Chapter 13: Group of Death (Ninety-Eight/One Hundred Thirty-Four)

The various awards presented before the Champions League draw ceremony have little to do with Lazio. As a player who was selected into the best European team last season, Mario Gotze only went on stage to receive an award after the lottery ceremony, and then took a photo with ten other players. He was not the protagonist at all.

The winner of this year's European Ballon d'Or is indeed Chelsea's midfielder Hazard, as the media previously revealed.

He was the number one contributor to Chelsea's ability to win the Champions League and League titles last season.

He became famous very early and now he has finally achieved enlightenment.

Di Matteo relied on Chelsea's overwhelming performance last season to win the honor of the best coach in Europe last season.

This honor has not existed before. Only FA's annual awards have the best coach award.

However, after Chang Sheng announced that he would no longer attend the FIFA awards ceremony, UEFA immediately added such a best coach award.

At that time, the media all said sourly that "a father's love is like a mountain", because anyone with a discerning eye could see that this was Platini's compensation for Chang Sheng.

Chang Sheng refused to attend the FIFA awards ceremony, thinking that he and FIFA had completely fallen out. Naturally, it is impossible for FIFA to award the best coach award to Chang Sheng.

As the best coach, how can you miss out on honors?

So Platini immediately thought of Chang Sheng.

I have to say that Platini is really good for Chang Sheng.

This friendship lasted until Platini became FIFA president.

So now Chang Sheng has a good relationship with FIFA. On the contrary, his relationship with UEFA is not as good as before.

Originally, there was one emperor and one courtier. Chang Sheng has enjoyed enough discounts from Platini. There are many people who like him, and there are also many people who hate him. There are even some people who can't get used to Chang Sheng because they can't get used to Platini.

Now Platini doesn't care about UEFA. When those anti-Platini forces in UEFA came to power and regained power, they naturally had to take action against the "Platini minions" Chang Sheng.

Therefore, last season "Corriere dello Sport" complained about Lazio's victory after being eliminated from the Champions League. I think this is purely a continuation of the political struggle at the top of UEFA.

Lazio was blacklisted by UEFA.

The criticism from Corriere dello Sport caused a stir at the time.

However, "Corriere dello Sport"'s statement lacked strong evidence and was just a speculation, so in the end their protest came to nothing.

Chang Sheng didn't say anything at the time.

Regarding being eliminated, he did not say that UEFA was behind it.

It was quite surprising at the time. I didn’t expect that Chang Sheng, who had always been fighting against authority, would give in at some point.

Of course, this matter was revealed soon.

UEFA will not allow anyone to continue to question their impartiality.

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Unexpectedly, in this Champions League draw ceremony, everyone deeply felt UEFA's malice towards Chang Sheng...

As a seeded team, Lazio was assigned to a death group by UEFA!

Their opponents in the group stage are Real Madrid, the strongest team in the second tier. Dortmund, the strongest team in the third tier. and fourth-tier team Nottingham Forest.

Nottingham Forest successfully promoted to the Premier League five seasons ago. Then it took four seasons to qualify for the Champions League. This season was their first time entering the Champions League after the 1980-1981 season. Also after the 1995-1996 season. Returning to Europe for the first time.

The rise of Nottingham Forest is largely due to their head coach Tony Twain. It took the local Nottingham coach seven seasons to finally bring this once veteran team back to the European arena.

Their return is a focal point in European football this summer.

At the same time, the Chinese midfielder Chen Jian in Nottingham Forest is also an important figure in Nottingham Forest's revival. The midfield double midfielder formed by him and England international George Wood is the most powerful midfielder combination in England. He is also an important contributor to Nottingham Forest's qualification for the Champions League.

They once swept past French Ligue 1 hegemon Lyon 7:1 over two legs in the Champions League qualifying round.

Many media and experts have regarded Nottingham Forest as the most anticipated dark horse in the Champions League this season.

Lazio, who has always won, is divided into a group with three such teams.

This is a veritable group of death!

None of the other seven groups can be compared with Group C where Lazio is.

When the group draw ceremony came out, many people thought of the article in "Corriere dello Sport" last season that denounced UEFA's shady story.

Now it seems..."Corriere dello Sport" is really right!

UEFA's group draw results clearly do not want the winning teams to advance to the knockout stages!

After the draw results came out, the live broadcast immediately gave Chang Sheng a close-up shot.

Not only the cameras, but almost everyone in the venue immediately set their sights on Chang Sheng.

Everyone wants to see what Chang Sheng's expression will be and what his performance will be when faced with the concealed lottery results.

They all know that Chang Sheng is a person who is so angry that he disowns all his relatives.

I remember when FIFA gave Messi the Ballon d'Or that David Silva was bound to win, causing David Silva to lose his first FIFA Ballon d'Or.

At that time, the angry Chang Sheng didn't care that everyone was celebrating and cheering for Messi, he walked straight onto the stage, then asked for the microphone from the female host, and delivered a very famous speech criticizing FIFA. Through the scene The live television signal spread throughout the world immediately.

Changsheng's attack on FIFA became big news that shocked sports festivals around the world the next day.

The relationship between Chang Sheng and FIFA also deteriorated rapidly. It was not until Platini became the president of FIFA that the two sides reconciled.

Chang Sheng even dares to attack FIFA in person, let alone UEFA?

Maybe we can see another wonderful show today?

Even the audience in front of the TV began to look forward to it.

Looking forward to Chang Sheng making a big fuss in UEFA just like making a fuss in heaven.

But these people are disappointed. Chang Sheng did not get angry and then go on stage to deliver an impassioned speech. Instead, he sat calmly in his seat with a smile on his face.

That's all. It was just a smile, and he didn't even change his posture.

This performance is somewhat bland.

After the lottery ceremony, Chang Sheng was surrounded by more media as soon as he came out. Naturally, everyone wants to hear Chang Sheng’s views and comments on this lottery ceremony.

Chang Sheng responded with another smile.

He declined the media's interview requests and quickly left the venue with a smile on his face, waving his hands.

Throughout the whole process, he only left everyone with an enigmatic smile.

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The next day, the media gave many interpretations about this smile.

Some people say that this is just an ordinary smile, which means victory and inner peace. , and did not take this matter seriously.

Others say Chang-Sheng's smile represents his surrender to UEFA, just like he did last season. I gave in.

Others think Chang Sheng's smile is actually a sneer. Chang Sheng expressed his disdain for UEFA with this smile.

In addition, some people said that the winning streak was due to UEFA's blatant manipulation of the draw results. Chang Sheng was deeply angry. He was so angry that he naturally laughed.

Anyway. Chang Sheng's enigmatic smile aroused great interest among people. Guess what it means to win. It has also become a gimmick for media hype.

After all, UEFA has gone too far. It is blatantly trying to make Chang Sheng die in the group of death.

Although they have performed poorly in the Champions League for several consecutive seasons, Real Madrid's strength is there. It is not an exaggeration to say that they are the strongest team in the second tier.

Moreover, Lazio spent two seasons poaching tirelessly and finally poached Isco from Real Madrid. Real Madrid has always been unhappy with this matter. If it weren't for Isco's firm attitude, they would never let him go.

Because Isco's matter is the "new hatred" between Real Madrid and Lazio, in order to take revenge, they will definitely perform beyond their level in the game against Lazio and strive to kill Lazio.

Dortmund has not participated in the Champions League for several consecutive seasons. As a result, their European war points are very low, so they can only be classified into the third tier of teams. But in fact, this sub-category caused controversy when it came out. Everyone thinks that Dortmund can definitely be put into the second tier team, because their strength is definitely much higher than other third tier teams.

So it is no exaggeration to say that Dortmund is the strongest team in the third tier.

As a result, these two strongest teams were actually in the same group. The probability was too small, and Lazio actually met them.

To say that there was no manipulation in this lottery ceremony would be hard for anyone to believe.

Many Italian and Chinese media complained about Lazio after the draw results came out.

"Shame! Shame! Shame on UEFA!"

"Corriere dello Sport" criticized this.

"This Champions League group draw has made us realize that even in European football, there has never been any openness, transparency, fairness and justice. UEFA has definitely manipulated the results of this draw. The purpose is very simple, it is to clean up those who have always been disobedient. of constant victory..."

This is a Chinese online media.

Other media also said that UEFA went too far, was too naked, and completely regarded other people as fools.

Even FIFA President Platini expressed surprise at the draw result.

"The probability that these four teams happen to be in the same group is really low. I didn't expect it to happen like this. I think all of us witnessed the birth of a miracle last night..."

Platini sneered.

After he left UEFA, the person in charge of UEFA became his enemy, and he naturally would not let go of this opportunity to ridicule his rival.