Chapter 378 Mwamba

The three goals won against Everton increased Liverpool's points to forty-three. Now they were only one point behind Newcastle's forty-four. However, they were still nine points behind Arsenal, who were fourth in the league, so their chances of qualifying for the Champions League next season were still slim.

With no prospects in the league, Liverpool continued to advance in the cup games.

The FA Cup quarter-final, March 18, Liverpool hosted Stoke City.

The opponent was not strong, and Liverpool was playing at home, so Liverpool had a great chance of advancing to the semi-finals.

If they could go all the way to the final and eventually lift the FA Cup, then this season would not be considered a failure for Liverpool.

In order to ensure that they could enter the semi-finals, Dalglish still sent out a strong starting lineup in this game.

Chen Hero and Suarez led the starting lineup, only making adjustments in the defense. Carragher started and wore the captain's armband.

Born in January 1978, Carragher was now thirty-four years old. With age, his condition had declined. However, he had great authority within the team, and the forgotten coach always gave him many opportunities to play. After Dalglish came, he unhesitatingly took down Carragher and put him on the bench. Most of the time, he appeared as a substitute player.

If it were another coach, Carragher would have probably thrown a tantrum long ago. But under Dalglish, Carragher behaved very well.

This also made many people worry whether the new Liverpool coach would be able to suppress this "football bully" after Dalglish left...

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January 17th to 18th was the FA Cup match day, but football was not the main focus on this day.

In the match between Tottenham Hotspur and Bolton, the game was suspended due to Bolton player Mwamba suddenly collapsing.

Mwamba collapsed during the match due to heart problems, and he was subsequently sent to the hospital.

The scene of Mwamba collapsing to the ground was broadcast live on national television.

The players on both sides of the field at the time were horrified, and the fans in the stands were also stunned. White Hart Lane was silent.

After being sent to the hospital, Mwamba was still in critical condition and had not yet escaped danger.

His condition touched the hearts of fans throughout the UK and even the world.

The day after the game, many players expressed their concern for Mwamba through various channels.

Chen Hero was among them. Because he had experienced a heart attack incident as a party involved—Cassano happened to be sitting next to him when he had his attack, and he was involved in Cassano's heart attack the whole time.

He expressed his concern and greetings to Mwamba in this capacity, and encouraged him to be strong and never give up.

"...No matter how terrible the disease is, it is definitely not as terrible as our own will to survive! Antonio is now running and jumping on the field, and I believe you can do it too!"

He posted this blessing via Twitter.

His actions were also praised by many people. Originally, because of the matter between him and Richards, many black fans had not had a high opinion of Chen Hero. They felt that even if Chen Hero did not insult Richards by calling him a n****r, his retaliatory approach to Richards made many black fans feel a sense of "when the lips are gone, the teeth are cold." They always felt that even if he didn't call Richards a n****r this time, he probably cursed "n****r" countless times in his heart. Since he could hate Richards so much, he was afraid that he hated other black people even more...

But this time, Mwamba's heart attack changed many black people's views on Chen Hero, and they felt that he was not as bad as everyone originally thought...

Chen Hero further stated that he was willing to donate to Mwamba's family if needed.

And in the FA Cup quarter-final between Liverpool and Stoke City a day later, Chen Hero scored a goal. After scoring, he lifted his jersey, which read: "Even if the whole world has given up, you must never give up, Mwamba, hang in there!"

When he did this, Anfield erupted in thunderous applause. This time, even the Stoke City fans who had just had their goal broken by him stood up and applauded Chen Hero's actions.

At this moment, the brilliance of humanity shone on Chen Hero. He gave people the impression not of a "bad boy," "troublemaker," or "impulsive butcher," but of a person full of love.

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Chen Hero's goal was the first goal of the game.

Three minutes later, Crouch scored an equalizer for Stoke City.

In terms of height, Chen Hero was not as good as Crouch. However, Chen Hero's header was better than Crouch's because his jumping ability was much better than Crouch's.

This was a competition between two tall guys.

In the end, Chen Hero's Liverpool defeated Stoke City 2:1 at home. Suarez scored the winning goal for the team in the second half.

And the person who assisted him was Chen Hero.

In the end, Chen Hero not only won against Crouch at the team level, but also defeated Crouch in terms of personal performance, with one goal and one assist.

But the Liverpool people were not in the mood to celebrate the victory.

Everyone was still talking about Mwamba.

At the post-match press conference, Liverpool coach Dalglish also said: "Shankly taught us that football is not a matter of life and death, football is higher than life and death. But this sentence is wrong, football can never be more important than life. Football can save lives, but football cannot become a killer of life. Everyone at our Liverpool club is praying for Mwamba, hoping that he can wake up soon..."

These days, the whole of England was talking about the health of football players.

The intensity and density of the Premier League schedule can be ranked first among the world's football leagues, and the Premier League does not have a winter break. In the most fragile winter of the human body, the schedule becomes even more dense. Players in teams with European missions have to play at least sixty to seventy games in a season, and the Premier League starts half a month earlier than other leagues, so the players naturally have half a month less rest time.

In such a high-intensity league, players are under tremendous physical and psychological pressure.

Over time, many problems will always erupt.

Some people have brought up the idea that the Premier League should set up a winter break again.

The media is also arguing about this matter. Some people think that setting up a winter break would require moving the games not played during the winter break to other times, leading to a more dense schedule for the players and frequent situations of two games a week and three games a week, which may not be much better than now.

Some people also suggest canceling the League Cup. Other countries only have one cup, but England has two special cups, which is a repeated game and a waste of everyone's energy and money.

But these arguments have nothing to do with Liverpool's players.

This matter made the Liverpool club realize the importance of the players' health. So Niang decided to conduct a detailed and meticulous physical examination of all the players. This physical examination was different from the physical examination for player transfers, it was more detailed and in-depth.

It can also detect some hidden dangers that cannot be detected in ordinary physical examinations.

They were just afraid that a player would have something like Mwamba's situation again.

In fact, heart disease has plagued professional football for many years. Among the earliest players related to heart disease that everyone has an impression of, the most famous is Nigerian star Kanu. When he played for Inter Milan, he was found to have a heart disease. After surgery, his condition and performance plummeted. After entering the new century, various heart disease tragedies have occurred from time to time. The most famous is Cameroonian player Vivian Foe, who played for Manchester City. He died of a sudden heart attack in the semi-finals of the 2003 Confederations Cup. The developed television broadcast broadcast the entire process of him collapsing, convulsing, foaming at the mouth, and dying to the world, which was shocking and once triggered fierce criticism from public opinion about FIFA's exploitation of players to earn high profits.

Later, Spain became a high incidence area for heart disease. Sevilla player Puerta and Espanyol player Dani Jarque both passed away due to heart disease. In addition, Real Madrid's midfielder hope star De la Red also fainted in the game due to heart problems, and then chose to retire at the golden age of twenty-five for safety reasons because he couldn't find the cause.

……

The list of players who died of heart disease can be very long.

But no one wants to be the next one.

So Liverpool Football Club specially arranged a very detailed physical examination.

Faced with this physical examination, not all players appreciated it. Because they felt that there was nothing wrong with their hearts, but they were afraid of finding out some very, very hidden diseases that might not threaten their safety, but could lead to the early end of their careers, just like De la Red of Real Madrid Club of Spain, who finally chose to retire for safety reasons because he couldn't find the cause.

This is really too bad.

No one wants to be like that.

So many people were uneasy.

Chen Hero was very calm about this. He was absolutely confident in his body, just as he was absolutely confident in his ability to defeat Messi and Van Persie and others.

The results of the examination relieved everyone. Except for some minor problems that were harmless, no one had a major illness that could affect their career prospects.

There were no heart-related diseases either.

The happy result relieved many previously uneasy people, and smiles reappeared on their faces.

But Chen Hero received some disturbing advice.