Chapter 22: Charging into the Semifinals

  Rush to the top on Monday, seeking recommendation votes and member clicks ^_^

  At this time, Hao Jiamin showed off his dribbling skills, using continuous fake movements to shake off the opponent's defense and successfully getting past them. The opponent's other central defender rushed over to block his passing angle, but Hao Jiamin then sent a beautiful arcing pass over his head. Yu Hai, who was sprinting into the penalty area at high speed, jumped up like an eagle spreading its wings, while the opposing full-back, who was following him, was unable to make an effective defensive play due to a height difference of more than 10 centimeters, and could only watch as Yu Hai headed the ball into his own net. The Chinese team took the lead again in their fourth match of this tournament, going up 1-0!

  Only 3 minutes later, Hao Haidong repeated his old trick again, but the Costa Rican team, who had already learned a lesson, sandwiched Yu Hai with their central defender and side defender. Yu Hai barely pushed the ball back to the middle road, and Gao Lin, who had just retreated, timely inserted the ball and took it away. In the first time, he accurately pushed the ball into the lower left corner of the opponent's goal, China 2:0 lead!

  In the 28th minute of the first half, Hao Haidong started again on the wing, but under Costa Rica's tight defense, Yu Hai was unable to get through. In the midst of mutual interference, two defenders from the opposing team also failed to clear the ball, which floated towards the back post. At this time, Jiang Chen, a Chinese striker who had already scored three goals in this tournament, used his superior strength to push away the opponent's defender, chest-trapped the ball and shot it into the net with great force, helping China take a 3-0 lead. What a dream start!

  At this time, even the Costa Rican players felt a little desperate, but the Chinese defender continued the glorious tradition of "friendship first, competition second" and actively sent a big gift. In this game, Lang Zhen, who replaced the suspended main central defender Cai Xi, faced the pressure from the Costa Rican forward and did not choose to quickly pass the ball, but instead tried to rely on his mediocre skills to shake off the opponent. As a result, he was robbed of the ball by the quick-witted opponent's forward, who then used his speed to get past Zeng Cheng and score an empty goal, tying the score at 3:1. Liu Chunming on the sidelines was furious and jumped up in anger.

  Just 2 minutes later, another central defender made a mistake and was caught by the Costa Rican team, who scored again to make it 3-2. The advantage that China's frontcourt players had gained earlier was almost completely lost in an instant...

  But just as the national youth team's head coach Liu Chunming was frantically preparing to substitute another defender to preserve the victory, Gao Jun began his own brilliant performance.

  At this point in the game, Gao Jun had noticed that Costa Rica was playing very civilized (the team historically won the Fair Play Award at this World Youth Championship), and even when they were three goals behind, there were no rough movements, so he decided to try out the results of his hard training over the past three years...

  "What a beautiful fake move!", the live commentator suddenly exclaimed, including him, no one thought that Gao Jun, who had previously been basically kicking the ball out and rarely even touching it, would actually dribble past opponents on his own. However, while the first guy he faked out could be said to have been careless, continuing to fake out a second and third opponent was enough to show off Gao Jun's excellent ball control skills. And in the end, his shot maintained its previous high standard, facing the charging goalkeeper, he made a light and quick push shot that directly penetrated two defenders...

  After discovering that Gao Lin's breakthrough ability was not weak, the Costa Rican team's head coach had to send out another defender to defend against him. However, this made the empty space in other areas even larger, especially on both sides of the field which were completely opened up by the Chinese team. In the 71st minute, Yu Hai broke through two opponents and passed the ball to the bottom, where Hou Jiamin, who was making a run from the far side, volleyed the ball into the net, expanding the score to 5:2!

  In the 79th minute, Li Benjian's free kick caused a scramble in the opponent's penalty area, and Gao Jun shot amidst the chaos, expanding the score to 6:2!

  Although the Costa Rican team is not weak, the psychological quality of the young players is far from that of adults. After losing to this extent, the team's psychology has completely collapsed. In the final moments of the game, Hao Jiemin took advantage of the opponent's defensive disarray and scored a brilliant goal, locking in the final score at 7:2! The Chinese team proudly advances to the semi-finals!

  After China surprisingly swept aside a not-weak Costa Rica, their dark horse status was finally confirmed, but most people still think they have reached the end of the road in this tournament because their next opponent will be Brazil, the number one favorite to win.

  But even if they stopped at the top four, this Chinese national youth team still created the best result for a Chinese national youth team in the World Youth Championship. As a result, not only did many well-known domestic sports newspapers send reporters to Finland, but even CCTV Sports Channel also sent someone to contact the Finnish side about broadcasting matters. However, although an agreement was reached, due to time constraints, it was no longer possible to broadcast live the semifinal match that the Chinese team participated in. Fortunately, regardless of whether they won or lost in the semifinals, there would still be another match afterwards, and that one could still be guaranteed to be broadcast live.

  At this time, Liu Chunming did fulfill the responsibility that a head coach should have. He unceremoniously blocked all those reporters outside, allowing the team to focus on preparing for the next match, which gave Gao Jun some confidence for the next game.

  However, this Brazilian youth team is indeed very strong. Although there are no future football superstars among them, the team's tactical coordination is very smooth and their defensive system is quite good. In fact, historically, it is often such a Brazilian team that is the most terrifying. In fact, this Brazilian team may be the strongest 17-year-old Brazilian youth team in history, just look at their impressive record in history.

  However, in the youth competition where the maximum age of players is not more than 17 years old, the gap between countries is far less than that of adult teams, and the performance is also more unstable, so there are still opportunities for upsets, especially now that the team has a second-generation player like Gao Jun as the core of the team's offense.

  Beijing time on August 27, 2003, the FIFA U-17 World Youth Football Championship entered its ninth match day, starting the semi-finals competition. The match between Brazil and China was held at the Ratina Stadium in Tampere, southwestern Finland, with an audience of 7,675 people watching the game live.

  Only 3 minutes into the game, China's team, still confident from their previous victory, created a scoring opportunity. Zhang Chenglin made a bold assist to the front of the field and received a pass from teammate Li Chunyu 30 meters away from the goal. He suddenly shot a cold arrow, but Brazilian goalkeeper Bruno was highly concentrated and jumped up to block the ball with his arm.