Chapter 弗格森 and Manchester United Have Nothing to Do With Liverpool

Ferguson and Manchester United's situation had nothing to do with Liverpool. After the game, Chen Hero and O'Neill wouldn't care about what happened to Manchester United. To them, whether Ferguson could continue as Manchester United's coach or not was none of their business.

After the focus battle between Liverpool and Manchester United, the Champions League Round of 16 also came to an end, and all eight teams participating in the quarter-finals were determined.

Subsequently, UEFA held a draw, which would directly determine the quarter-final and semi-final matchups. At the same time, after determining the matchups for these two rounds, the final's bracket would also become very clear.

In the eyes of outsiders, Liverpool had good luck, as they were placed in the upper bracket, avoiding their arch-rivals Barcelona and Real Madrid. Real Madrid and Barcelona were placed in the lower bracket, and if they wanted to advance to the final, they would have to fight each other in the semi-finals.

The duel between Real Madrid and Barcelona was the mainstream in European football in recent years, because these two teams had surpassed other European powerhouses by too much, and no one could compete with them. They could only play among themselves. In La Liga, the "Spanish Super League" formed by the two of them far surpassed the other eighteen teams. Each season, no matter who was second in the league, the gap with third place was more than ten or twenty points.

In the Champions League, where strong teams gathered, they could always advance to the Round of 16 with an undefeated record.

If it weren't for Liverpool, these two teams might have met in the final every year.

This time, Liverpool drew a good opponent in the quarter-finals, Porto from Portugal.

In terms of strength comparison, Porto was definitely not Liverpool's opponent. Everyone said that Liverpool had already secured a semi-final spot in advance.

Porto's coach, Vítor Pereira, said directly in an interview after the draw: "Liverpool is a team that no one in Europe wants to face, our luck is too bad... I don't know if we can go further, it's unrealistic to talk about this now, let's talk about it after we play the first game against Liverpool..."

In fact, Porto is a true powerhouse in Portugal, having won the European Champions Cup twice. The famous Mourinho, who is now doing well at Real Madrid, was initially recognized by the world starting from Porto. Porto's second Champions League title was won under his leadership. Later, André Villas-Boas, once considered "Mourinho II", also came from Porto, leading them to a treble.

But when facing Liverpool, the team with the second-most championship titles in Portuguese football history had to lower their heads.

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The match against Porto would not take place until the end of March.

Before that, Liverpool had a league game—Liverpool would face Sunderland at their home stadium. This game was not too difficult, so O'Neill rotated the squad, using a half-main, half-substitute lineup to face Sunderland.

Even so, Liverpool still completely defeated Sunderland 3-0 at their home stadium.

After that game, many English media outlets, regardless of the feelings of Manchester United and Ferguson, directly placed the title of "New Generation Premier League Overlord" on Liverpool's head.

Martin O'Neill's continued insistence on a low-key style was now in vain.

Everyone was convinced that Liverpool had replaced Manchester United and become the true overlord of the Premier League. After sending off the twenty-one-year Manchester United era, the Premier League was about to usher in a Liverpool era that no one knew how long would last... To stop Liverpool from dominating, there was only one way: to let Chen Hero transfer away.

But that was tantamount to wishful thinking.

Chen Hero was having a very pleasant time at Liverpool. The club's owner and manager were his good friends. Martin O'Neill satisfied all his requests. In the locker room, Gerrard supported him. He had a large group of good friends and close brothers who rallied around him, following Chen Hero's lead. From the top to the bottom, everyone supported him. He was like an emperor emeritus. Why would he leave?

Manchester City had previously offered a sky-high weekly salary of 300,000 pounds to attract Chen Hero, but they had failed. So, economically, he would not easily betray Liverpool for some small favors.

In terms of honors, Liverpool had already won the Premier League title last season. Now, Liverpool had the strength to compete for championships in all aspects and was no longer the team that could only make people shake their heads and sigh. Staying at Liverpool, the future was bright, and Chen Hero really had no reason to transfer away.

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After defeating Sunderland with a half-main, half-substitute lineup, Liverpool welcomed Porto at their home stadium.

Also a half-main, half-substitute lineup.

The commentators were a little surprised, never expecting that the always cautious Martin O'Neill would be so unrestrained and bold.

"Is this looking down on Porto?"

If Liverpool looked down on Porto, everyone would really believe it.

After all, the gap in strength between the two teams was too large, and Liverpool had an invincible Chen Hero. What did Porto have? The previous meritorious players were almost all gone. They were able to reach the quarter-finals entirely because of their good luck.

Generally speaking, if Liverpool used such a lineup to deal with an opponent in the Champions League, the opponent would definitely feel insulted and very angry, wanting to fight Liverpool to the death.

But Porto's coach, Pereira, was the opposite—he didn't feel insulted at all. On the contrary, he was very happy. Because Liverpool still used rotation when playing against them, it showed that Liverpool didn't use their full strength. If they didn't use their full strength, then Liverpool wouldn't be as strong as the legends said. Perhaps Porto would have a chance?

With this in mind, Pereira told his players to go all out even on the road, not just thinking about a draw, but to try to score goals.

As long as they had an away goal in hand, Porto wouldn't panic. When they returned to their home stadium, wouldn't they have a chance to fight?

Before the game, Vítor Pereira really thought his team had no chance.

But now that he saw Liverpool only used half of their main players!

He keenly realized that this might be his chance.

So, he hastily modified his strategy for this game a few minutes before kickoff, hoping to get at least one away goal.

But when the game started, Pereira realized how wishful he was...

Even if Liverpool only used half of their main players, they were still Liverpool!

And most importantly, no matter how Martin O'Neill rotated the squad, Chen Hero was still on the field!

That was the most deadly thing!

You, O'Neill, should have the ability to rotate half of your main players and rotate Chen Hero off the field!

Through this game, Vítor Pereira fully realized that Chen Hero could be worth half of Liverpool's main force. The so-called rotation of half of the main players didn't count as long as Chen Hero was still on the field. Even just rotating Chen Hero could be called "rotating half of the main force"!

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Twenty-eight minutes into the game, Liverpool scored first. The scorer was Chen Hero.

Next, the game entered Liverpool's most familiar rhythm. After taking the lead, they could comfortably play defensive counterattacks.

And because Porto had temporarily adjusted their strategy before the game, the players pressed forward in large numbers, wanting to get an away goal, so the defense was naturally empty.

So, it wasn't surprising that Porto, eager to score, conceded another goal to Liverpool before the end of the first half...

Leading by two goals in the first half, the game had basically lost its suspense.

And the two goals were like two basins of cold water, completely waking up Porto's coach, Vítor Pereira.

They made him realize what kind of behemoth he was facing! He actually dared to try to steal at least one clean goal at their home stadium...

He simply didn't know how to write the word "death"!

During halftime, Pereira returned to the team's previous tactics—total defense, nothing but total defense.

In fact, Pereira had originally planned to have the team defend to a 0-0 draw on the road, so that when they returned to their home stadium, they wouldn't be so passive.

Who knew that he would be deceived by Liverpool's removal of half of their main players, and gave birth to thoughts he shouldn't have had.

Now, the big mistake had already been made. He didn't know if it was too late to mend the fold after the sheep were lost, but he still had to do it. Conceding two goals was better than conceding four, right?

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In the second half, Porto fully retreated to defend. At first, Liverpool thought that the other side was using a feigned retreat, because Porto had shown a very strong desire to score in the first half, so everyone thought that Porto definitely still wanted to score.

But after observing for more than ten minutes, they found that Porto really didn't want to score anymore, they just didn't want to concede...

Since that was the case... Liverpool could press forward with confidence.

Then, in the seventy-fourth minute, Liverpool finally broke through Porto's dense defense, with Chen Hero scoring a goal.

In the end, relying on Chen Hero's two goals and Adam Johnson's goal, Liverpool completely defeated Porto 3-0 at their home stadium.

This result made many people feel that the second leg of the match had lost its suspense.

After the game, Porto's coach, Vítor Pereira, also admitted that Liverpool was too strong and they couldn't compete with them.

"I think Liverpool, Barcelona, and Real Madrid should form another Champions League, with those three teams playing a home-and-away double round-robin system, and the champion would be decided by points."

Pereira on the stage was very helpless, but the reporters under the stage were amused by his complaints.

This might be the heartfelt voice of many other team coaches!

Because these three teams were really too strong now. Although Liverpool's strength couldn't compare to Barcelona and Real Madrid, it was only a matter of time before they reached the height of those two teams.

Liverpool had just defeated Manchester United, a season double-kill, defeating them twice in a row at Old Trafford. They had lost their opponents in England, so next, naturally, they would sweep across Europe!