Football: The strongest post-2000s Chapter 050

The format of the Youth FA Cup is basically the same as the Adult FA Cup. The Adult FA Cup is a single-elimination tournament from start to finish, with the final held at the new Wembley Stadium. The Youth FA Cup is a single-elimination tournament from the first round to the quarter-finals, with the venue determined by draw. The semi-finals and final are decided by two legs, home and away.

Manchester City U 18’s home match against Liverpool U 18 in the Round of 32 was a single-elimination match. If it ended in a draw, the two teams would play thirty minutes of extra time. If extra time also failed to produce a winner, the match would go into a cruel penalty shootout.

Of course, the ninety minutes of regular time had not yet ended, and extra time and penalty shootouts were still far away. Li Qing, the youngest player in this match, naturally clenched his fists. Although his team’s defense was not strong, he wanted to help the team advance to the Round of 16 with his own strength!

Previously, agent Mendes had communicated with first-team coach Klopp, stating that Li Qing’s current strength was several notches above U 18 players, and that promoting him to U 23 would not provide much training value. He hoped that Li Qing could join the first team.

If there was no position in the first team, then he hoped the club would let Li Qing go to other teams for training.

Klopp clearly stated that he would make his decision after this Youth FA Cup match. If Li Qing performed well, he could join the first team; otherwise, he would be loaned to teams willing to offer playing opportunities.

Three goals could be said to be extremely outstanding, but Li Qing didn’t want to experience the feeling of losing, so he decided to help the team score another goal to take the lead within the limited time and advance to the Round of 16 of the Youth FA Cup.

Liverpool U 18 head coach Neil Critchley made a personnel adjustment before the match restarted. He replaced Glen McAuley with Brewster, increasing the understanding between the attacking players and Li Qing.

The score returned to a balanced state, but time was running out. Both sides became cautious in their attacks. Threatening passes, which Manchester City U 18 had been constantly attempting earlier, were rarely made. They were clearly worried that high-reward, low-success rate passes would be intercepted by the opponent, leading to high-quality counterattacks.

Of course, this also had something to do with the players’ declining physical fitness. Once the ball was intercepted, it would be difficult to chase back. Even if they chased back in time, what about next time?

Li Qing’s physical fitness had also declined, but the head coach had not assigned him defensive tasks, so he was still able to sprint at full speed even ten minutes into the game.

Manchester City U 18 head coach Lee Carsley saw that Li Qing’s physical fitness was still abundant and realized that the situation might be very bad, so he took advantage of a dead ball situation to pull Foden aside and give him some instructions.

Thus, this Youth FA Cup Round of 32 match entered its slowest rhythm since the start of the game.

As the match entered a slow pace, the Liverpool U 18 players got a much-needed breather, and the situation became a stalemate, with neither side able to gain an advantage.

Ten minutes quickly passed in the stalemate, and the match reached eighty-five minutes. All three substitutions available to both sides had been used up, but the deadlock in the score failed to ignite the players’ determination to score, resulting in the score remaining unchanged.

As time dwindled, Li Qing noticed that Manchester City U 18’s defense was becoming increasingly layered, especially on his active attacking right flank.

To face goalkeeper A. Muric, he would have to overcome many obstacles. With his current skill, dribbling, and ball control stats, it would be difficult, so he secretly bought two five-star technical cards in the system store, waiting for an opportunity to use them.

Sancho, Diaz, and Foden, these three star players, were affected by declining physical fitness, and their attacking enthusiasm had decreased, but this did not mean they didn’t want to attack. Instead, they were conserving energy, waiting for the opportunity to kill the game!

A goal at this point in time would be nothing short of a decisive winner!

In the blink of an eye, another three minutes passed. Diaz’s dribbling in front of the penalty area was intercepted by Harvey White, giving Liverpool U 18 an opportunity to transition from defense to attack.

According to head coach Neil Critchley’s arrangement, the ball was to go to Li Qing immediately.

Substitute Dylan immediately rushed towards Li Qing, fouling him before he could receive the ball.

The referee blew his whistle, indicating a foul by Dylan.

Li Qing had a wide field of vision and saw that the Manchester City U 18 players were retreating slowly. He suddenly realized that this might be a good counter-attacking opportunity.

He quickly got up from the ground, stopped the ball that he had instinctively hugged when he fell, and then quickly kicked it to the substitute, Brewster.

Brewster and Li Qing seemed to have a natural understanding. He made no stop, directly passing the ball forward.

The fouling Dylan was still talking to the referee when he suddenly heard a roar from behind: “Defend!”

At the same time, Dylan felt a strong gust of wind beside him. He turned around and saw… it was Liverpool U 18’s most threatening player, Li Qing!

Oh no!

Almost all Manchester City U 18 players thought Liverpool U 18 would slowly take the free kick from the back, and their return speed was relatively slow, until Brewster kicked the ball to Li Qing did they suddenly realize something…

Li Qing dribbled the ball quickly forward. The clearly fatigued Latibeaudiere, already on a yellow card, collided with Li Qing from the side, but he clearly underestimated Li Qing’s speed and overestimated his own speed. There was no physical contact between the two.

To outsiders, Latibeaudiere looked more like he tripped and fell while running.

Manchester City U 18’s two central defenders, T. Wilson and E. Francis, quickly fell back to defend, maintaining a distance from each other. Defensive midfielder Joveni reached out to pull Brewster, who was trying to receive the ball.

Even without looking up, Li Qing, who was dribbling, could quickly assess the situation. He quickly dribbled the ball past the halfway line, actively seeking out T. Wilson and E. Francis.

Manchester City U 18 had three defenders against two attackers in their own half. Head coach Lee Carsley instantly felt a surge of frustration. While everyone’s attention was on the field, he rushed to the sidelines and roared, “Foul!”