Chapter 8 Wood's substitute

Rafinia (Note: "Raffenha" above, due to translation issues, I used to be called Rafinha, although I think this name is very awkward. Today, a book friend pointed out the mistake, and the correct name is one more word than mine, and I am very happy to accept the advice of this book friend! So in the future, the purchase of "Raffenha" was changed to "Raffenha") is a very morale transfer action. Although fans rarely pay attention to the Bundesliga, Tangen and people in the football world know that there are many geniuses in the Bundesliga, and Rafinia is one of them. His arrival has enhanced the team's strength on the right side, and Rafinia can handle it both offense and defense.

After coming to Russia to report, Rafinia quickly devoted herself to the team's daily training. Donn was not worried about how the Brazilians in this team could integrate into the team. It should be no problem with Pepe, a Brazilian fellow.

At this point, the personnel on Don En's list have basically been introduced. There are players of equal strength in the forwards, midfielders and defense, whether they are the main players or the substitutes. There is only one problem left that has always troubled Don En needs to be solved - George Wood's substitute problem.

Last season, Tang En used Sun Jihai as Wood's substitute, and his performance was average, but he was just average. Sun Jihai tried his best, but his strength was too different, so his performance was not so reassuring when playing against a strong team. Moreover, as he grew older, Sun Jihai's economic status and physical functions were declining. Last season, Sun Jihai was also troubled by injuries. It was not a major injury, but it was enough to sound the alarm for Tang En.

He did not sell Sun Jihai because he recognized Sun Jihai's sportsmanship and his "pandemic oil" attribute of playing multiple positions. If he sold Sun Jihai, he might need to introduce a similar substitute in multiple positions such as right back, back midfielder, left back, right forward.

After all, Sun Jihai is not a midfielder, so Tang En decided to introduce a regular midfielder to enhance the team's strength. This midfielder must meet several requirements at the same time:

1. You must be able to accept the fate of a substitute and will not get angry with the coaching staff just because you sit on the bench for a few days.

2. Although he is a substitute, his strength cannot be weak and he must be strong enough. He is a substitute for the Forest team, at least he will be the main force in the mid-range Premier League team.

3. The salary requirement will not be high. The low value will not increase the financial burden of the team. And once Tang En decides to give up, he will not be criticized for losing too much money.

4. It is best to be an Englishman to facilitate the team to register through the Champions League qualification. It can also be said that he has passed the Premier League level test and adapted to this kind of league.

Tang En has very strict requirements on these four points and does not give in. After all, this player's substitute position is the team's "waist". It is the most important part of the team, more important than the forward and goalkeeper. He would rather be lacking than being overly ill.

Therefore, the team has never found a suitable candidate.

Until the end of last season.

If anyone still remembers when George Wood played for Nottingham Forest's first team and who his opponent was, he would not be unfamiliar with this candidate.

03-04 season. In the second half of the English Football League (later the English Championship), George Wood was transferred to the first team by Donn and made his first appearance in the game with Reading, when he was wearing the No. 33 jersey.

Reading is a team that left a deep impression on Don En's coaching career. Not to mention their many encounters with Forests in the First Division, nor to mention the personal grudges between their head coach Steve Kopel and Don En, just mention the "football violence scandal" that shocked the world in September last season, which made the two teams form a deep hatred. When the two teams met for the second time in the Super League, the police in charge of the order of the court were facing a great enemy, and there were as many as six members of the English FA referee committee where the field was supervised and the law enforcement was sent to supervise the referees. You should know that usually only two people were sent to each game...

Against this background, the substitute that Tang En likes is Reading's player.

Steven_sidwell.   Former Arsenal youth training product, but it has never been reused by Arsenal coach Wenger, and is always loaned to low-level teams.  In January 2003, Wenger officially decided to give up the England U21 international and resold him to Reading at a low price.     But no one expected that playing in the First Division would make Sidwell improve rapidly, and soon conquered Reading's head coach Steve Koper, and became the absolute main force in the team's midfield.

Do you remember Wood's wonderful defense in his debut? Stephen Sidwell was knocked to the ground by him.

Poor Sidwell, due to his position on the court, as long as the Forest team plays against Reading, he will meet George Wood, the "monster". The situation is better, it will be a throw-out ball, and the worse is a throw-out ball and then help the team get a free kick. The worst is a throw-out ball, and the referee still ignores it - because Wood did not commit a foul at all!

Of course, we cannot judge the ability of Sidwell as the only criterion for the two people. In fact, we can firmly hold the main position in Reading, play 35 games in Reading's first Premier League season, start all of them and score dead goals. This result is still amazing.

At the same time, he also attracted the attention of various English club teams because of this performance. Nottingham Forest is one of them.

Although the first game against the Forest this season had very bad consequences, Sidwell did not directly participate in the entire conflict, and Don was not afraid of buying Sidwell and being isolated in the locker room after coming.

This kind of buying players from the enemy is common in professional football.

When Luis Figo played for Barcelona, ​​he was the captain of Barcelona and the leader of Real Madrid. He broke through Real Madrid's goal several times and was a local hero in the minds of Barcelona fans.

Remember what happened after Barcelona regained the league championship under the leadership of Rijcalde after a few years? At the Barcelona championship celebration, Real Madrid youth training camp forward Etoo shouted in front of tens of thousands of people: "Real Madrid bastard, coward, come and pay tribute to the championship!"

This angered many Real Madrid players. But in fact, this was originally called by Louis Figo...

When Etoo was just imitating his predecessors, Louis Figo turned to the arms of Barcelona's archenemy Real Madrid as early as 2001.

The former Real Madrid midfielder Luis Enrique, who later became Barcelona's flagship figure.

Donn was not worried about Sidwell's Reading background at all, and because he was a Reading player, he tried every possible way to get him shot.

Why snatch it?

Because Sidwell's contract with Reading had expired after the end of the 2006-07 season, his agent did not renew the contract with Reading, but was just waiting to find a team for Sidwell that has more development prospects than Reading.

Chelsea was the first to express their appreciation for Sidwell. Mourinho's relationship with Abramovich continued to deteriorate, and Abramovich did not want to continue to invest in the transfer market, forcing the Portuguese coach to find those free players, and Sidwell was one of them.

After hearing that Chelsea was going to grab Sidwell, Don immediately contacted Sidwell's agent and expressed Nottingham Forest's attention to the 25-year-old midfielder.

At that time, Arteta had not left, and the Forest team did not do their best to operate the introduction of Sidwell.

The situation is different now, Arteta leaves. The team lacks an excellent player who can be a substitute in the midfielder position. Sidwell is very suitable for Donn's series of requirements, and the Forest team has also accelerated the pace of contacting the opponent's agent.

Without Forest's intervention, Chelsea and Sidwell might have signed a personal contract. But the European champions have joined, making Sidwell's agent qualified to have a good talk with the clubs that pursue his players...

Sidwell himself is a professional player with a clear mind. He knows what he is pursuing.                                                                                                                   �

However. When he learned that the Forest team, which had just won the Champions League championship, was also very interesting to him, he immediately changed his words... Going to Nottingham Forest is also a good choice.

Nottingham Forest, which just won the Champions League, is not a country team that was looked down upon a few years ago. It is a quasi-wealthy family on the ground.

Frank Ribery, Luther van Nistruei, David Beckham, Edwin van der Sar, George Wood... Which of these people is not one of the best players in their respective positions?

In addition to the achievements this team has just achieved, it is really difficult to make people not interested in her.

The agent did not immediately reply to several teams pursuing Sidwell, and only said that the answer would be given after the vacation was over. In fact, the situation was obvious. In front of Chelsea and Nottingham Forest, other clubs participating in the competition were not attractive enough. Now it is just a question of whether to choose Chelsea or Nottingham Forest.

The Forest team set out early to Moscow for training, while some of the club continued to contact Sidwell's agent. They discussed with him and came to a contract that both parties were satisfied with.

Chelsea agreed to do this again, but none of them knew whether the conditions given by the other party could meet Sidwell's satisfaction. They could only wait for Sidwell to say it.

On July 13, Sidwell's agent officially announced that his client, former Reading's main midfielder Stephen Sidwell, accepted a £60,000 weekly salary contract issued by Nottingham Forest. He will become a member of Nottingham Forest in the new season. He has now flew to Moscow for a physical examination and then trained with the team.

The Forests finally offered Sidwell a weekly salary of 60,000. Chelsea offered 50,000, which became the decisive factor. Sidwell hoped to earn more money while receiving high-level football training. Nottingham Forest fulfilled his wish, so he chose the Forest and rejected Chelsea.

After learning that Sidwell had become his man, Don Eun was very happy. This time, this signing was a kill of three birds with one stone. Not only did it expand the team's strength without spending a penny. It increased the thickness of the midfield bench, and also poached Koper's most valued player from Reading, which also severely hit Koper's arrogance. Finally, Don Eun defeated his old rival Mourinho's Chelsea in the transfer market this time.

There is no better result than this.

Sidwell came to the Forest's training base outside Moscow with some fear. Because the two teams were in trouble last season, the whole world knew that he didn't know how his new teammates would view him, the person who came out of Reading.

Since George Wood is always promoted by the media as a "evil guy" who is simple-minded, well-developed, and has a bad temper. He only has frequent fouls and is sent off, Sidwell doesn't know if he will be isolated by Captain Wood in the locker room.

As a result, when he arrived at the training ground, Donn introduced Sidwell to the team routinely, Wood took over and introduced Sidwell to his new teammates in a tone that he always tried to look calm but was actually a little cold.

No one talked about the grudges between the two teams last season. People like Ribery and Eastwood started joking with Sidwell as soon as they met, which made Sidwell breathe a sigh of relief. Sidwell still admired the team that won the European championship. He didn't want to make him isolated here because of some things from his former club.

Beckham, the biggest star in the team, is also approachable and has no airs in front of Sidwell. And seeing his conversations with others, they get along well. Sidwell was completely relieved.

The only person with bad looks is Pepe, who was injured twice in the match against Reading. The second injury almost made him unable to play in the Champions League final. How could he forget such a "painful experience"? He just shook hands with Sidwell and had nothing else to say.

Sidwell doesn't care either. It's impossible to have a good relationship with everyone in a team. There will always be a very good teammate. He will also have bad teammates. He is mentally prepared.

Sidwell's signing did not cost the team a penny, and the Forest team, which had a large amount of money, decided not to continue looking for new players. Because Donn told Evan and Allen that the Forest team's current lineup was enough, not to mention that they had already cooperated and did not need to make major adjustments. In Donn's words, "This is the championship-level team."

Next, Done began to renew his contract with the players in the team. After winning the Champions League, Forest team had the conditions to increase their salary. Sidwell, who plays as a substitute for Forest team, has a weekly salary of 60,000 pounds. The main players of Forest team cannot live with the previous salary standards, right?

Frank Ribery, Eastwood, Pepe, Pique, Bell, Barnes, Zimbonda... and others all received a new contract. The above salary and treatment made everyone satisfied, so they signed it one after another.

The Forest team, which won the Champions League, is not the poor boy of the past. Tang En also knows that he must give these players a new contract that satisfies them, otherwise even the loyal players may be poached by their opponents for their high salaries.

The large-scale contract renewal is actually Tang En's response to the rumors of transfers everywhere.

With the success of Forest's Champions League, the players in the team have also become highly anticipated targets in the transfer market. Tang En doesn't want his team to be divided up by those giants who are eyeing him. For the outside world, his method of treating various transfer rumors is simple and crude - "not selling products".

He just said that there is no "non-sale product" in the world, so he made his entire team become "non-sale product".

There is really no good way to deal with such a scoundrel. He insists on not selling. The club is behind him again. The players now have a relationship with the head coach like a newly married couple, and they are inseparable. How can they turn against the water? No matter how you look at it, the Forests are at their best now, and they still have the opportunity to create new achievements that are more brilliant than last season.

This is what Tang En told his players, and his players believed so much.

A Champions League is not enough, after all, we have not won the league championship yet, and the FA Cup championship has not yet been involved.

Continuing to stimulate them with honor is one of the means that Tang En used internally, and another method is naturally the large-scale renewal mentioned just now.

Honors will become a passing cloud in the future, and only contracts are the most effective method.

After determining all the staff of the first team in the new season, the joint training of the Forest team officially kicked off. After all the newly joined players experienced the legendary "original originator" Brian Clauve's successor Tony Tangen at a close distance, they devoted themselves to the overall tactics of the Forest team. Defense is still the top priority, this is the "retained program" of the Forest team, but the team also pays more attention to the team's offensive tactics when encountering positional warfare.

Next season, as the defending champion of the Champions League, whether in the European arena or in the league, the opponents facing Forests may choose to counterattack against them.

At that time, how to break the intensive defense and how to deal with the opponent's quick counterattack after a stable defense are all issues that Tang En and his coaching staff need to solve.

But Tang En won’t have a headache. He has confidence in his team and the entire team behind him. Now this team is full of momentum and nothing can stop the fortress chariot from advancing.
Chapter completed!