Chapter 4: Defense Is the Key?

"How are the opponents for the training matches arranged?" Patrese asked.

In order to prepare for the game, Patrese found a total of four warm-up opponents.

They are Roma in Serie A, Barcelona in Spain, Wolves in the English Championship, and Porto in the Portuguese Super League.

"It's not particularly smooth. Barcelona explicitly rejected our invitation for the warm-up match, and Porto and Wolves said that they have already arranged their schedules and have no spare time."

Are you kidding me?

Patrese was angry.

Barcelona is fine, but Porto and Wolves definitely did it on purpose, and it is very likely that they don't want to have a warm-up match with Arsenal without Wenger.

Patrese's face was uncertain.

"Who are the opponents who invited us to the warm-up matches?"

Martin Hughes said helplessly; "There are many teams that invited us, but they are mainly concentrated in the second-tier league."

Patrese's face became even uglier.

This is isolating Arsenal!

As the champion of the Champions League last season, Arsenal has become the research target of many teams in the new season.

After Wenger fell ill and Patrese took over the team, no team wanted to play a warm-up match with this European rival.

They wanted to study Arsenal without exposing themselves.

But Wolves refused the warm-up match, which was simply disgusting!

After a moment of silence, Patrese sighed and said, "Find three teams to fill the vacancies. We will go to Italy tomorrow, and the remaining three warm-up matches will be held in London."

Anyway, it is the invited party, and it is up to you to decide where to play.

In fact, since Arsenal won the championship, some doubts about Arsenal's championship have gradually appeared in the outside world.

The problem lies in the intensity of Arsenal's games.

Arsenal has only faced one traditional strong team, Bayern Munich, in the entire Champions League.

Paris Saint-Germain is also a rising star in recent times.

Although Juventus has revived, it is still not among the top teams in Europe.

Therefore, many people think that Arsenal has benefited from the draw, and they did not get the Champions League from Real Madrid, Barcelona and other teams.

Strong teams were defeated by other teams, while Arsenal took advantage of the opponent's weakness to defeat the opponent.

In short, they are questioning the value of Arsenal's Champions League.

Arsenal did not make any rebuttal to this.

A champion is a champion, how can there be a stolen championship?

They reached the Champions League final and defeated their opponents, so how can they not be champions?

But fans outside don't recognize this.

Anyway, there is no gold content.

Arsenal has no way to deal with this.

It can be said that the current Arsenal has become a loss for everyone.

Under the halo of the Champions League champion, everyone's research target at the beginning of the season is Arsenal.

While slandering Arsenal, they are also studying them.

Moreover, the current Arsenal has just experienced a major change of blood. Under the influence of many main players leaving, it is also a question worth studying how many points of combat power are left.

The next day, the entire Arsenal team, led by Patrizi, went to Rome, Italy to prepare for a warm-up match.

Here, Lucky saw many familiar faces.

First is Arsenal's former player Gervinho.

This Arsenal player who played at the same time as Luka was eventually abandoned by Wenger and transferred to Rome. His current situation in Rome is not particularly good.

However, Gervinho seemed to be deliberately avoiding them and did not want to communicate with them too much.

Obviously, for Gervinho, the memory of his time at Arsenal was not particularly good.

On the contrary, Szczesny seemed particularly enthusiastic.

He even invited Luka and other Arsenal players to have a party at their house after the warm-up match.

But Patras directly rejected it.

Szczesny had no choice.

In addition, Dzeko also transferred from Manchester City to Rome.

Obviously, there was no place for Dzeko in Guardiola's lineup, so he sought a transfer.

Dzeko looked at his former opponent, Arsenal, the current Champions League champion, and felt very uncomfortable.

They are already the Champions League champions!

But he began to go downhill.

Although Serie A is also one of the top five leagues, compared to the Premier League, neither the salary nor the intensity of the game can be compared.

Both sides quickly got involved in the warm-up match.

Arsenal still used the tactical play of last season!

Arsenal (4-3-3):

Goalkeeper: Cech!

Defenders: Chambers, Mustafi, Koscielny, Gibbs.

Midfielders: Kante, Wilshere.

Lucky.

Forwards: Aubameyang, Suarez, Sanchez.

Roma (4-3-3):

Goalkeeper: Szczesny

Defenders: Florenzi, Manolas, Rudiger, Digne.

Midfielders: Pjanic, De Rossi, Falk.

Forwards: Dzeko, Perotti, El Shaarawy.

Lucky stood in the field, constantly jumping lightly.

For a whole season, Lucky has achieved the goal of losing weight, his whole body has become lighter, and the frequency of his feet has also been effectively trained.

In fact, Lucky didn't know how it was going, he needed to verify it in the game.

But Lucky's light body made him feel great.

And Patelas also told him that Lucky should stand forward to the left, and he needed to connect with Sanchez and Suarez.

Obviously, compared to Aubameyang who just joined, Patrese prefers that Lukay and Sanchez can play a chemical reaction.

Does it look familiar at first glance?

This is how Arsenal played last season!

It's just a personnel change.

Patrese is copying homework.

But Di Maria and Cazorla in key positions are gone or injured, which makes Patrese full of trepidation. He doesn't know if he can play effectively.

In this case, the warm-up match began.

Arsenal took the lead in kicking off.

After Suarez passed the ball back, he ran forward.

Lukay received the ball, continued to pass it back, and made a protective response.

After confirming that there was no one around, Lukay asked for the ball.

The ball came to Lukay's feet again.

Lukay dribbled forward.

But he pulled the ball sideways, along the left side, facing the right side, and pulled the ball with his right foot while sideways.

In the past, Lekai would not pull the ball like this, but after the holiday training, the faster frequency of his feet allowed him to choose more ways to play.

Just like now, Lekai's position can better observe the front, and when facing defense, he can suddenly accelerate laterally, which gives him more choices.

After pulling the ball sideways for a distance, Lekai saw the Roma players retreating and frowned.

Last season, many teams would choose to press forward, but this time they looked for retreat.

Obviously this has been studied.

They are afraid of Lekai's passing ability.

After looking around and finding that there is no good passing position, Lekai can only pass the ball to Wilshere, and then retreat a little depressed.

Wilshere is full of energy and runs very actively.

He and Suarez have completed many passes and cooperation.

But Aubameyang is obviously not very adaptable to Arsenal's passing and cutting system, so every time the ball comes to Aubameyang's feet, there is a sense of dragging the rhythm.

Aubameyang is not dribbling, he can also pass the ball.

But the speed of passing and thinking was too slow, which also led to a decrease in the overall rhythm.

Lekai sighed, there was nothing he could do about it, only Aubameyang could gradually adapt.

The game continued little by little, and the offense of both sides began to open up.

Both sides had many offensive cooperation and shots.

But neither of them scored a goal.

The defense of both sides was extremely excellent.

Roma coach Spalletti nodded with relief, they were here to test their defensive ability.

Being able to complete the defense under Arsenal's offense is already excellent.

On the other hand, Patras frowned.

There is a problem with Arsenal's offense!

Speaking of Arsenal, it is definitely a team with explosive offensive power.

The same was true for Arsenal last season. In terms of offensive power, they are definitely the top team in the Champions League.

But in this warm-up match, Arsenal's offensive power was greatly reduced.

There is the influence of personnel changes!

There is the influence of new players not adapting!

There is also the influence of insufficient overall running-in!

Anyway, for now, Arsenal's best performance is actually the defense?

Damn!

Arsenal's defense has become a big shot!