Lin Hai Ting Tao
Chapter 900 Back and Forth
"Mark Wagner!!! He scores his second! Extends Borussia Dortmund's lead to three goals! Now, on aggregate, Borussia Dortmund is tied with Napoli!"
"This is exciting! Just one minute ago, Higuain's shot almost pierced Dortmund's goal, and now Dortmund has used a classic fast counterattack to send the football into Napoli's goal for the third time!"
"Dortmund has scored two goals in three minutes, rewriting the score to 3-0! Borussia Dortmund is simply invincible at home!"
The commentators were going crazy.
The story that unfolded in these three minutes was just too wonderful, too exciting.
In the first minute, Dortmund used a counterattack to score a beautiful goal. In the second minute, Napoli's counterattack almost returned the favor, but it certainly scared Dortmund's fans. Then in the third minute, Dortmund actually took advantage of Napoli's missed counterattack to once again use the same counterattack to extend their lead…
Some games might only have a few exciting moments in the entire ninety minutes, but in the match between Dortmund and Napoli, it was all condensed into three minutes.
"Yan Min's lightning-fast sprint was impressive! His unstoppable momentum after getting the ball is fascinating!" He Ping started his "brainless praise of Chinese players" mode, but at this time, the Chinese fans in front of the TV were even more excited and brainless than he was.
It wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that Yan Min was the biggest contributor to this goal—first, he actively participated in the defense in the backcourt, intercepting Callejón's ball with Kehl, and then immediately threw himself into the attack, dribbling the ball wildly, and doing a one-two with Aubameyang, before sprinting powerfully again to send the football to the center.
The whole process was as smooth as flowing water, full of the beauty of speed.
Before, back in China, he was just an ordinary young player, with no particularly outstanding qualities. But after going to Dortmund, in less than half a year, he has bloomed with such brilliant light, almost as good as Zhou Yi…
Is studying abroad really that magical?
This question may be difficult to answer. But Yan Min's changes are obvious to everyone. In any case, everyone is happy and proud that China has another player who can gain a foothold in Europe. At the same time, Yan Min's sudden emergence before the World Cup is just too timely—at this time, as long as it can increase the strength of the Chinese team, everyone welcomes it.
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After the goal, Mark pointed at Yan Min and ran towards him, then hugged him.
He patted Yan Min's head hard: "Well done! Well done!"
More teammates swarmed in, surrounding the two of them.
They howled with excitement, just like those crazy Borussia Dortmund fans in the stands.
However, Dortmund's celebration did not last long, because they had not forgotten that their goal in this game was to win by four goals.
Now they were only leading by three goals, they really had no position to celebrate wildly.
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As the Dortmund players ran back to their own half, on the sidelines, Benitez was preparing to make a substitution. He called Swiss midfielder Gökhan Inler to his side and gave him instructions.
The task he gave Inler was not to contain Zhou Yi, but to constantly sweep back and forth in midfield. Dortmund had scored consecutive goals with two counterattacks. When their counterattacks passed through midfield, they encountered almost no obstacles at all. Benitez thought this was abnormal, indicating that Napoli's midfield control was too weak, so he brought on Inler to enhance control and interception ability.
The game restarted in less than two minutes, and Napoli made a substitution. Inler was brought on, replacing Dzemaili.
"Inler is on!" When Inler ran onto the field, the commentators were a little excited.
After the TV broadcast gave Inler a shot, it switched to Zhou Yi's face to see Zhou Yi's expression.
But there was nothing strange or special on Zhou Yi's face.
The last time the two teams met, Inler injured Zhou Yi. Now that the two have met again, what sparks will they create in the game?
Everyone was curious.
Not long after Inler came on the field, everyone could see that he was not defending against Zhou Yi, but was responsible for constantly sweeping the midfield.
Logically speaking, Zhou Yi is Dortmund's organizational core, so he should be the focus of defense.
But Benitez had already seen that today's Dortmund was fully capable of multi-point blossoming. Even without Zhou Yi's organization, they could launch very threatening counterattacks.
For example, that goal just now was like this. Zhou Yi did not participate in this attack at all. He watched the excitement in the backcourt from beginning to end.
In this case, if Napoli were to put heavy defensive forces on Zhou Yi again, the greatest possibility would be that they would be riddled with holes by the counterattacks of Yan Min, Aubameyang, Reus, and others.
Therefore, even if Benitez knew that Zhou Yi was Dortmund's core player, he did not dare to ignore the others and just mark him.
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After taking a three-goal lead, Dortmund's attack became even more intense.
Soon, Dortmund won a corner kick. Reus took the corner kick, and Sven Bender headed for the goal in the penalty area, but it was saved by Reina.
Zhou Yi got the second point outside the penalty area and shot with his foot, but the football was slightly off and flew out of the baseline…
In the sixty-ninth minute, Durm crossed from the wing, and Mark headed for the ball in the center. Although he hit the football, it went wide of the left post and did not result in a goal.
Dortmund's attack during this period was very fierce, and Napoli was unable to cross even half the field. The fans at the scene seemed to tirelessly cheer for the team. Every attack, every shot, every threatening pass from Dortmund was able to win cheers and shouts from the Dortmund fans in the stands. The home atmosphere was really explosive.
Faced with Dortmund's aggressive attack, Napoli also made adjustments.
Benitez replaced Callejón with Insigne. The substitution in the attacking position showed that Benitez still wanted to attack.
Since the aggregate score was already 3:3, at this time, whoever could score would be able to break the balance. Benitez saw that Dortmund's attack was becoming more and more fierce, so he decided to take a risk, not to strengthen the defense, but to attack, hoping to take advantage of Dortmund's fierce attack to attack their back.
Benitez's doing this was really risky enough, but riches are found in danger. If Napoli really lost to Dortmund by four goals in the away game, then they would fall to third in the group, and it would be their turn to worry about their group qualification situation.
If they could score an away goal, even if they lost to Dortmund 1:4 in the end, because they had an away goal, in the comparison of the two sides' records, Napoli would still have the advantage. With the advantage of this one away goal, they could beat their opponents in the case of the same points and continue to rank second in the group.
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Dortmund needed a goal, and Napoli also needed a goal. So from the seventieth minute, the rest of the game became very open…
In the seventy-first minute, Kehl made a slight mistake when passing the ball forward from the backcourt. The football he passed hit Behrami's body and bounced back, landing right at Higuain's feet. Higuain turned and sent the football forward, passing it to the ribs of Dortmund's defense.
Insigne, who had just come on the field, successfully broke the offside trap, pulled to the ribs to receive the ball, and then, facing Weidenfeller who was attacking, he shot!
The football passed over Weidenfeller's body and flew straight to the far corner of the goal.
When the football was flying in the air, many Dortmund fans' hearts were hanging in their throats.
"This is a great opportunity for Napoli, Insigne—!"
The Italian commentator roared.
Unfortunately, the football shot by Insigne hit the goalpost and then bounced out, then it was kicked out by Sven Bender who had rushed back!
"Aiya!" The Italian commentator held his head in his hands, very regretful. "This may be the closest shot that Napoli has had to the golden goal! Insigne who was just substituted! I don't know if it's because he just came on the field and his feet haven't warmed up yet…"
Insigne's failure to score made Benitez on the sidelines also feel very regretful. He had not been so regretful when Higuain missed that goal before. Now Napoli can be said to be in a "desperate battle", and any goal is crucial.
I wonder if Insigne will feel annoyed afterwards because his shot didn't score?