Chapter 257: No choice

"He is the king of Arsenal, he saved the team, he is Thierry Henry--!"

Arsenal players ran towards their captain. The goal came too timely and important. With six minutes left in the game, Arsenal tied the score of the game and tied the total score of both sides.

Wenger jumped from her seat, hugged Pat Rice with her arms wide open.

The two thousand Arsenal fans who followed the team to Nottingham also burst into loud cheers. Amid their cheers, Nottingham Forest fans fell into a brief silence.

Don En's heart fell from the clouds to the bottom of the valley, and the feeling was really unspeakable. He bit his lip and stared at the Arsenal player celebrating on the court.

He was about to advance to the finals to win, but at the last moment Henry scored a goal! Really...

At that moment, what were their players thinking? Do they think they were sure to win? The reaction speed was as slow as the 90-year-old man!

The players of the Forest team held their heads in annoyance and watched them celebrate.

George Wood looked down at his feet.

When he was shoveling towards Henry from the back, he suddenly remembered Tang En's warning in his mind. He was very young and would get the third yellow card because of this foul, and maybe even a red card directly.

So he stopped his feet like a conditioned reflex.

It was just such a distance that made Henry avoid...

He shouldn't have stopped his feet. He should have directly shoveled the opponent's forward to the ground, so that he could not break through and shoot, but his body was out of control at that moment.

What a bastard, he spoke beautifully, but in the end he was a coward...

He raised his head again. Seeing the depressed teammates around him, the depression caused by his performance turned into anger, and he opened his mouth and rushed out: "What are you doing? We haven't lost yet!"

Arteta looked up at Wood, who was clenching his fists and roaring loudly, and everyone turned their heads to look at him.

"We haven't lost yet! I don't know who was eliminated, what are you doing?!"

Then he walked towards Arteta: "Don't protect me, there's no need."

"But George..."

"Let's talk about this after entering the finals." He turned around and ran to the goal, took the football out of the net, and then carried it all the way to the middle circle. He put the football on.

"kick off!"

Donn, who saw this scene off the court, turned his head and said to Chris Lack: "No matter whether we can reach the final or not, it makes me feel less frustrated - at least we have gained a real captain."

Chris Lak smiled, not knowing what to say.

The game started over and Arsenal wanted to seize the last moment and defeat the Forest, who hoped to score another goal in the remaining minutes to get the advantage back to their hands.

Both sides refused to give in and fought fiercely in every corner of the stadium.

The result is that when the referee blew the whistle at the end of the ninety-minute game, the score between the two sides was still 1:1.

"The total score is 2:2, both sides have a away goal, no difference. Now they need to decide the winner through 30 minutes of overtime... If it still cannot, then a penalty shootout is required.

It was a dramatic game, when the Nottingham Foresters thought they were sure to win. Henry tied the score at the last moment..."

Both teams will not enter the locker room to prepare for overtime. They will sit or lie on the sidelines, asking the team doctor to massage while listening to the head coach's latest instructions.

"We're in a hurry. So I won't criticize you for being distracted in the last moment." The players from Nottingham Forest formed a circle, and Don squatted in the middle with a serious expression. "In overtime, defense is still the primary goal, take the time to counterattack.

Fortunately, we prepared a penalty kick before the game... If the battle cannot be resolved within thirty minutes, let's drag it until then."

On the other hand, in Arsenal's half, Wenger stood in front of the players. While paced back and forth, he said to them: "Overtime, rest halftime, attack halftime, and strive for goals. If you can't force yourself, we will play a penalty with them."

There is only a short five-minute break before the ninety-minute game and overtime. Many players only have time to smooth their breath and have to walk back onto the court and join the game.

George Wood stood up from the ground. Donn looked at him and watched him return to the court. He said nothing.

Because he didn't know what to say... what else he said now is really meaningless, and it's even a question whether he can reach the finals. What's the use of reminding him not to get a yellow card?

Let it be.

After the first half of the overtime game began, Arsenal took advantage of their just equalizing momentum to siege the Forest's goal, as if the battle was to be resolved within these thirty minutes.

Nottingham Forest posed the defensive formation they were best at and familiar with to meet Arsenal's storm-like offensive.

Donn made his last substitution. He replaced Leighton Barnes with Gareth Bale. Barnes had cramps when running. Bale was in good physical condition and let him go up and stabilize the defense.

In the first half of the overtime game, there was basically no counterattack from the Forest team. Anelka wandered alone in the front for a while and found that the football could not be passed. He looked at the tense terrain behind and hesitated for a while and decided to go back to participate in the defense.

Generally speaking, although there is no regulation that this must be done, overtime in football does show an interesting phenomenon.

That is, the 30-minute overtime game divided the performance of the two teams into two extremes due to the first and second half. Take this game as an example. Now Arsenal is attacking wildly in the first half. Then after the second half, Arsenal will definitely not have the energy to make any attack. This is the turn of Nottingham Forest to attack.

This may be related to the fact that the game is so strong that both sides do not allow them to attack for 30 minutes, so they can only choose to rest half and attack half.

Arsenal attacked for fifteen minutes. No gains were made, the Forests' defense was organized very well. The score was still 1:1, and the Forests' players knew that their chance was coming.

There is no rest time between the first and second half of the overtime game, and the players can only buy themselves rest time by slowly passing through the court.

Now, both Arsenal players and Nottingham Forest players have reached their physical limits and intensive schedules. The continuous battles have made everyone tired. They are slowly moving their pace on the court.

There is only one person who is the exception...

George Wood ran to the other half with his head held high. When he passed by Fabregas, the Spaniard could even feel a gust of wind passing by his cheeks!

After the second half of the game started, the Forest team pushed forward and attacked according to the convention. No one wanted to really drag the game to the penalty kick. It was a decisive way to win without any safety factor.

Everyone went up, and Gareth Bale also frequently participated in the offensive. Only George Wood was still standing behind, protecting everyone's rear.

Almost everyone believes that after fifteen minutes of bombing, Arsenal will no longer have the energy to threaten the Forest’s defense line. George Wood is really stupid to watch others perform.

Look at the offensive momentum of Nottingham Forest now. Arsenal's defense alone will exhaust all their remaining physical strength. How could it still endanger the Forest's goal?

Eastwood's shot was hugged by Lehman. The German goalkeeper did not choose an inefficient method of driving forward with big feet. He threw the ball with his hand... launched an attack!

The football arrived at Fabregas in a blink of an eye, and before the Forest players could react, Fabregas transferred the football to their captain, the most trusted striker Henry.

Then when most of the Forest players were still stunned by this sudden change in the frontcourt, Henry had already adjusted the direction of the football and began to drive the ball towards the Forest team's goal!

"This is Arsenal's counterattack! The Forest attacked too hard. They forgot that Arsenal and Henry, this extremely dangerous figure with first-class speed!"

"Damn!" Tang En jumped up on the sidelines, "I told them to take the time to fight back! It's not to press the siege!"

"Don't worry, Tony George is behind..." Chris Lark comforted.

"This is what I worry about the most..." Tang En murmured.

Henry looked back and saw that his teammates could not run anymore, and there were not many people following him. At the same time, although the people from the Forest team were desperately returning to defense, they looked at their running posture. They were obviously exhausted. So...

Henry turned around and looked at George Wood directly in front of him.

We're the only two of us left?

"Thierry Henry, George Wood! The collision of two captains..."

Wood doesn't have to look around to know what's going on now.

There was no one else on the defense line except him and two central defenders. When the Forest team was in a fierce attack just now, everyone rushed up without any attention, hoping to become a hero who helped the team to lead the finals at the last moment.

He didn't go up. It wasn't because he couldn't run anymore. It wasn't because he wasn't interested in attack, but because he saw Henry cruising near the middle circle. As everyone returned to the penalty area to defend.

Why did Henry, the only captain, not set an example?

He thought of a possibility, and soon this might become a reality - Henry was the ultimate weapon of Arsenal's counterattack, and when he returned to Arsenal, he really gave up.

The cunning Wenger hoped to take advantage of this opportunity to score a goal in the overtake score until the last moment!

Henry knew very well about George Wood's interests. Once he was close to him, he would be entangled. He didn't know what the attack would be like.

So the key to this counterattack is that you must never be close to Wood and you must not be able to have the opportunity to bother you.

Wood knew that Henry was very fast and had good physical strength. Judging from his running posture and his legs were still strong, he knew that he could still accelerate and could force himself to break through with speed.

You must never distance yourself from him. Once you let him pull the distance apart, he can use his speed to force his breakthrough. You must lean on it and entangle him...

Henry turned the ball to the left. He wanted to break through with a diagonal line. George Wood moved horizontally and went up.

Henry began to accelerate, and Wood also began to accelerate, following Henry tightly, preventing him from escaping from his control.

Suddenly, Henry stopped suddenly, as if he was about to break through from another direction. Wood followed the brakes and was careful to guard against the opponent's next move. Henry did not change direction, it was just a change in speed and rhythm.

When he saw Wood slow down, he immediately accelerated, trying to get rid of the other party.

But Wood's physical condition was very good, almost at the same time as Henry. This time he got rid of it was not successful.

"Henry is going to be entangled by Wood! The two are very close. The players from Nottingham Forest are returning to defense. As long as Henry is held back, Wood's defense will be considered successful...wow!"

Just when everyone thought Henry had no choice, he suddenly pushed the football diagonal line between Wood's legs!

Immediately afterwards, he stopped suddenly and turned around. He broke through from the other side of Wood's body!

"The man ball has been divided! Beautiful!"

Wood was not prepared for Henry's move. When he realized it, the other party had already passed by.

What does it mean if Henry just breaks through the past like this?

There were Pepe and Pique behind them. Perhaps the situation was not so bad that they had to do that. Wood thought so. He looked up and saw Fabregas and Van Persie running forward desperately.

Three to two?!

Wood knew what this meant.
To be continued...