While Chinese fans were looking forward to a bright future, the game had long since resumed.

Trailing by two goals, Australia was unwilling to accept defeat and hoped to tie the score in the remaining twenty minutes.

They launched an all-out attack on China's goal.

Faced with Australia's onslaught, the Chinese team chose to retreat across the board to defend. They made full use of the defense composed of Zhou Yi, Yang Muge, Guo Nu, and Sun Pan to resist Australia's attack.

At the same time, Gao Hongbo also made a substitution, replacing striker Gao Lin with defensive midfielder Yang Hao to further strengthen the midfield defense. Only He Ying was left in front.

With comprehensive technical abilities and outstanding speed, He Ying was indeed the most suitable candidate for this kind of defensive counterattack. His individual combat ability was very strong, and he didn't need the support and cooperation of his teammates. He could still dribble straight to the opponent's goal. Even if he couldn't score, he could try to keep the ball at his feet for as long as possible to consume game time and wear down the opponent's morale.

Of course, all this was on the premise that He Ying was in good form. If he wasn't, he would lose the ball as soon as he got it, and he wouldn't be able to play any role.

Fortunately, He Ying was in surprisingly good form today for some reason.

After scoring two goals, he could pass, dribble, break through, and shoot. If all else failed, he could protect the ball and stall for nearly ten seconds. Anyway, he was like a troublemaker in the frontcourt, constantly creating problems for Australia's defense and preventing them from attacking with all their strength.

In this situation, Australia could only choose the simplest offensive method, which was to cross from the wings.

But this was not a big threat to China's defense.

In addition to Guo Nu, the Chinese team also had a goalkeeper with a wide range of activity, Sun Pan. Guo Nu's height disadvantage was compensated by Sun Pan's high jumps and outstretched arms.

Several times, Australia's crosses from the wings, as long as they were slightly closer to the goal, were picked off by Sun Pan with a loud shout of "I've got it!"...

If they didn't go down the wings and wanted to organize an attack through the middle, they would face a midfield defense composed of Zhou Yi, Yang Muge, and Yang Hao.

It was extremely difficult and inefficient to break through this line of defense.

Once possession fell to China, it was Australia's nightmare. Under Zhou Yi's leadership, the entire Chinese team, including goalkeeper Sun Pan, would participate in the "passing game" that they hated so much.

The image of passing the ball around has never been very good in the minds of Chinese fans, who believe that it is a concrete manifestation of players' lack of initiative and lack of offensive ideas. But since Barcelona's success, everyone is now much more accepting of this kind of back-and-forth passing in the midfield and backfield.

But the most important thing is the current Chinese team. Passing the ball around is their tactic to consume time when they have the advantage. From the perspective of Chinese fans, they don't care whether it is negative or ugly, as long as it is conducive to winning the game, they support it.

So when the Chinese team passed the ball around, cheers rang out in the stands of the Zhuque Stadium. The cheers would sound every time the Chinese team successfully passed the ball, and would continue until the Chinese team finished passing the ball around, or the possession changed hands.

Honestly, from a neutral point of view, the Chinese team was playing very rascally, using their superior ball control ability to delay time.

But the Chinese team is the representative of Chinese national football and only needs to be responsible to Chinese fans. How many Chinese fans would stand on a "neutral" position when watching the national team's games? So it is meaningless to consider the reaction of neutrals.

Who told the opponent's passing and control ability to be inferior to that of the Chinese team?

Australia, whose passing and control ability was inferior to that of the Chinese team, became a little angry in the end, and their movements became more and more exaggerated in the pressing.

Two Australian players received yellow cards within five minutes, one on Zhou Yi and the other on He Ying.

It is normal to foul Zhou Yi, because he is the core of the Chinese team's passing and control style.

He Ying's yellow card was because he took the ball to the Australian half, away from the Chinese penalty area. Since there was no chance to directly threaten the Australian goal, and there were no teammates coming up to meet him, he simply took the ball to the corner flag, and then protected the ball and blatantly delayed time.

This is completely in accordance with the rules. If he can keep the ball under his feet until the end of the game, the referee cannot call him for a foul. Football is different from basketball. Basketball has a twenty-four-second rule for offense, and there is also a restriction that you cannot stay under the opponent's basket for more than three seconds. There is also a requirement that an offensive player must pass, shoot, or dribble within five seconds in a closely guarded state.

In short, basketball players cannot hold the ball with both hands and protect the ball without moving on the court.

But football has no such regulations.

Therefore, when it is necessary to delay time, you can often see offensive players taking the ball to the opponent's corner area, and then protecting the ball without moving.

And the defending side, if they can't break the ball with conventional means, then they will definitely not watch the offensive players "act rascally" like this. They will often take a foul to get the game back on track.

He Ying caused an Australian player to receive a yellow card for this reason.

With twenty minutes left in the game, the Chinese team began to consume time like this. It can be said that the Chinese team was playing negatively, but this was a normal tactic to pursue victory. Standing on the side of the Chinese team's supporters, no one would accuse them. Only the Australian commentators were constantly protesting loudly: "The Chinese team has no sportsmanship. This negative attitude makes the game simply unwatchable!"

Nonsense, as an Australian, of course they hope that the Chinese team can press out and fight them head-on. It would be best if even the center backs crossed the center line and the goalkeeper rushed out of the penalty area, so that Australia could directly score into an empty goal. But if the Chinese team really actively attacked, they would definitely not receive positive comments such as "brave" and "gentlemanly," but would only be scolded as "having water in their heads."

This is not the time to discuss the Olympic spirit. Winning and getting three points is the only hard truth.

Faced with the aggressive movements of the Australian players, the Chinese players frequently fell to the ground, and the referee Hassan's whistle continued to sound. The game was always interrupted. This game was not good at all, but the Chinese fans didn't care about this. It didn't matter whether it was good or not, winning was enough.

Moreover, the fans in Xi'an didn't care about the scene. As long as there was physical contact between Chinese and Australian players, and then someone fell to the ground, deafening "fuck your mother" would sound in the stands. The scene was really spectacular.

Zhou Yi fell the most, on the one hand because he was the most frequent target of the Australian players' infringements, and on the other hand because his body was not strong enough, and he was indeed prone to losing his balance and falling to the ground during the opponent's deliberate collisions.

However, although his falling movements were very exaggerated and looked frightening, in fact he was not seriously injured, because he knew how to protect himself.

Of course, this self-protection of his, in the eyes of Australian players and supporters, was a blatant "dive."

The commentators on Australian television almost always angrily denounced Zhou Yi as a vile diving clown and a representative of poor sportsmanship every time Zhou Yi fell.

But no matter how angrily he accused, it could not change the reality that the Australian players did not have the advantage on the field.

Before this game, the impression of Chinese football among many Australian fans may have still remained in the past, in the dark history of Chinese football's weakness. Regarding the Chinese team's runner-up finish in the Asian Cup, they were more willing to believe that the Chinese team had just had a lucky run. Regarding the Chinese Olympic team's gold medal at the Olympic Games, they were more willing to believe that it was a chicken rib competition that the world's football powers did not value, and at the same time, the Chinese must have taken drugs.

They refused to accept the fact that the Chinese team had gradually become stronger, so those stubborn, arrogant, and conceited Australians had their worldviews completely destroyed in this game.

Of course, the hardliners would not admit this because of this one game.

They would still think that the reason why the Chinese team was able to win at home was because the referee helped. Otherwise, so many dives would have already resulted in several people being sent off. Looking at Hassan's penalty in this game, it was obviously biased towards the Chinese team. Isn't China rich now? They must have spent a lot of money to bribe the entire referee team to make them make penalties that were biased towards the Chinese team in the game.

This guess really made Australian fans very unhappy. Originally, after China's rise, surpassing Japan in economic aggregate to become the world's second largest economy, made many developed countries unhappy with China, and Australia was one of them. In Australia, there is a popular basis for the uglification and discrimination against China.

Football is a war without gunpowder, which can often amplify this kind of civil hostility.

Finally, when the referee Hassan blew the whistle to end the game, the Chinese team defeated Australia 2-0 at home. While taking three points, they also kicked Australia into hell.

The Zhuque Stadium turned from a volcano into an ocean of joy.

The Australian fans gritted their teeth and looked forward to the game against the Chinese team after returning to Australia. They would definitely teach the Chinese how to behave on their own territory. At that time, there will be no West Asian black whistle to help the Chinese team!