Chapter 166 A Swift Decline

Perhaps there was another reason besides their own emotions for the Zenit St. Petersburg fans to cheer so generously for Chen Hero’s goal.

That was… they knew that even if Chen Hero equalized for Napoli, he couldn’t stop the team from losing away!

In the seventy-ninth minute, Denisov scored the second goal for Zenit St. Petersburg, making the score 2:1, and Napoli fell behind again.

And this time, it was impossible for Napoli to equalize and prevent a defeat.

Because Chen Hero was substituted in the seventy-sixth minute.

Before he left the field, Zenit St. Petersburg’s offensive was coming wave after wave, and Napoli’s defense was crumbling, and they could concede a goal at any time.

Mazzarri, who had already seen Napoli’s crisis, directly replaced Chen Hero with a defender, Santacroce.

But even so, he couldn’t change the fate of conceding a goal.

This goal made Mazzarri realize that it was impossible to defy fate here, so he simply admitted defeat and replaced Cassano and Maggio respectively, giving up on continuing to attack.

In the end, Napoli lost 1:2 to Zenit St. Petersburg, which had an invincible home advantage, and experienced their first defeat in the Champions League.

At the post-match press conference, Mazzarri looked helpless: "In this weather, on this field, such a… trip away, my players have tried their best, and I am proud of their performance. But everyone knows that a team cannot always win. In fact, I am already ecstatic with our performance in the first three group matches, so… this defeat may have come at just the right time."

After losing to Zenit St. Petersburg away, the Napoli team took De Laurentiis’ private plane back to Naples overnight.

They really couldn’t take it anymore… Mazzarri called the chairman directly, his tone was very serious, and in the phone call, he asked De Laurentiis to rescue his troops in Russia.

In this way, with a defeat and a group of sick people, Napoli fled the snowy St. Petersburg in a bit of a mess.

Chen Hero didn’t know if he would have a chance to play in St. Petersburg again in the future, but this trip back to St. Petersburg would be memorable.

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Although they lost the game, just as analyzed before, Napoli did not lose their qualification for the group stage because of this defeat.

Lyon also won the game. In this way, Lyon climbed to the top of the group with nine points, while Napoli fell to second place. However, for Napoli, who participated in the Champions League group stage for the first time, their goal was obviously only to qualify from the group stage. Before that, whether they were first or second in the group was not their concern at all.

Lyon, on the other hand, had been holding back to get that first place in the group, because this would allow them to avoid those terrifying giants in other groups.

For Lyon, who can participate in the Champions League every year, qualifying from the group stage is not their goal at all. There must be some more long-term goals. The group ranking largely determines how far they can go in the Champions League knockout stage.

What surprised people was not Napoli, the dark horse, but… Liverpool’s rapid decline.

Previously, the Napoli people were complacent that they were able to draw with the Red Army at Anfield, Liverpool’s home ground. But now they are not happy at all, because it is not worth showing off at all!

In the match on October 20, Lyon had already defeated Liverpool at Anfield. Now that they returned to their home court, they once again defeated Liverpool, completing a double kill.

In this way, Liverpool fell to the bottom of the group, becoming the bottom team. Zenit St. Petersburg, relying on their terrifying home advantage, has now accumulated four points, surpassing Liverpool with only two points. They are very hopeful to participate in the knockout stage of the UEFA Cup…

This was something that everyone had never thought of after the group draw came out.

Previously, everyone thought that if there were no accidents in this group, Lyon and Liverpool would advance together, while Napoli and Zenit St. Petersburg would compete for a UEFA Cup qualification.

Who would have thought that after four rounds of group matches, the situation would have changed completely…

Napoli, the dark horse, came out of nowhere and is currently ranked second in the group, with a great hope of advancing to the knockout stage of the Champions League.

On the Liverpool side, even their club’s board of directors did not expect the team’s performance in this season’s Champions League to be so bad. The fans initially thought they had drawn a good draw and looked forward with joy to perhaps recreating the glory of reversing AC Milan to win the championship in Istanbul in 2005.

Who would have thought…

But reality is so cruel, especially in the world of football, this cruelty is always magnified a hundred times.

The rise of a new power is at the cost of the complete fall of an old powerhouse…

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Returning to Italy does not mean relief and rest for Napoli.

On the contrary, everything they experienced in St. Petersburg still needs time to digest.

Hamsik’s fever has subsided, but his physical and mental condition is very poor, so he still needs to rest for a few days. Therefore, he cannot participate in the team’s training normally, and even if his physical fitness is fine, he cannot participate in the away game against Catania.

And the poor Christian Maggio was not only mentally affected, but also physically escaped the disaster. He suffered a bit of an injury in the game due to the slippery field. At first, he thought it was nothing serious, but when he returned to Naples for training, he realized that the situation was more serious… After examination, he had a strained thigh muscle and had to rest for at least two weeks.

As Christmas approaches, the number of injured players in the team has also begun to increase. This makes Mazzarri very headache, because the subsequent schedule will only become more and more difficult to deal with… The only thing worth gratifying is that the team’s trident is currently free from injuries and performing well.

The exhausted Napoli went to Catania for an away challenge. This is not a strong team. Catania is ranked nineteenth, second to last, and has only accumulated seven points in eleven league matches, winning only one game, drawing four, and losing six.

It is such a team, if it were in the past, even in the away game, Napoli would have absolute confidence to defeat the opponent.

But this time, Napoli, known for their super offensive power, did not score a single goal and drew 0:0 with Catania away.

Napoli, who have not won in two rounds, also fell to sixth place in the league after this game.

Napoli’s weaknesses in lacking experience in dealing with two-front battles and insufficient personnel reserves have finally been exposed.

Fortunately, Mazzarri will soon have a time to adjust and rest—after playing Catania, there will be a week and a half of international A-level match days, and national team matches will be the theme of the actual football world during this period.

Fortunately, there are not many national players in the Napoli team, only Arshavin, Cassano, De Jong, Hamsik, Sanchez and others.

The most important Chen Hero still does not have to participate in the national team’s matches, which makes Mazzarri the happiest.

He had learned from Chen Hero before that the reason why Chen Hero did not participate in the national team’s matches was because he was banned by the Chinese Football Association!

At that time, Mazzarri felt very incredible and legendary when he heard about this. If he were an official of the Chinese Football Association, no matter what excessive things Chen Hero said, he would definitely call him into the team, because he has a vital role in improving the level of the Chinese national team.

But after all, that is someone else’s business, and he can’t control it. Moreover… Chen Hero not participating in the national team’s matches is actually a good thing for Mazzarri. This means that Chen Hero will have more opportunities to rest, and he will not be infected with the so-called FIFA virus in the back and forth, and will not be injured in the national team’s matches.

At this time, Napoli especially needs a healthy Chen Hero.

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Every time on national team match days, the debate about whether Chen Hero should return to the national team is raging in China. But no matter how much the media and fans argue, the Football Association’s attitude is unswerving—they don’t talk about the name Chen Hero at all, as if there is no Chinese player named Chen Hero in Napoli at all.

Some fans have already labeled the Chinese Football Association as "the largest traitor organization in China today."

But these are of no avail.

Whenever it is a national team match day, Chinese fans should not think about seeing that arrogant big guy in the national team again.

Whether the Chinese team wins or loses, it always fails to truly arouse the fans’ interest.

How long will this situation last?

No one knows.

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When Chinese fans are feeling sorry for Chen Hero still being unable to join the national team, Chen Hero doesn’t care about the national team’s matches at all.

Since he was expelled from the Football Association, he has not watched the national team’s matches, and has not understood what the current situation of the national team is.

He is in the dungeon, undergoing intense training with Inzaghi and Maldini.

There are no skills in practicing off-the-ball running, it is just practice makes perfect, constantly practicing and practicing again, repeating and repeating again, turning it into an experience with thousands of repetitions, and then transforming the experience into the body’s instinct, so that in the eyes of outsiders, this is like… talent.

"Stop, Hero! You have to pay attention to observing your surroundings… If you continue to run like this, aren’t you running into the opponent’s encirclement?"

"Very good, the position is right, but you ran too early! You can’t catch the ball at all like this!"

"Pay attention to your teammates, don’t just focus on running positions, you have to pay attention to your teammates at the same time, look at their running positions and passing, and grasp the timing!"

"Timing! Timing! Timing is the most important! Half a second early or half a second late, you can’t catch the ball! You won’t get a chance to shoot!"

"What if the time is too tight and you don’t have time to run to the open space in the conventional way? You can use some unconventional methods…"

"When shooting, don’t pursue beautiful movements, or shapes that can be on the cover of a magazine. You have to remember that you are a striker, and your only task is to score goals. As long as you can shoot the football into the goal, you don’t care what method you use, head, feet, legs, chest, buttocks… even hands, as long as you can prevent the referee from seeing it, it’s okay!"

Inzaghi’s voice kept ringing in the virtual training ground dungeon.

Chen Hero believed that the real Inzaghi must not be like this, so this is really learning from a teacher… The Inzaghi in front of him is like a driving school coach, constantly scolding him loudly and correcting his mistakes.

But don’t say, with such a teacher teaching him, Chen Hero feels that his progress is indeed much faster…

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p.s., a little preview in advance, there will be an outbreak on Saturday the 24th, and on Saturday and Sunday, for two consecutive days, there will be four updates every day~