coach legend

Chapter 452 Cruel Christmas schedule
After loaning two youngsters to Stoke City, Blackburn ushered in the Christmas schedule.

The Christmas game is a very important schedule in England.Especially for teams that are aiming to win the championship, it is a game that must be paid more attention to.Many strong teams had good results in the previous games, but on Christmas, there are definitely not a few who fell behind due to the intensive schedule.

Therefore, whether it can pass the Christmas schedule is a huge test for the championship team.

Now it's the Christmas schedule.But for Blackburn it is a devil's schedule.Before and after Christmas, the three teams that Blackburn encountered were all Premier League teams.

On December 12th, in the No.24 round of the Premier League, Blackburn played Aston Villa at home.

On December 12, in the No.26 round of the Premier League, Blackburn challenged Manchester United away.

On December 12th, in the No.28 round of the Premier League, Blackburn challenged Newcastle United away.

These three teams are absolutely strong teams in the current Premier League.Needless to say, Manchester United has been a strong team in the Premier League since the establishment of the Premier League.So far, Manchester United has only appeared outside No.3 once, and they have been in the top three of the Premier League at other times.

And before Blackburn's strong rise, it has never fallen out of the top two in the Premier League.Although Manchester United's performance has been somewhat poor in the past few seasons, no one dares to ignore the old man Ferguson and the Manchester United team.

Newcastle United's performance in recent seasons is also very good.Especially after Robson took over, Newcastle United often hit the top four positions in the Premier League.

Last season, Newcastle beat Liverpool and Chelsea to become No.4 in the Premier League.

It is a pity that Newcastle failed to break through this season's Champions League group stage.But Newcastle's performance in the Premier League is still very good.

As for Aston Villa, it is also a Premier League powerhouse.

In recent seasons, although Villa has not been able to hit the top groups such as Blackburn, Arsenal, and Manchester United.But the results were able to stabilize within the top eight.Usually it is No.6 or No.7. When the performance is good, it can even be ranked No.5.

Aston Villa is a typical core team of the second group.His results won't be too bad, but he doesn't have the strength to hit the position of the first group.This kind of team is a powerful team, and if you are not careful, you may be bitten out by him.

When encountering such a devil's schedule, George can only admit that he is unlucky.

One game in two days has given George a headache.And now playing three strong teams in a row, George's head is even bigger.How to rotate players reasonably and what tactics to use to play the game.All these require George to ponder carefully.

But before George could think about it, the seventeenth round of the Premier League began.

On December 12, Blackburn faced Aston Villa at home.

Speaking of the current Villa, there are very few stars that Chinese fans are familiar with.Even if there are, they are young players who have not yet become famous.There are only a few outstanding players at Villa now.

Vassell and Crouch on the front line, Mellberg on the back line, and Gareth Barry.But Crouch at this time is still a kid with average strength.It is not taken seriously in Villa, that is, it is just a substitute.

Vassell is a rising star in the Premier League.Vassell, who is fast and in excellent physical condition, is currently Villa's top striker.

Mellberg is not well-known, but he is a capable man.Is the main central defender of the Swedish national team.

Since it is the first game of the Devil's schedule, George certainly hopes to get off to a good start.

Although Villa's strength is good, it is still much worse than Blackburn.Especially in the midfield, Villa's strength is completely incomparable with Blackburn.

At this time, Barry was not the midfielder Barry of the England national team.Not the midfielder who is valued by McLaren and Capello and is known as a midfielder who can solve the double virtue problem.

After a few years, Barry performed extremely well in the midfielder position.Even in history, Benitez would rather give up Alonso in order to chase Barry.In the end, Alonso left Liverpool in a fit of anger.It also started the fuse of Liverpool's decline in performance.

It is conceivable how well Barry performed at Villa at that time.

But at this time, Barry is still playing the left midfielder position in Villa.

This is the position that was just changed last season.When Barry debuted, he even played central defender and full back, and performed very well at the left back position.For a while, he even became the left-back substitute of the England national team.

Later, the growth of Ashley Cole brought two generals, Ashley Cole and Daniel Morrison, to the position of England's left back.Barry can only be assigned to the U21 national team.

By last season, Barry became Villa's left midfielder.Well done.

Therefore, the current Villa team has poor midfield defense and organized offense.

In the first half, Blackburn relied on Klose's one-point shot in the penalty area to lead Villa [-]-[-].In the second half, a free kick from Pires scored the second goal of the game.

But in the 76th minute of the game, Alonso was injured and fell to the ground in the fight with Barry.

Let George almost be out of his wits.

Now at Blackburn, Alonso is George's most important midfielder.If he does get hurt, then George is going to cry.

But fortunately it was a false alarm.

Alonso's injury is not serious.It's just a flawed injury, it's just a little sore from foot to foot.As long as the pain is over, you can still be alive and kicking.

But George didn't dare to be careless at all.

Quickly used Parker to replace Alonso.

Alonso played a lot of games.Even Alonso entered the Spanish national team last season because of his outstanding performance at Blackburn.And began to strongly attack the main positions of Baraja and Albelda.

And Blackburn is relying more on Alonso.

So Alonso really couldn't rest.When George saw Alonso injured and fell to the ground, his heart almost jumped out.Fortunately, it was a false alarm, but George still didn't dare to be careless.

We beat Villa [-]-[-] and played Manchester United two days later.

In fact, George's plan is to continue to use Alonso.But playing against Villa made George too scared.So George put Alonso on the bench.George dare not be careless, what if Alonso is really injured.

Still should let Alonso rest.If you play too many games, even an iron man may get injured.

Parker is strong.

But to support Blackburn's midfield, the strength is still lacking.Or it's not a matter of strength, there are also many problems in coordination.Although Blackburn worked very hard at Manchester United's home court, they still failed to resist Manchester United's attack.

Keane received a cross from the wing, shook his head and scored the only goal of the game.

George can only accept a zero-to-one defeat in the away game.

The devil's schedule tests the thickness of the bench, perseverance and so on.

It may be that the victory over Arsenal and the breakthrough in the Champions League group stage made Blackburn's luck run out.After losing to Manchester United, facing Newcastle, Blackburn got another defeat.

Because Campbell had a minor injury, George asked Lescott to replace Campbell just to be on the safe side.

It never occurred to Lescott not to be able to withstand the impact of Shearer.

In the end, George lost again by one to two in the away game.In the devil's schedule, it is a two-game losing streak.

George's brows became tighter and tighter.

Because after December, Blackburn suffered more and more injuries.In the past few years, although there were some injuries, they were not serious, or not very common.George is quite satisfied with Blackburn's team doctor.

In recent years, Blackburn has rarely suffered large-scale injuries.

This is also a guarantee for Blackburn to get good results.But at the beginning of this season, there have been more injuries on Blackburn's side.Don't say that Hargreaves needs to lie in bed for three months, and after his comeback, no one knows whether he will repeat it.

In addition to Hargreaves, Micoud has also suffered more injuries this season.Sometimes it takes a week, sometimes it takes two weeks.There are many minor injuries.

Although Pires is slightly better than Micoud.

But Pires has also had two injuries this season.Although they were all minor injuries, they also missed the game.

Campbell doesn't know why, and there will be many minor injuries.

Even Sagnol, who has been disease-free and disaster-free, has been troubled by some injuries.

This made George quite dissatisfied.

But there is no way, this is a natural disaster.

The Christmas schedule was a complete failure.Three games have achieved one win and two losses, and only accumulated three points.

As for Blackburn's opponents, their results were much better than Blackburn's.Let me talk about Manchester United first. During the Christmas schedule, Manchester United had two wins and one loss, accumulating six points.

Manchester United defeated Tottenham Hotspur 17-18 away in the No.19 round of the Premier League, beat Blackburn [-]-[-] at home in the No.[-] round, and lost [-]-[-] to Wolves in the No.[-] round of the Premier League.It was a surprise.

Needless to say Blackburn, Tottenham can also be regarded as a strong team in the Premier League.But Manchester United won them all.

The Wolves are a team in the relegation zone.It is still ranked No.1 from the bottom of the Premier League.Manchester United actually lost to such an opponent.

Chelsea, which has invested heavily this season, has not bad results.

The Christmas schedule also achieved a record of two wins and one loss.

First, they beat Charlton [-]-[-] at home, but in the next away game they were beaten [-]-[-] by Charlton.After returning to the home court, they were in good form and beat Portsmouth [-]-[-].

Only Arsenal's record is the best.

In the No.15 round of the Premier League, Arsenal lost [-]-[-] at home to Blackburn.In the next four games, Arsenal never lost again.

In the sixteenth round of the Premier League, Arsenal defeated Leicester City [-]-[-] away.Entering the Christmas schedule, Arsenal's performance is still outstanding.In the seventeenth round of the Premier League, the away game was tied [-]-[-] by Bolton.But then they beat Wolves [-]-[-] at home and then beat Southampton [-]-[-] away.

So far the Premier League half is over.

In nineteen games, Arsenal had 44 wins, five draws and one loss, accumulating [-] points.Currently tops the list.

(End of this chapter)