Walker had seen Ling's interview the day before on Sky Sports, especially the thinly veiled reference to that old bar incident involving Maria, and had immediately become furious.
In reality, his humiliating demotion to the youth team had nothing to do directly with Ling; it was his own behavior.
In fact, he should even thank Ling for physically stopping his foolish, drunken behavior; otherwise, he estimated he'd have spent a good half-month in jail for assault and definitely wouldn't have stayed employed at Manchester City afterward.
But some people always like to blindly blame others for their own massive misfortunes.
Kyle Walker received the ball on the overlap and burst aggressively past Nemanja Matic with sheer pace, but his first touch accuracy at high speed wasn't great.
After pushing it too far ahead of him, Ashley Young stepped up perfectly to clear the danger.
Kyle Walker, fueled by anger, didn't want to lose possession easily, accelerating further and clashing solidly and dangerously with Young.
The ball eventually rolled out of play for a United throw.
"Manchester City's possession play is too extreme, they can't afford the slightest mistake, but the threat it creates when it clicks is equally huge. There are about ten minutes left until halftime," Ling gasped heavily, wiping sweat from his brow during the break in play.
"Huff—everyone, hang in there a bit longer. We have to build an advantage before the whistle."
Manchester United's high-intensity pressing tactics would be incredibly hard to sustain physically in the second half.
And Manchester City was the exact opposite.
Possession play doesn't consume nearly as much stamina for the team on the ball; it can even help recover some energy while making the opponent chase shadows.
Manchester United couldn't afford to drag the 1-1 scoreline out. S
ince they chose to press, they had to press for a lead!
"Skip, you can shift a bit wider to the right, I'll cover the gaps in the middle," Kante hesitated for a moment before speaking up, offering a tactical tweak.
Manchester City's inverted winger strategy, dropping into midfield, made it incredibly difficult for both Herrera and Matic, as they were constantly outnumbered and could only adopt more conservative defensive positions.
This greatly reduced their overall defensive coverage.
So, more aggressive central positioning from Kante was necessary to create higher-intensity pressing traps.
"Good call, N'Golo. Do it," Ling agreed.
...
The match continued.
Manchester City shifted the ball from the wing back to the center.
Fernandinho received possession, with an immediate, panicked warning from De Bruyne behind him.
"Watch out for their number 7!"
Ling closed in rapidly from Fernandinho's blind spot to challenge for the ball.
Even though Fernandinho's intended forward pass was disrupted and deflected by Ling's outstretched foot, it still somewhat accurately reached David Silva in a pocket of space.
Herrera gritted his teeth, fighting through the fatigue, and charged forward, coordinating perfectly with Pogba to double-press the Spaniard.
The "Space Magician" David Silva wanted to shake off the tight marking in a small area with his trademark agility, but he simply wasn't the "Space Magician" of five years ago.
Dragging the ball sideways and then attempting a rapid flick in the opposite direction—the technical idea of the entire move was executed very smoothly in his mind, but unfortunately, his aging legs couldn't physically keep up with it quickly enough.
Age had finally caught up to his turning circle.
Herrera and Pogba closed the trap with a fierce double-team, winning back possession cleanly in the center circle.
Efficiency!
Earlier, Ling had confidently stated in the Sky Sports program. "The answer to solving Manchester City's problem is—efficient pressing and efficient counterattacks!"
At the time, Carragher was somewhat puzzled by the simplicity of the statement.
But when he saw Manchester United's rapid counterattack unfold now, he instantly understood everything.
A counterattack rhythm as beautiful and devastating as a painting.
Kante played a sharp diagonal pass to the dropping Mahrez.
Mahrez laid it off horizontally with one touch to the advancing Pogba, and Pogba instantly threaded a massive, defense-splitting through ball behind the recovering Fernandinho directly into the path of Ling.
The ball carved a lightning-like, pristine path across the green pitch, piercing straight through Manchester City's high-pressing, disorganized formation!
Gary Neville: "Beautiful!!! Absolute perfection!"
Jamie Carragher: "Manchester City will pay the ultimate price for their extreme possession play here!"
Pep Guardiola put down his crossed legs and abruptly stood up in horror, walking to the absolute edge of the coach's technical area.
Fortunately for City, they had set a disciplined offside trap while pressing high.
Otherwise, Ling could have made a direct, central run forward onto the pass.
And the consequence of that would have been a clear through ball for a guaranteed one-on-one with Ederson.
Now, there were still two defenders blocking Ling's direct path to goal—Vincent Kompany and Aymeric Laporte.
Ling received the ball on the turn without the slightest hesitation.
Because he had to pursue maximum attacking efficiency, otherwise Manchester City's rapid midfielders would quickly recover and rebuild their defensive block.
Left or right?
Aymeric Laporte was clearly in poor mental form today, so he chose to attack the right side!
"Ling!" Mahrez quickly moved forward on the overlap, drawing Zinchenko's attention, who desperately wanted to cut inside to support Laporte but couldn't leave his man.
Ling mentally gave the Algerian a thumbs up for the decoy run, then immediately accelerated with terrifying intent directly toward Laporte!
Sudden stop, aggressive change of direction, another sudden stop, another violent change of direction!
Ling performed three consecutive, blindingly fast stop-and-go moves right in front of the penalty area, completely scrambling the out-of-form Laporte's defensive footing!
The defender's mind could process and keep up with Ling's intentions, but his heavy body was far from capable of matching the rapid shifts in momentum.
Coupled with his previously injured right knee, the joint bore forces many times his body weight during the desperate, high-frequency directional changes trying to stay in front of the attacker.
RIP!
Laporte seemed to hear a horrifying tearing sound echo in his own head.
He wanted to tough it out and continue pressing for the crucial tackle to save a goal.
But his knee gave out completely uncontrollably, buckling under his weight and sending him crashing heavily to the ground in a pitiful, agonizing sight.
Ling didn't have time to pay attention to Laporte falling.
Upon reaching the right side of the penalty area, having created the necessary yard of space, he adjusted his footing and unleashed a powerful, driven shot!
Ederson had anticipated Ling to aim for his trademark curling shot to the far post or attempt to slip it through his legs, so he focused his body weight and defense on covering those two most likely areas.
But the ball flew straight and true like a laser toward the absolute top right corner—the near post.
Ederson raised his strong hands at top speed but still couldn't stop the whistling, rising football.
SWISH!!!
With the crisp, deeply satisfying sound of the ball hitting the net, Manchester United took the lead again!
Gary Neville: "Beautiful! Magnificent!"
Jamie Carragher: "The exact same pressing style, forcing another unforced Manchester City mistake in midfield, and scoring another devastating counter-attacking goal!"
Gary Neville: "Both teams absolutely refused to yield an inch from the start, each wanting to dictate and control the match. In the tactical battle and the player contest, Manchester United have ultimately achieved their goal of brutal efficiency!"
Jamie Carragher: "And Ling also displayed his pure physical dominance, with three stop-and-go moves at the edge of the box, completely shaking Laporte off his feet!... Wait. Huh, why hasn't Laporte gotten up yet?"
Neville was about to lavish further praise on Ling's finish when he saw the Manchester City medical staff rushing urgently onto the field with a stretcher.
'Could it be...'
"In basketball, we often call agile players like Allen Iverson, Chris Paul, or Dwyane Wade 'ankle breakers' because their crossover dribbles are so exaggerated and fast that defenders often literally sprain their ankles during sudden changes of direction," Neville didn't take the opportunity to mock the injured player, but continued expressing his feelings soberly.
"There are similar, brutal scenes in football history, like Kaká infamously breaking Walter Samuel's knee with a turn, or Pasquato sending Flamini flying... Antonio Valencia..."
Professional players all carry lingering injuries to some extent, and areas like knee ligaments are incredibly fragile.
Exerting too much unnatural force while off-balance easily leads to catastrophic injury.
Seeing Guardiola's grim, devastated expression on the touchline, the team doctor, after a quick on-field examination of the screaming defender, said worriedly.
"Pep, a conservative estimate is a full ACL tear. We need an immediate MRI scan for specifics, but he definitely, absolutely cannot continue playing today, or likely for the rest of the year."
It had been less than six months since Laporte's last major knee surgery.
Now, with the exact same area severely injured again, even with another successful surgery, it would be incredibly difficult for him to ever return to his previous elite level of mobility.
His career at the top level will undoubtedly be significantly shortened.
Guardiola comforted the weeping Laporte briefly as he was loaded onto the stretcher, before urgently urging John Stones to warm up and enter the fray.
On the field, Ling didn't celebrate excessively after scoring his goal.
He watched Laporte being carried away on the stretcher... feeling genuinely somewhat uneasy inside.
It wasn't out of excessive, guilt-ridden sympathy, but as a fellow professional player, he deeply understood the pure terror of career-altering injuries.
How many generational talents in football have been ruined by their own bodies?
Marco Van Basten, the original Ronaldo, Kaká, Michael Owen... And this horrific incident was directly related to his own aggressive dribbling.
But if Ling had to do it again, he would still make the exact same choice to attack the weakness.
As the saying goes, a player must live up to his professional responsibilities and give everything for the jersey he wears.
Pity has no place on the pitch.
After Aymeric Laporte left the field due to the sickening injury, the sheer, frantic intensity of the match diminished somewhat, as a somber mood fell over the pitch.
The tactical reasons for this were complex.
Since Manchester City, shell-shocked by the loss of their key defender and the goal, did not continue their aggressive, risky attacks, the exhausted Manchester United players were content to drop into a mid-block and take a much-needed breather.
Thus, the remaining time in the half was gradually, safely whittled away by both sides.
BEEP-BEEP!
Soon, the referee blew his whistle twice, signaling the end of a breathless, dramatic first half!
Manchester United 2 - 1 Manchester City!
---------
Read 30 chapters ahead and support me on patreon.
patreon (.)com/Newbietranslator