Chapter 3 The Straw That Breaks the Camel's Back

Zhou Yi's goal gave Dortmund a 3-2 lead over Hoffenheim on their home turf. Though Dortmund was only ahead by one goal, it felt like the last straw that broke Hoffenheim's back.

In the following minutes, Hoffenheim tried to counterattack, but Dortmund's counterattacks always pushed them back. The momentum they had gained from scoring two goals at home and taking a two-goal lead was completely gone.

Until the end of the match, Hoffenheim was unable to close the gap.

In the end, Dortmund defeated Hoffenheim 3-2 on the road.

This result naturally made the Dortmund media very happy. They had secured three points, maintained their pursuit of Bayern Munich by four points, and Dortmund could finally go to the Club World Cup with peace of mind.

But throughout Germany, apart from Dortmund's own media, other media outlets were probably not so optimistic about Dortmund.

After the game, many media outlets believed that although they had defeated Hoffenheim, Dortmund could not relax. If Dortmund did not face the problem squarely, they would be in big trouble.

"...Although Hoffenheim was defeated, a big problem with Dortmund was exposed—how could Dortmund have had such a difficult time against a team like Hoffenheim in the past? But now they have to work so hard to win against Hoffenheim, and watching their players excitedly hug and celebrate after Zhou Yi's goal, I don't think there's anything to be happy about. Dortmund should reflect—why are they playing like this against a team like Hoffenheim?"

"Dortmund's strength has clearly declined this season. To be honest, after watching Dortmund's games for more than half a season, I think it's already very difficult for Dortmund to rank third. Let's be realistic, Dortmund's goal this season is to get a Champions League spot for next season, and don't expect to win the league title..."

In response to this situation, some media outlets interviewed Dortmund players to hear their views on the current public opinion.

Grosskreutz naturally lashed out at those media outlets, believing that they wanted to create a big headline.

But most of the players did not accept interviews, refusing to answer the question on the grounds that "we must now focus on the next game."

Zhou Yi, on the other hand, responded from a tricky angle: "I think the media is saying this is disrespectful to Hoffenheim. I'm not trying to stir up trouble, I don't know what other people think, but if I were a Hoffenheim player, I would be furious when I heard the media say this—what does 'playing against a team like Hoffenheim, they can play like this' mean? Is Hoffenheim weak? The league has played sixteen rounds, and if I remember correctly, Hoffenheim is ranked eleventh, in the middle of the rankings. It's normal for us to play like this against such a team away from home...Yes, it's normal even if we lose the game. If Hoffenheim wins against us, it means they performed well. We won against them, also because we performed well, and not because we must win against Hoffenheim. Anyway, I think the media's remarks are really insulting to Hoffenheim..."

After speaking, Zhou Yi also shrugged, spread his hands, and shook his head.

After Zhou Yi's words were reported by the media, they did indeed cause a reaction from Hoffenheim. Hoffenheim's coach talked about this matter at a regular press conference in the middle of the week, and he expressed his support for Zhou Yi: "Zhou Yi is a great player, not only does he perform well on the field, but I think his words and deeds off the field are also great. You certainly know what I'm talking about, right?"

Reporters in the audience laughed.

"In the game against Dortmund, Hoffenheim had times when they performed very well, so we took a two-goal lead. But there were also times when they didn't perform well, and conversely, Dortmund performed better, so they ultimately defeated us. No one wants to lose, but sometimes the result is not something you can control. I don't think Hoffenheim is a team that anyone can beat easily, if anyone thinks so, welcome them to try."

These words were not very polite, and Zhou Yi's words were like a fuse, igniting Hoffenheim's anger. But it can't be said that Zhou Yi was instigating discord, because the words said by those media were not friendly to Hoffenheim in the first place.

These media may have just wanted to use Dortmund's game against Hoffenheim to criticize Dortmund. After dominating the Bundesliga for three consecutive seasons, many people have become a little tired of Dortmund, and are always happy to see negative news about Dortmund.

But when they attacked Dortmund in a rush, they didn't care about Hoffenheim's feelings at all. Of course, deep down, they didn't value this team, so this situation occurred.

This gave Zhou Yi an opportunity to take advantage of.

In the final analysis, it was their heartfelt disdain and contempt for Hoffenheim that caused this situation.

Not only was Hoffenheim's coach Gisdol dissatisfied, but Hoffenheim's fans were also very dissatisfied with the media's contempt.

Today is the era of the Internet and social media. Everyone can express their views and make their voices heard on social media, without worrying that no one will hear them.

A large number of Hoffenheim fans left messages criticizing and accusing the official accounts of those media outlets that criticized Dortmund through Hoffenheim. Although the number of these enthusiastic Hoffenheim fans was not large, they were very combative. And the fewer people there are, the more they can be seen as a vulnerable group, and their voices are even more dared not to be ignored. So those media had to respond to the protests of Hoffenheim fans.

"...We absolutely have no intention of discriminating against Hoffenheim..."

"We apologize to Hoffenheim fans for the inappropriate wording in our reports, although we didn't mean it that way, we are still very sorry for causing misunderstanding..."

At this time, they couldn't care less about badmouthing Dortmund...

And Dortmund?

Naturally, they couldn't bother to entangle with the media on this matter. After finishing the game with Hoffenheim and returning to Dortmund, they rushed to Morocco to prepare for the Club World Cup semi-finals.

Zhou Yi stirred up the war between the German media and Hoffenheim fans, and then fled far away, hiding his identity and name...

The German media was overwhelmed by Zhou Yi's troubles, while the Chinese media did not care about what happened in Germany. At most, they reported this as an "interesting" event back to China, but they would not repeatedly hype around this topic.

They have more important things, that is the Club World Cup.

This year's Club World Cup is very special for Chinese football, Chinese fans and Chinese media that report on Chinese football.

Because this is the first time in history that a Chinese team has participated in the Club World Cup.

In the Toyota Cup era, the predecessor of the Club World Cup, the competition rules stipulated that the participating parties could only be the European champion and the South American champion. Although the venue was in Asia, it had nothing to do with Asian teams.

Later, FIFA briefly held the Club World Cup, changing it to champion teams from various continents to participate. But this had nothing to do with Chinese teams.

Later, the FIFA Club World Cup completely replaced the Toyota Cup, and the competition system was fixed. The winners of the Champions League in each continent in that year can participate in the Club World Cup in that year. But Chinese teams are still out of reach, because Chinese club teams are too weak.

In the short history of the Asian Champions League, Chinese teams have never won the championship, so how could they get the qualification to represent Asian club teams to participate in the Club World Cup?

Before this year, the best results of Chinese club teams in the Asian Champions League were the semi-finals, which were created by Dalian Shide in 2003 and Shenzhen Jianlibao in 2005 respectively.

The two teams met West Asian teams in the semi-finals. Dalian Shide narrowly lost to Al Ain 6:7 and missed the final. At that time, there were few participating teams, and they could directly enter the semi-finals after breaking out of the group stage.

By 2005, Shenzhen Jianlibao had also entered the semi-finals. They broke through one more level in the knockout stage than Dalian Shide, but lost to Al Ain 0:6 in the semi-finals, and the Chinese team missed the final again.

After that, Chinese teams' performance in this competition was lackluster.

The best results are only the quarter-finals of Shanghai Shenhua and Shandong Luneng.

Because of the weak performance of Chinese teams in this competition, the Asian Champions League has no sense of existence in the minds of Chinese fans. Everyone is familiar with the knowledge of the European Champions League, but not many people know about the Asian Champions League.

Until the emergence of Guangzhou Evergrande. Guangzhou team, which participated in the Asian Champions League as the champion of the Chinese Super League in 2012, was the first time to participate in the Asian Champions League, and two years ago they were still in the Chinese League One. The result is that this team entered the quarter-finals in its first participation in the Asian Champions League.

This year, 2013, they won the championship in one fell swoop. In the home and away two-round system final, they defeated the South Korean team Seoul and won the Asian Champions League championship, creating history—this is also the first championship won by a Chinese club team in the Asian Champions League.

Guangzhou Evergrande, who won the championship, naturally also qualified to participate in the Club World Cup at the end of the year. In the draw, if they can pass the first round of the Club World Cup, they will meet the European champion in the semi-finals, and the European champion is Dortmund.

This is not the first confrontation between Dortmund and Guangzhou Evergrande. The last confrontation between the two sides was actually very recent. In the summer of this year, Dortmund's first stop on its China trip was Guangzhou, and the first warm-up opponent was Guangzhou Evergrande.

But that game was, after all, a commercial game. Especially, Dortmund players would hardly do their best on the court, and their attitude towards the game was different from that of a formal game.

Now it is different. Guangzhou Evergrande has finally won an opportunity to officially challenge Dortmund through its own efforts. This time, I believe Dortmund's mentality should also be different from that of a commercial game.

Of course, all of this must be based on the premise that Guangzhou Evergrande must first pass the first round of the knockout stage.

Their opponent is Al Ahly, the African Champions League champion from Egypt.