Chapter Sixty-Six: The Ubiquitous Kanter

N'Golo Kante's presence is a real problem for United's attack.

"Carrick has a long pass! Accurately found Di Maria!! ”

The commentator chanted as Carrick's long ball crossed most of the pitch and landed exactly at Di Maria's feet.

The Argentine hooked the ball off with a stretch of his long leg and beat Leicester City's right-back Danny Simpson, with Di Maria's excellent technique at his feet on full display.

After getting past Danny Simpson, Di Maria habitually glanced at the box and then crossed with his feet.

However, N'Golo Kante didn't know when he would come in and disrupt Di Maria's cross.

N'Golo Kante always seemed to know what positions on the pitch needed him to fill in, and he could be seen everywhere in central midfield.

"Leicester City has risen as a dark horse this season, and there is no doubt that what attracts more attention is the goal-scoring Vardy, or the skilled Mahrez at his feet, or even the goalkeeper Schmeichel who is not inferior to De Gea this season, but in fact, the most indispensable member of Leicester City's squad is actually N'Golo Kante." Andy Grey was full of praise for N'Golo Kante's performance.

Gary Neville in the commentary box also nodded: "After this season, this Frenchman will receive invitations from many big teams, and I don't know who this Makelele-style defensive midfielder will end up with." ”

Although Leicester City have performed well this season, in the eyes of the outside world, a team with little foundation and not very strong financial resources has performed so well, then what awaits them next season will be the dismantling of the squad by the giants.

Leicester City's current squad has several core backbones that have long been eyed by the giants. If this is the transfer window, Leicester City will probably have been sold by the media.

...........

Li Qingshan found Kante to be quite difficult to deal with.

In the 28th minute, Manchester United finally created a one-on-one chance for Li Qingshan to face the central defender through non-stop passing, Li Qingshan easily resisted the turn of Wes Morgan, and then turned the ball sideways, and then he was about to volley hard.

However, just as he picked up his right foot, Kante's innocent black face appeared in front of him, and Kante did not come up to break his ball, but blocked the angle of his shot.

God knows when Kante appeared in front of Li Qingshan's eyes, such a scene has appeared many times, in desperation, Li Qingshan had to give up the idea of forcing the goal, and passed the ball back again, and Manchester United could only reorganize an attack.

In fact, it's not impossible for Li Qingshan to cover his feet, maybe he will be refracted with good luck.

However, it is also possible that the football was blocked by Kante and created a counterattack opportunity for Leicester City, and the previous goal conceded let everyone see Leicester City's counterattack ability, Li Qingshan did not want to take risks, reorganize the attack, reorganize the attack.

Leicester City are now completely back to the defensive, even their two strikers Jamie Vardy and Japanese Shinji Okazaki, especially Shinji Okazaki, who is not playing like a striker at all, Shinji Okazaki is like a defensive midfielder in midfield, running and covering the defense at all costs.

However, Manchester United did not dare to be careless, and Leicester City relied on defensive counterattacks in the shrinking half this season to achieve today's results. Vardy's pace and Riyad Mahrez's precise passing footwork and dribbling made Leicester's counter-attacks razor-sharp. Manchester United had already tasted it before.

finally had a chance to shoot with his feet, but he was forced to give up, Li Qingshan was also a little unwilling, but he thought about it carefully and found that he couldn't do anything with that black boy. He was always in key positions to neutralise United's attacking threat.

There is a limit to the number of threats that can be created in a single game, especially with Leicester narrowing their defence, and the number of times United can threaten the door of Schmeichel's handle is very limited.

In the thirtieth minute, Li Qingshan simply made a long-range shot from the periphery, slightly off the bottom line.

With such a shot, it was already the most sustained shot on goal for Manchester United in the past 30 minutes.

..........

In the forty-third minute, Li Qingshan pulled out of the penalty area to respond.

With Marouane Fellaini out injured, Carrick was offered a start. Despite his defensive toughness and high-altitude interceptions, Carrick is inferior to Fellaini. But the experienced Carrick can provide more help to the team when it comes to controlling the team's tempo.

The pros and cons of who starts Fellaini and Carrick are obvious, it just depends on how to weigh them.

What really affected the attack was Juan Mata's absence.

Rooney is not used to playing on the right side, he is always used to moving closer to the middle, so that Li Qingshan's distribution of the ball in the middle will be squeezed out by Rooney.

This time, the two of them simply ran to the same area.

Li Qingshan took the ball and tried to find a gap on the right, but he looked up and saw that Rooney was next to him.

Ancelotti frowned as well. It seems that the function of wanting Rooney to replace Juan is a bit of a fate. These two are not the same type of players at all.

However, it is still only the first half, and Ancelotti is unlikely to choose to make substitutions to make adjustments, let alone who can he replace?

In that position, United don't have a second Mata.

It seems that only tactical adjustments can be made.

Carlo Ancelotti was already thinking about the second half.

But Li Qingshan was thinking about scoring goals.

After Li Qingshan got the ball, he handed the ball to Rooney and ran forward. Since you can't give it to the wings, it's okay to try to break through in the middle.

Rooney was almost cut off by Drinkwater after taking the ball, and now Rooney is not as explosive as he was a few years ago, so he stopped the ball a little too much and almost lost the ball.

But fortunately, he still controlled the ball, but in this way, Rooney also lost the opportunity to move forward.

Fortunately, Di Maria came to pick him up, and Rooney was relieved when he passed the ball to Di Maria. He was now feeling more and more powerless.

Di Maria did not stop the ball, but sent Li Qingshan a penetrating through ball.

Li Qingshan took the ball and cut to the side of Wes Morgan, and just as he was about to shoot, Kante appeared in front of him again.

Does this kid teleport?

Li Qingshan is going crazy.

However, there was not much time left in the first half, and Li Qingshan decided to go it alone.

Li Qingshan is well aware of his dribbling ability, so he rarely dribbles on the field, but the temptation to face the goalkeeper directly after passing Kante still made him decide to take a risk.