Chapter 116 Chen Yingxiong's Attitude

Chen Yingxiong had a great vacation with Cabral, and they went to South America for a holiday. The two of them enjoyed days of undisturbed bliss there.

Then he sent Cabral back to Italy. Her vacation was shorter than his. From Italy, Chen Yingxiong flew back to China. First, he went to Shanghai. As the boss of "hero" Apparel Co., Ltd., he always had to inspect his business.

He also took the opportunity to reunite briefly with his parents, then went to Beijing to sign an endorsement contract with TCL, and also attended a commercial event prepared for him by Nike—"Face to Face with Hero." Young players selected from all over the country would spend four days in a training camp with Chen Yingxiong in Beijing. During these four days, Chen Yingxiong ate and lived with the young players, taught them how to play football, and played with them.

Finally, the two luckiest players who performed the best in the training camp would get the opportunity to go to Liverpool to watch Chen Yingxiong's games live.

At the same time, Chen Yingxiong also shouldered another task, which was to connect Liverpool Football Club and Nike.

As early as a season ago, due to Liverpool's unsatisfactory performance, they did not even qualify for the European competition, and the team was in turmoil. At this time, Adidas added insult to injury and planned not to sponsor Liverpool's sportswear after their sponsorship contract with Liverpool expired. Liverpool had no choice but to look for another sponsor.

For a giant like Liverpool, it was obviously a humiliation to have their main sponsor cancel the sponsorship contract. Generally speaking, jersey sponsors are different from other sponsors, and they rarely change. They often cooperate for decades. For example, Adidas sponsors Real Madrid and AC Milan, and Nike sponsors Barcelona and Manchester United. How many seasons have these been?

What's more, the reason why Adidas canceled the continued sponsorship was because they felt that Liverpool's performance was too poor and their performance did not meet their brand image.

This was simply a blatant slap in the face... But Liverpool at that time really lacked convincing performances to make people feel injustice for them, so they could only swallow this breath themselves.

Who would have thought that not long after this decision was made, the news that Chen Yingxiong was transferring to Liverpool spread, and Adidas immediately understood what kind of changes would happen if Liverpool had Chen Yingxiong. They had missed an opportunity to sign Chen Yingxiong before, just because Chen Yingxiong was not very famous at the time, and his agent's asking price was too high, and they thought it was not cost-effective. But later, Chen Yingxiong's performance was like slaps in the face, constantly slapping their faces.

At this time, Adidas regretted it very much.

Now that Chen Yingxiong was going to transfer to Liverpool, even if they couldn't sign Chen Yingxiong, they could use other methods to use the influence and fame of this star. For example, sponsoring Liverpool, then wouldn't Chen Yingxiong have to wear Adidas jerseys to participate in the games every game? This also helped promote the Adidas brand.

Maybe they could also use the cooperation opportunity with Liverpool Football Club to dig Chen Yingxiong from the Nike camp?

So Adidas re-approached Liverpool and planned to sign a new five-year contract with them.

Although Adidas did not say that they were coming for Chen Yingxiong, Niang, who was in charge of this matter, was not a fool. He knew that if it weren't for Chen Yingxiong, Adidas would not have changed their mind.

To put it bluntly, they value Chen Yingxiong, not our Liverpool.

This was the second humiliation.

After the first humiliation, Niang had already made up his mind that, at least during his tenure, he would not sign any cooperation agreement with Adidas.

So he refused Adidas without hesitation.

He would rather find a new sponsor than accept Adidas' condescending charity.

Adidas was turned away, and reluctantly and unwillingly retreated.

Niang then began to look for a new jersey sponsor.

In the end, Chen Yingxiong's partnership with Nike played a key role. Nike took the initiative to approach Liverpool through Chen Yingxiong and told Niang that they could sponsor Liverpool's jerseys.

But the premise of this contract was that as long as Chen Yingxiong was in the team, they would continue to sponsor, and if Chen Yingxiong transferred, they would also terminate the sponsorship.

They were still coming for Chen Yingxiong, but the conditions they proposed were much more acceptable than Adidas. Niang also had no objections, because he was confident that he could keep Chen Yingxiong in Liverpool for at least five years.

In this way, the two parties began to discuss the specific details of the cooperation.

This time Chen Yingxiong was in Beijing, in fact, to attend the signing ceremony of Nike sponsoring Liverpool. At the same time, as the first project of the cooperation between Liverpool and Nike, and also the first step for Liverpool to open up the Chinese market, the first Liverpool peripheral merchandise store will also open in Beijing. This store sells Liverpool's various styles of jerseys, training clothes, sportswear, scarves, gloves, hats, teacups... all kinds of things closely related to life are sold here, but they are all printed with the Liverpool team emblem. Chen Yingxiong and the team's general manager Niang will also be there to congratulate.

And in the new season, Liverpool will wear jerseys sponsored by Nike to compete in the Premier League.

Nike was very happy to be able to seize the sponsorship of Liverpool from Adidas, and Adidas, who took the initiative to give up, must be regretting it very much... They had missed Chen Yingxiong once, and this time they fell into the same pit again, which was simply unlucky.

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When participating in various commercial activities in Beijing, reporters' interviews were also indispensable. Chen Yingxiong attended no less than three press conferences alone. At the press conference, the most frequently asked question to Chen Yingxiong was his evaluation of the two head coaches.

It sounded normal. The media had to use this method to understand the evaluation of the two head coaches in the players' minds, but in fact, this was a provocative question. If you said good things about the former coach, what would the current coach think? If you praised and welcomed the current coach, would it give people a feeling of "ungratefulness" or "out with the old, in with the new," and would it be too snobbish and despised? However, today's players have become sophisticated, and they have reached perfection in not offending both sides, so such questions often become a formality and really become just ordinary questions.

But it still had to be asked.

What's more, the object of the question was the straightforward, big-mouthed, and mindless Chen Er Bi (a somewhat vulgar term for an idiot)? Maybe there would be unexpected gains.

There really were unexpected gains.

"...Dalglish is a very good coach. It was just bad luck to be dismissed... We all miss him very much. As a legend of the club, he did everything he could for the team... I am very sorry that I was banned for six games when he needed help the most and did not play the role I should have..."

Niang, who was sitting next to Chen Yingxiong, smiled bitterly in his heart. He knew that Chen Yingxiong had some opinions on his dismissal of Dalglish, but there was no way, he did not expect Chen Yingxiong to understand this kind of thing. Chen Yingxiong valued loyalty. Whoever was good to him, he would be good to him. Otherwise, how could they have gotten him to Liverpool? So, now they have to bear the negative impact of his loyalty...

"I think I will miss him often."

The reporters were happy—finally a fish was hooked!

Hurry up and strike while the iron is hot!

"If you were not banned for six games, would Dalglish not have been dismissed?"

This time, Chen Yingxiong did not go too far. He shook his head: "I don't know."

It was a bit of a pity that Chen Yingxiong did not fall into the trap, but it didn't matter. The questions the reporters prepared were not just this one.

"Then, what do you think of the new head coach Martin O'Neill? Can he lead Liverpool back to the position people expect?"

Chen Yingxiong shrugged and told the truth: "I don't know him. If you want me to evaluate him now, I can't say anything valuable. Can he lead Liverpool back to its peak? This is not my responsibility. If I knew, I wouldn't play football. I should go into fortune-telling. So you should ask him this question."

Chen Yingxiong pointed to Niang next to him.

Niang quickly took over the topic with a smile on his face and talked about Martin O'Neill: "He is a very capable head coach. I believe that Liverpool can return to its peak under his leadership... We have great confidence in him, and I also believe that Hero and his cooperation will be very pleasant..."

In fact, in his heart, Niang was saying: You have now seen Hero's personality, Martin, right?

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What Chen Yingxiong said in Beijing was quickly transmitted back to Liverpool by the English media.

Moreover, the English media was really good at picking quarrels. The title they used was: "Martin O'Neill? I'm not familiar with him."

This title was actually not wrong, but when they said it and used another tone, it gave people the feeling that Chen Yingxiong disdained Martin O'Neill.

As for whether Chen Yingxiong hated and disdained O'Neill, that was unknown.

Anyway, when Gerrard and Skrtel and other Liverpool players were asked the same question, they all behaved very smoothly, thanking Dalglish and expressing their welcome and support for O'Neill. Only Chen Yingxiong stiffly said that he did not know O'Neill and then kicked the ball to Niang.

So if it caused other people's reverie, then Chen Yingxiong brought it on himself.

Martin O'Neill held the newspaper, saw the title above, and shook his head helplessly.

It seemed that this Liverpool's number one star was much more difficult to deal with than he thought.

But he had to win over Chen Yingxiong, because he was the absolute core of the team. If he and Chen Yingxiong did not get along well, his work in Liverpool would be difficult. He had heard that Chen Yingxiong, as Dalglish's appointed fourth captain, also had a certain influence and voice in the locker room.

So if he wanted to carry out his work smoothly in Liverpool, he had to get Chen Yingxiong's support.

But now it seemed that he was still very nostalgic...

It seemed that "King Kenny's" influence in this locker room was not as easy to eliminate as he thought... From the perspective of an outsider like himself, Dalglish's coaching in Liverpool was a failure. The team's results were so poor that he thought that the team might be looking forward to his departure. Now it seemed that he was wrong. He was indeed a legendary figure of the club, and his influence was extraordinary.

Chen Yingxiong's matter was just a reminder, reminding him that it would not be so easy to win the hearts of these big-name players.

Who in Liverpool's locker room would support him, who would oppose him, and who would be fence-sitters, watching coldly from the sidelines and then deciding on their choice?

Being the head coach of a wealthy club was not that simple...