"...In a UEFA Champions League 16th-final match ending this morning Beijing time, Sampdoria, who was played for Chinese player Gao Zheng, was tied by Atletico Madrid 1:1 at home. Although Gao Zheng scored a goal in the game, the team failed to win at home, which cast a shadow on Sampdoria's journey to advance to the Champions League..."

"... Gao Zheng performed well in the Champions League match early this morning, scoring a goal, and almost defeated Atletico Madrid. After the game, Gao Zheng was the highest-rated player in the game... Atletico Madrid head coach Simeone said at a post-match press conference that he returned to the locker room and kissed Courtois hard because he saved Gao Zheng's shot..."

"The Italian media praised Gao Zheng's performance. The media that complained about Gao Zheng last season all praised Gao Zheng one-sidedly this time. The Roman Sports Daily even believed that not only Sampdoria was not worthy of Gao Zheng's strength, but the entire Serie A was a little behind for Gao Zheng... To be honest, when the author heard this evaluation, he almost thought that this was a joke made by those good people on the Internet. As a result, when I went to the official website of the Roman Sports Daily, I saw that the most eye-catching position on the homepage was the title of the report: Serie A can no longer tolerate Gao!... It turned out that I thought that only China produces all kinds of high-praise. Now it seems that foreigners are not morally honest and bottom-line when they brag..."

...

In Chinese book and magazine kiosks and convenience stores, the previous person had just sold the last sports weekly newspaper in the store. The boss was enthusiastically recommending several other morning newspapers to the people behind, because there were also a lot of reports on the Champions League in the early morning.

White-collar workers carrying briefcases and programmers carrying backpacks are waiting for the bus stops. They have big differences in their dress and temperament, but the common point is that they are all browsing the Champions League news on them with their mobile phones.

There were many sleepy office workers in the subway, but when the multimedia TV in the car started to broadcast the highlights of the Champions League match between Sampdoria and Atletico Madrid in the early morning, the people who seemed to be asleep all raised their heads and stared at the screen with wide eyes.

On campus, those children who like football were discussing how good it would be if Gao Zheng had entered the last world wave, and they argued endlessly about whether Gao Zheng should stay in Sampdoria.

This was originally just an ordinary working day morning in China, but it became special because of the Champions League match in the early morning.

Everyone is paying attention to Gao Zheng’s situation.

On the Internet, Gao Zheng dominated this morning, making the originally boring and unbearable road to work seem to be interesting.

Due to the time difference, Italy only entered the daytime later, the media became active and various news came in a flood.

There were two Champions League quarterfinals last night, but the Italian media paid the most attention to the match between Sampdoria and Atletico Madrid.

They are more concerned about the impact of failing to win this game on the team's next Champions League journey.

Some people also criticized Sampdoria. They were not criticizing the team, but mainly criticizing head coach Di Francesco. They believed that in January, the team paid too much attention to the Italian Cup, resulting in intensive events and the players did not have a good rest, which led to two players being injured in a game.

Now Sampdoria has failed to win Atletico Madrid at home, and it is probably a big disaster to go away in the second leg.

It can even be asserted that Sampdoria's Champions League trip this season is about to end here.

Although Di Francisco said at yesterday's post-match press conference that the team would not admit defeat in advance, many people felt that it was time to focus on domestic events now.

In fact, with Sampdoria's strength, it is already very good that they can reach the top 16 of the Champions League. When overlords like Juventus are not good, they cannot blame Sampdoria too much.

The Spanish media's requirements for Atletico Madrid are more stringent.

They think that even if Simeone's team failed to win Sampdoria away, they were not worried that Atletico Madrid would not be able to advance to the quarterfinals, but they felt that it would be too embarrassing for Atletico Madrid to advance to the quarterfinals.

Judging from the strength gap between the two teams, Atletico Madrid should beat Sampdoria at home and away.

Famous reporters and experts did not understand and were not satisfied with the strategies adopted by Simeone in the first half. Some criticized Simeone for being scared out of fear. Some people exaggeratedly said that if Atletico Madrid played like this, even if they could advance to the quarterfinals, it would definitely be difficult to continue moving forward. Moreover, not only the Champions League, but their performance in all the next games will decline, because of Simeone's timid performance, his authority among the players has collapsed, and the team is almost falling apart...

These words are particularly exaggerated and sound terrifying, which makes people wonder whether it is Sampdoria's chance of advancing to the quarterfinals or Atletico Madrid...

After playing the Champions League match with Atletico Madrid, Sampdoria will play in the league and Italian Cup finals.

The schedule is still relatively intensive in general.

Next, Sampdoria will face Milan at home in the league. Then, a week later, Sampdoria will challenge Turin in the league. After playing this game, she will have to go to Rome to participate in the Italian Cup final.

The Italian Cup final date is March 5, with only three days apart between the two games.

This game will be the league on March 9th again.

After the league is over, Sampdoria has to go away to challenge Atletico Madrid in the middle of the week.

Before the second leg of the Champions League quarterfinals, Sampdoria had to play three games in a row, with two consecutive weeks in a row, which required very high physical fitness.

How to reasonably arrange the lineup rotation is also a test for Di Francesco.

Before the weekend's match with A Milan, everyone thought that Di Francisco should not rotate the roster, because everyone knew what the match with A Milan meant.

Even Milan thinks so, but when Sampdoria announced the lineup before the game, they found out that Di Francesco actually rotated the lineup, and it was not the kind of fine-tuning that was made in one or two positions...

Sampdoria's lineup surprised and delighted A Milan.

Surprisingly, I didn't expect that Sampdoria would rotate this time. You should know that the last time the two sides met this season, although the Champions League group stage was followed, Sampdoria still played all the main players.

Of course, Milan can finally take revenge on Gao Zheng.

However, the final result was different from what Milan expected.

With Gao Zheng's goal in the 78th minute, Sampdoria tied 1:1 with A Milan at home.

They still failed to defeat Sampdoria, Gao Zheng, and even let Gao Zheng score another goal.

This goal is Gao Zheng's 15th league goal this season.

In an interview after the game, Gao Zheng once again stated that the match against A Milan was an ordinary game, and Sampdoria's rotation in this game also seemed to prove his words, so please don't pay too much attention.

However, the reporters always think that Gao Zheng said this just because he probably no longer takes a Milan seriously now...

Of course, with A Milan's current performance and performance, it is indeed lacking convincing. At the beginning of this year, Allegri was dismissed by A Milan club because of his poor performance in leadership. Dutchman Seidorf, who had played for many years, was invited. However, after Seidorf took over the team, A Milan's situation did not improve, and his performance was still ups and downs.

After twenty-five rounds of the league, A Milan scored 33 points and ranked tenth. Sampdoria is ranked two places higher than A Milan, and their competitor is indeed not A Milan.

The former wealthy family has fallen to this level, which has indeed made many people sigh.

Among the people who were sighing, some of them couldn't help but think about it. If they hadn't given up on Gao Zheng at the beginning, if Gao Zheng could have stayed in Milan, would they still be so embarrassed now?

But that was just a few people's guess after all.

With the tension between Gao Zheng and A Milan, everyone knows that this "if" is absolutely impossible to achieve.
Chapter completed!