Chapter 146 An Opportunity

Ralf Rangnick thought his adjustment had negated Klopp's earlier changes, but Klopp didn't necessarily think so. Watching Hoffenheim abandon pressing in the midfield and instead choose to fall back and defend, he sat on the bench, not even shifting in his seat.

Hoffenheim's defensive retreat allowed Nuri Şahin, playing as a defensive midfielder, to move up a bit, and Zhou Yi, already positioned in front of Şahin, moved even further forward, closer to Hoffenheim's penalty area.

Seeing Zhou Yi running forward, Klopp smiled.

In fact, having Zhou Yi act as a transition and playmaker for Şahin wasn't really his forte. But given the circumstances, he was the only one who could do it. Zhou Yi's performance was also really good; he didn't object to the arrangement, but instead seriously completed the task assigned to him.

Facing such a player, it was hard for Klopp not to like him.

But Klopp also knew that having Zhou Yi play as a playmaker was a waste of his talent.

So when he saw Zhou Yi moving further forward, running to the edge of the opponent's penalty area, Klopp's heart was filled with anticipation for Zhou Yi.

This young man was always worth anticipating.

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Faced with Hoffenheim's dense defense, Dortmund didn't really have many solutions, even with Şahin.

Şahin's strength wasn't really passing those extremely penetrating and threatening balls; otherwise, why would he be a defensive midfielder? He was mainly responsible for controlling the team's tempo and making some broad adjustments.

He was slightly lacking when it came to more refined work.

Let's compare him to Mesut Özil, another Turkish player of roughly the same age.

Both were Turkish, but in the end, Şahin chose to play for the Turkish national team, while Özil chose to play for the German national team.

Both were midfielders, but Özil was positioned slightly further forward than Şahin, and could also play as a winger. Özil was more skilled than Şahin in delivering the crucial final pass.

Therefore, Dortmund, with Şahin as their midfield core, would inevitably encounter such a problem—when the opponent fell back to defend, how would Dortmund attack?

That was why Rangnick dared to confidently allow his team to concede space and fall back to defend.

Şahin could only try to find openings in the opponent's defense through lateral passes.

And Hoffenheim paid special attention to maintaining the integrity of their defensive line, precisely to prevent Dortmund from finding openings in this kind of horizontal passing.

So far, they were doing quite well; Dortmund really didn't have any chances.

Zhou Yi also participated in these lateral passes a few times. It wasn't that he didn't want to pass forward, that he didn't want to deliver a penetrating pass, but he couldn't. If he risked doing so, the most likely outcome was that possession would fall into the hands of the opponent.

While constantly passing the ball around, Zhou Yi's head never stopped moving; he was constantly observing the situation and thinking.

This situation of Hoffenheim's dense defense hadn't appeared in the matches he had simulated… After all, in the simulated world, he had always been a starting player, and there was no situation where he came on as a substitute.

It seemed difficult to tear apart the opponent's defense purely by passing.

The team needed a breakthrough player.

After Zhou Yi received the ball, he began to pass the ball more to Großkreutz and Kuba; their dribbling abilities were also limited.

Barrios, who was leading the attack on the front line, wasn't the kind of striker who was good at dribbling either.

At this time, Zhou Yi began to miss Götze.

Götze wasn't fast, but he was an excellent dribbler. If he were on the field, their chemistry could definitely create some opportunities.

But for this match, Götze had stayed in Dortmund and hadn't come to Hoffenheim at all.

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"The opponent's defense is too tight; we need someone who can open up a breakthrough." On the sidelines, Buvac also mentioned this problem.

"Hmm… maybe I should have brought Götze along?" Klopp and Zhou Yi had the same thought.

"It's too late to say that now. Are we going to make a substitution?"

Klopp turned his head and glanced at the bench, then shook his head: "In this situation, I'm afraid there's nothing good to substitute…"

"Then what do we do?" Buvac asked.

"Let them play on the wings more." Klopp shrugged. "Also, we can increase long-range shots appropriately."

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So Dortmund began to focus on the wings, hoping to attract Hoffenheim to shift their defensive focus to the wings through their wing attacks.

But Hoffenheim remained unmoved. They knew that wing attacks would always eventually return to the center, so as long as they defended the center well, that would be enough.

Moreover, Dortmund only had one striker, Barrios, right now, so it was relatively simple to mark him.

In Rangnick's view, this was the aftermath of Klopp's substitution—he had replaced Zidan, a player with outstanding individual ability who could shoot, dribble, and pass, with an unknown nobody who could only make transition passes. Although he had relieved the pressure on Şahin, he had brought Dortmund's attack in the frontcourt to a standstill. Now that Zhou Yi's last bit of usefulness was gone, wasn't this substitution a waste?

Thinking of this, Rangnick smiled slightly and turned his head to look at Dortmund's bench, waiting to see what move Klopp would make next.

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Watching Dortmund's wing play consistently fail to produce good results, Zhou Yi began to consider that the wings might not be a good option. Maybe… Hoffenheim wanted Dortmund to play on the wings?

Wing attacks were very common in football matches and had become a proven and effective attacking routine for many teams. But in reality, in football matches, the center was the most popular area. If possible, all attacking teams would be willing to break through and shoot from the center, rather than going around to the wings.

But at the same time, the defending side was also very aware of this, so they would always stockpile a large number of troops in the center to defend, which was why the attacking side had to choose to play on the wings.

From the very beginning, playing on the wings was a last resort. But since they had to go there, they had to carefully study how to attack on the wings, so various wing attack tactics and routines came into being.

But no matter how fancy the wing play was, the attack eventually had to return to the center, because the goal was in the center.

There were many kinds of central attacks, some through small-scale give-and-go combinations, forcibly breaking through the defense. There were also single players dribbling and breaking into the center single-handedly.

Another very common type of central attack was long-range shots.

Zhou Yi watched everyone passing back and forth, attacking from the left to the right, and then from the right to the left, and suddenly remembered a match.

Why not do that?

Zhou Yi always had some sudden ideas, and then he would be attracted by these ideas.

Now the beast in his heart was stirring, determined to put his ideas into practice.

If it were those mediocre people, they might have been frightened by Zhou Yi's idea long ago—you're just an unknown nobody, it's good enough that you can play, just complete the task the coach gave you honestly, don't do anything out of line! If you easily waste the team's attacking opportunities, then criticism will follow, and all the good performances you've worked so hard to accumulate will be wasted!

But Zhou Yi wouldn't listen to them. He actively ran towards the center and watched his teammates' passes, looking for opportunities.

At the same time, he was constantly observing Hoffenheim's players, and found that they didn't seem to be paying attention to him.

This was a good opportunity…

Just at this time, Großkreutz was having difficulties with the ball on the wing and wanted to cut inside to the center to seek development.

After he cut in, he found that Hoffenheim's defense was still very tight, and there were no loopholes for him. Barrios cut in diagonally forward, but he couldn't pass the ball because there was no passing route, which also caused Barrios to be offside.

As a result, even passing into the penalty area wasn't possible.

At the far end, Kuba was cutting into the penalty area from the wing, but this took time, and Großkreutz wasn't sure whether he could pass accurately. He still wanted to play it safe.

He knew that Hoffenheim was now waiting for a chance to counterattack, and if he easily handed over possession to the opponent, it would also be a blow to their morale.

While hesitating, Großkreutz saw Zhou Yi slowly running towards him.

Seeing Zhou Yi, Großkreutz immediately thought of Zhou Yi's performance in training.

Why not do a combination with him?

Thinking of this, Großkreutz decisively passed the ball to Zhou Yi, and then he suddenly stopped and changed direction, cutting horizontally into Hoffenheim's defense.

At this time, Zhou Yi only needed to pass the ball over the top to the back of the defense, and he could receive the ball.

But if he was too late, he would also be offside like Barrios. If he was too early, the ball would definitely fall into the hands of Hoffenheim's goalkeeper, Hildebrand.

So the timing of the pass was very important.

But Großkreutz wasn't worried about this. He had confidence in Zhou Yi. In training, Zhou Yi had shown them his ability countless times.

This kid could stay in the first team not just because he worked hard in training.

But as he was about to pass through Hoffenheim's defense, he turned his head and glanced at Zhou Yi, and was almost stumbled to the ground in shock!

What did he see?

He saw Zhou Yi swinging his foot at the ball!

Judging from the range of his swing, that was definitely not a lobbing action, but… a shot!

Zhou Yi met the ball passed by Großkreutz and didn't intend to stop it at all, but shot directly!

"A shot?!" Marcel Reif was a little unsure, his voice filled with doubt.

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In fact, not only was Großkreutz surprised, everyone who saw this scene was shocked!

Most of them had only one thought in their heads—this kid was going to shoot directly? Was he crazy?!

Many people seemed to be able to see the scene of the football flying high over the crossbar, across the sky, and onto the stands of the Rhein-Neckar-Arena.

An attacking opportunity was so rashly wasted by a reckless youth!

And Hoffenheim's players' surprise was directly expressed in the fact that when Zhou Yi shot, no one came up to defend him, stop him, or interfere with him. They just watched, letting Zhou Yi curl his right foot!

Of course, Großkreutz's contribution was also there—his sudden cut inside attracted the attention of some of Hoffenheim's defensive players, and they all retreated to defend him, which invisibly widened the gap in front of Zhou Yi…

The football drew an arc, but it didn't fly up. Instead, it skimmed low above the grass, just bypassing the Hoffenheim players in front of the penalty area!

Everyone thought that Zhou Yi's shot must be aimed upwards, including goalkeeper Hildebrand. He had prepared to dive upwards, and his weight had shifted to his near foot, accumulating power.

But when Zhou Yi kicked the ball and it bypassed the Hoffenheim defender in front of him, he was surprised to find that this shot was not a high ball! But was heading towards the far post!

Hildebrand's reaction was really quick. He quickly made adjustments. He moved one step laterally, and his far foot exerted force, pushing his entire body out, reaching out to the football.

At this time, Hoffenheim's fans placed their hopes on this goalkeeper, who had once broken Kahn's record for the longest consecutive scoreless streak in the Bundesliga.

Hoping that he could make a world-class save!

But the football fell to the ground in front of Hildebrand's hand, bounced once, and then shot forward, passed Hildebrand's palm, and flew into the goal behind him!