Chapter 93: The Little Cows in the Team (3)

  No matter what, Wang Jia-yu's mediocre physical condition will still limit his growth. Fortunately, the organizational type of back waist does not have too high a requirement for physical quality, and the only relatively high requirement is physical strength. With Wang Jia-yu's non-defective body and young age, it can be completely practiced. In comparison, it is the relatively low emotional intelligence that is the main limiting factor for Wang Jia-yu's growth. This is why he cannot reach the same height as Wu Qiu-wei in either history or this time-space...

  Certain positions on the football field do not have high requirements for physical fitness, but there are also several core positions that have strict requirements for physical fitness. Among them, the central defender position is particularly special. Even if it's a so-called technical central defender, if the necessary physical qualities are not up to standard, they will still be unable to perform the role.

  Moreover, unlike other positions, one of the physical qualities required for a central defender is difficult to improve through hard work, and that is height. Just like Gao Lin's example, it's unknown whether it's fate or not, but in the history of Dongfang team, there was an unusually short central defender named "Bai Jiajun". This player had all the potential to become a world-class central defender in other aspects, but his height was only 1.63 meters (the registered data of 1.65 meters was self-reported by him)......

  Although technology, consciousness and bounce can compensate for the lack of height to a certain extent, there is still a limit. The most successful shortstop in the history of world football, Cannavaro, also has a height of 1.75 meters. If he only had a height of 1.63 meters, he would have been abused by various airmen on the field long ago...

  In fact, Bai Jiajun was also temporarily let go to play as a right-back in the team due to a lack of players at the time, but unexpectedly performed well and became the core of the team's defense during the China League One period. After being loaned out to Shanghai SIPG for the second half of the season when the team was promoted to the Chinese Super League, the average number of goals conceded by the team per game more than doubled, which fully shows Bai Jiajun's "stabilizing" role in the team's defense line. Even the "White Witch Doctor" Trusier, who has always been picky about players, praised him for his perfect performance in the game after coming to China to coach.

  Bai Jiajun has an extremely fast recovery speed and a surprisingly high one-on-one interception success rate, which is not possessed by most central defenders. As a result, when the Oriental team controls the ball and attacks, they can minimize the threat of quick counterattacks from their opponents. At the same time, the Oriental team's pressing tactics in the frontcourt also made it impossible for their opponents to directly launch high balls to attack Bai Jiajun's height disadvantage, largely achieving the effect of "making the best use of one's talents and avoiding one's weaknesses". Therefore, Bai Jiajun's performance in that half season was nearly perfect.

  However, after Dongfang team entered the Super League, they no longer had the strength to suppress their opponents and often had to play defensive counterattacks. In this way, Bai Jiajun's height weakness would be infinitely magnified. Although he has accurate prediction, super-fast reaction speed and movement frequency, plus his sturdy physique, excellent defensive skills and tough playing style, which makes him often able to thoroughly defend against opponents who are 10-20 cm taller than him through proactive defense in mobile warfare, including some powerful foreign forwards worth over one million euros. However, this trick is useless in defending set pieces, and the Super League matches will definitely give the opponent more opportunities for set pieces than the China League One, so if Bai Jiajun continues to play as a center-back, he will absolutely become a major hidden danger on the team's backline.

  At that time, Coach Xu was preparing to let Bai Jiajun return to his old position as a left-back after returning to the team. However, due to Bai's poor physical condition and attacking ability not being as good as Wang Shuang and another left-back Li Yunqiu, he could only be a substitute in this position. This was unacceptable for Bai, who had previously been the core of Dongfang's defense for half a season and quickly became a mainstay after being loaned to Shanghai SIPG. After experiencing the hustle and bustle of the big city, Bai Jiajun could no longer tolerate the loneliness and low salary level of Dongfang, and eventually transferred to Shanghai SIPG. Because he insisted on leaving, Coach Xu, who was usually softhearted, even let him go without receiving a transfer fee from Shanghai SIPG...

  After joining the Shanghai team, Bai Jiajun had a stable main position and a thick salary on paper, but he quickly fell into the then chaotic Shanghai team like a big dye vat. In less than two years, he became ordinary among many people, although he could still play as a main player, those rare characteristics of his among domestic players were basically gone...

  But to be honest, even if Bai Jiajun didn't fall like in history, he would still find it difficult to become a top-level domestic player who can go down in Chinese football history as a full-back, because his muscle type is quite special, with high proportion of white muscles (most yellow people are dominated by red muscles, having better endurance but insufficient explosive force), so endurance is hard to train out, and a full-back without abundant physical energy to support frequent runs up and down the pitch is basically incompetent.

  In addition, Bai Jiajun's attacking ability is not as good as his defensive talent, and the responsibility of a full-back requires a lot of attacking, so if Bai Jiajun plays as a full-back, his growth space will be very limited and he won't be able to make an impression on Gao Jun like he did when he played as a center back.

  In addition, in the next decade, Chinese football will encounter an unprecedented shortage of central defenders. Later, even Zhang Linpeng, who was not suitable for playing as a central defender, was forced to develop in this direction due to the team's needs, and thus basically lost his hope of going to Europe to play football. Because at that time he over-pursued a powerful physique, resulting in a significant decline in speed and physical fitness, making it impossible to meet the requirements of the top five European leagues for full-backs...

  After Gao Jun crossed over and met Bai Jiajun, who was still very young at the time, he still hoped that he would develop into a central defender, because his talent in all aspects was more suitable for playing as a centre-back rather than a full-back. In particular, his muscle type, which was mainly composed of white muscles, gave him extremely rare explosive power among Chinese people, as well as amazing starting speed and jumping ability, which were very important for a central defender. The lack of aerobic endurance that came with it had little impact on this position, and even if we don't consider his technical and conscious talents, he was born to play as a centre-back.