England and a traditional strong team, got its name from the red roof when it was first built. Except for the roof, the overall exterior wall of the stadium is divided into upper and lower parts. The upper part is red even with the roof, and the lower part is white-exactly the same color as their home jersey.

Because the appearance of the isosceles triangle on the roof of the main stand looks like a huge red pointed house from a distance, Tramed fans nicknamed the stadium "Red House".

The nickname sounds very warm, just like the little girl's home in a fairy tale.

But in fact, this used to be the famous "Devil's Home Stadium" in European football. During the period when Tramed's achievements were the most brilliant, this stadium made any visiting team daunting.

So there are rumors that the red of the "Red House" is not paint, but the blood of the opponent. The "Red House" is not a warm place full of fairy tale atmosphere, but a lair of some evil existence. Therefore, Tramed has a nickname called "Scarlet Witch", which is as scary as the cannibal witch in medieval legends.

In the past ten years, the "Scarlet Witch" has lost its dominance over the Premier League, and the "notoriety" of this stadium is not as prominent as before.

But even so, playing in this stadium is not an easy task for any team.

Tramed fans don't need to deliberately target the visiting team. Just cheering for the home team is enough to make many players of the visiting team feel difficult to breathe... After all, the capacity of 60,000 stands is relatively large for the current Premier League. It can indeed be counted as a huge number, corresponding to Leeds City's home stadium Flanders, which can accommodate 30,000 people.

But there was a little accident in the "Red House" today.

Tramed fans found that the visiting Leeds City players did not seem to be affected by the noise they made.

From the very beginning of the game, they played proactively, not at all like playing away, but more like playing at their own home court...

If the performance of the players may still be the illusion of the fans, it is impossible to count.

Then in the opening 26 minutes, it was the visiting team Leeds City who scored the first goal. Perhaps everyone can confirm the fact that today's Leeds City is not the same as the team they have seen in the past one and a half seasons. .

"Pete Williams—!!" Matthew Cox drawled. "He got Lorenzo's header back and deftly cleared Kirk with a chest stop! And he shot! Walker missed the ball! Leeds took the lead away! Unexpectedly, the first goal turned out to be Leeds City!"

Watching Pete Williams rushing to celebrate the goal in the TV broadcast, the fans in the "White Rose" bar opened their arms, beat the beat rhythmically, and then sang loudly along with this beat:

"Pete! Pete! Pete! Pete! He's our genius Pete! Pete! Pete! Pete! Pete! He's the Pete who always loved Leeds! Ah--Pete Williams! Ah--Pete Williams! "

It's a cheering anthem created by Leeds City fans for their favorite players, who sing the character anthem whenever a player does well.

Leeds City is playing away today, and many of them can't go away, so they can only sing in front of the TV to cheer for the players.

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Leeds City fans were not happy for long.

Tramed's French striker Pape Bonet fired a powerful shot from the corner of the penalty area before the end of the first half to help Tramed equalize.

Just after the start of the second half, Trammed's Dutch midfielder Nick van Delft opened Leeds' goal again with a low shot from outside the box.

"Van Delft!! Beautiful!! His shot completely suppressed the height, and the football ran forward against the turf, making it more difficult for the goalkeeper to save! Facing his Dutch compatriot, Van Delft But there is no intention of being merciful at all!"

As the score was overtaken, the fans of Tramed came alive. They sang and danced in the stands, cheering for their team for a while, and mocking the little brother of Leeds City with singing:

"Go where you gotta go! Champions League! Go where you gotta go! Champions League! You know which one we're talking about!"

Then there was a huge burst of laughter.

Leeds City is not well-known in the history of English football, and it can be regarded as an out-and-out unknown.

It stands to reason that there should be no hatred between them and Tramed in Manchester-in the long history, they have rarely had a chance to fight against Tramed.

But Tramed fans taunted them, still mercilessly.

It has little to do with football, it's mostly a regional feud - stemming from the historic feud between the two cities of Manchester and Leeds.

The United Kingdom is a traditional sheep-raising country and an important wool producing area in Europe. Their wool has always been supplied to the whole of Europe.

Later, after the failure of the Hundred Years War with France, Britain decided not to simply export wool, but to vigorously develop the wool textile industry. The wool spinning industry has become the "national industry" of Britain. With the enclosure movement in the 16th century expanding sheep farms and increasing wool production, British woolen exports accounted for 78% of all exports.

At that time, Leeds was the famous woolen industry center in the UK, and gathered a large number of woolen industry workers.

The home stadium of the Leeds City Club is called "Flanders Stadium", which also highlights the development of Leeds' wool textile industry at that time - Flanders is not the current place name in the UK, nor does it belong to Leeds, but a historical place name in Western Europe. It is roughly equivalent to the provinces of Zeeland in the Netherlands, East-Flanders and West-Flanders in Belgium, and the Pas-de-Calais and Noors in France.

This place had the best woolen workers in Europe at that time. British wool raw materials were also transported here, and then exported to the whole of Europe.

The rise of the British wool spinning industry is also due to the poaching of a large number of Flemish workers.

In order to commemorate this period of history, the stadium of Leeds City Club, which represents the city of Leeds, is called "Flanders".

The rise of Manchester is inseparable from the British cotton textile industry. The cotton textile industry is grabbing the wool spinning market.

As Lancashire, where Manchester is located, began to imitate Indian cotton cloth with cotton from the East and West Indies and Brazil, the British cotton textile industry gradually entered the right track. Coupled with the invention of the Jenny loom, an important symbol of the first industrial revolution, cotton spinning developed rapidly.

The cotton textile industry is Manchester's pillar industry, and the sales of cotton cloth have impacted the woolen market, causing wool spinning factories to close down one after another. A large number of wool spinning workers lost their jobs and had to go from Leeds to neighboring Manchester to seek a living.

The competition between wool spinning and cotton spinning contributed to the success of Britain's first industrial revolution, and it also made the people of these two cities feud.

So even if there is no conflict in football, after the teams of these two cities meet, they will not give each other good looks. (Note 1)

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Hu Lai heard the singing in the stands and understood it.

After all, he has been in the Premier League for two months and has played five games, so he has some understanding of the ways of the Premier League.

Knowing that England fans like to express their emotions with singing, they sing when they are happy, they sing when they are angry, even when the game is too boring, they also sing to express their dissatisfaction with the boring game, or simply entertain themselves happy.

For example, they will throw an inflatable penis during the game until the inflatable penis falls under the stands and is picked up by the police and confiscated. Then the fans will start singing a song repeatedly. This song has only one line: " Give our big dick back!"

Hu Lai has played football for so many years, and this is the first time he has seen such boring fans...

In many cases, what they sing can be described as "unbearable".

It belongs to the kind that if you record a live watching video, and then translate the lyrics sung by these fans into Chinese subtitles and put them on the domestic Internet, you will be 404 in all likelihood.

The British football field implements a high-pressure policy against all kinds of racism, and resolutely does not allow racial discrimination speech to emerge. But it doesn't matter about personal attacks.

In other words, hostile fans can call Hu Lai a fool, but they cannot call Hu Lai a "yellow monkey". The former is part of English football culture, the latter will be severely punished.

Fans will sing swear words greeting the player's mother and the whole family, laughing at a player's physical handicap, and rubbing salt on the most painful wounds of the opposing team.

If you accidentally score an own goal in a final, the team loses the championship. So even if five years have passed, when you play against the opposing team, you will definitely hear the opposing fans singing in the stands to bring you back to this old dream...

Before coming to the Premier League, Hu Lai had seen the domestic media criticize the behavior of insulting opposing players in the stands with local characteristic foul language. He believed that this was discrediting the sport of football and was evidence of the low quality of Chinese fans.

When he came to the Premier League, he realized that compared with the British fans, the Chinese fans are as polite as three-good students...

When it comes to you, the viciousness is really vicious.

But if you scold your opponent, it's really cool...

For example, the current Tramed fans are very happy, and their players continue to attack Leeds City's goal amidst the cheers of the fans.

Obviously, neither the fans nor the players are reconciled to only leading Leeds City by one goal.

After all, they are traditional giants. Although they haven't won the championship for several years, their foundation is still there.

How can you play inextricably with a team that wants to relegation at your own home court?

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Tramed continued to press the attack, trying to crush Leeds City.

On the sidelines, Leeds City coach Tony Clark once again showed his gambler-like approach, never accepting the result of "losing less and winning", but also encouraging the team to fight back and fight Tramed. .

Even if this is the opponent's home court, so what?

We are not even afraid of losing, what are we afraid of?

In the 66th minute of the game, Leeds City intercepted Tramed midfielder Van Delft's ball in the midfield and turned to counterattack on the spot.

The football was passed to Charlie Potter by Pete Williams.

After Porter took the ball, he looked up and looked forward, because Leeds City had intercepted the ball when Tramed was attacking, so Tramed's backcourt was relatively empty at this time.

Without hesitation, he directly made a long diagonal pass and passed the football to the middle!

When Charlie Potter passed the ball, Hou Lai, who was in front of him, ran quickly. He accelerated and ran forward. Trammed's central defender Scott Wilson noticed Hou Lai's movement and immediately accelerated. , Blocking Hu Lai behind him.

He could still feel that Hu Lai even used his hands to try to push him away in order to compete with him, but with his physical strength, how could he be pulled away so easily by him? Sure enough, soon there was no movement behind.

What Wilson didn't know was that Hu Lai, who was behind him, suddenly changed his posture to continue running forward, and retreated back!

"Hoola!!"

Accompanied by He Feng's shout, the football drew an arc in the air and passed over Wilson's head.

He looked back and saw the Leeds City No. 14 player who had five goals in three games stopped the incoming ball forward with his chest, and then took advantage of the opportunity to pass the ball into the penalty area!

"Beautiful connection! A great opportunity for Leeds City! Are they going to tie the score?" Cox yelled, raising the hearts of the Leeds City fans in front of the TV.

The Trammed fans booed like thunder from the stands at the Red Roof.

Hu Lai was completely immune to these disturbances. After he waded the football into the penalty area, he looked up to observe the situation. Tramed's goalkeeper Tom Walker has abandoned the goal!

So he chose to lob the shot, and when he swung his right foot down, he raised his toes slightly, changing from a volley to a lob.

At the same time, Walker judged that Hu Lai was going to shoot low, so he fell to the ground, unable to do anything about the football flying over his head...

"Hu Lai - lob shot!! Great shot!! Beautiful!!!"

"What a wonderful shot! Hu's kick is so calm that people forget his age! Facing the goalkeeper Walker, he is calm like an experienced veteran! Great! This is his Premier League. At the same time, it also helped Leeds City equalize the score! At the Red Roof Stadium, Leeds City stubbornly bit Tramed and did not let go!"

After the goal, Hu Lai did not stop, he turned and ran to the corner flag area, and then made his signature celebration.

Wearing a white away jersey, he is particularly eye-catching in front of the "red wall" composed of Tramed fans in red jerseys.

"For Chinese fans and players, Tramed's red-roof stadium is like a dream stage, unattainable! But now, our Chinese player Hu Lai has left his figure in this stadium In my memory! He broke not only Tom Walker, the England national gate, but also blasted open the gate of the 'Red House'! This scene will definitely become a classic picture of Chinese football in the future!"

In the picture, other players of Leeds City swarmed towards Hu Lai, those white figures were on the red "wall", like bullet holes, making the high red wall look less indestructible and daunting up...

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Note 1: This content and data come from the article "The Rise and Decline of Britain - The Competition Between Wool Spinning and Cotton Spinning Is a Battlefield Without Gunpowder"