Chapter 167: A 16-Meter Header-Lob and Chelsea Eva's Curse
"Beep!"
"Beep!"
Referee Mark Clattenburg—well, the text uses Taylor—was quite busy; just after dealing with the clash between Xia Qi and Essien, Wenger and Mourinho started squabbling.
He stopped the game, dashed to the touchline and gave each of the two bosses a verbal warning.
After those two skirmishes, the derby atmosphere thickened; every touch by an Arsenal player was met with frantic boos.
The tension between players rose, and physical contact became more frequent.
On the pitch,
Chelsea's Willian threw the ball in from the sideline.
Oscar trapped the ball on his chest, before he could turn and pass he was already on the ground and the ball was stolen by Cazorla.
Amid the roar of "Foul!" and "Yellow card!" at Stamford Bridge, the referee Taylor pushed his hands forward to indicate no foul and play on.
Instantly, boos rose up, and shouts of "biased ref!" came flooding in…
After Cazorla intercepted, worried Oscar might counter-press, he played the ball away on the next touch and it reached Gnabry.
Gnabry galloped down the right flank,
…
…
Frank Lampard in Mourinho's second spell was a major issue.
In Mourinho's defensive system everyone has to defend; that's the first rule for Mourinho's disciples.
But in his second spell Lampard, influenced by his previous manager, was no longer the box-to-box midfielder; he was stronger in attack and weak in defense, almost leaving a lane for Gnabry to get through.
There was no choice—veteran Michael Essien silently shouldered much of the work.
However, Gnabry, facing Essien, got a little cocky; after a simple change of direction he attempted to burst past Essien on the left.
The not-yet-dull veteran Essien wouldn't let that happen; like lightning he poked left and struck the ball cleanly.
Mourinho-era Lampard's defensive attributes had declined, but his attacking skills were still top-tier.
He seemed to have anticipated it, arriving closer to the ball than Kevin De Bruyne and getting the ball first. He immediately combined with Oscar in the middle with a quick one-two, perfectly shaking off De Bruyne's pressure.
At that moment, Gustavo, who had been hiding behind Hazard, suddenly surged out from an angle and faked a "I'm going to get the ball" move,
scaring Lampard who naturally passed to the unmarked Hazard.
Gustavo had been waiting for that and happily stuck his foot in to intercept,
but he overestimated his defensive attribute and underestimated Lampard's attacking quality.
Lampard had indeed fallen for the trap, but his attacking stats were high!
The ball traced a C-shaped arc across the turf, barely grazing Gustavo's toes as it was played through.
Gustavo's attempted trick backfired.
The dribbling king (Hazard) received the ball, quickly cut inside, and in the blink of an eye burst into the Arsenal box.
Aurier dashed forward to block, Mertesacker shouted to Umtiti, "I've got it," while pointing at Torres,
reminding Umtiti to be ready to mark Torres one-on-one. He himself charged at Hazard to help double-team the dribbling king.
Hazard's dribbling, like Yossi's, uses short quick touches. Facing Mertesacker and Aurier pinching left and right,
he alternated feet to feint and pull the ball—an exquisitely skillful move—slipping between the two.
"Like a fried meatball!"
"Hazard slips past the defenders, Arsenal are in danger!"
In an instant,
Arsenal's box was leaking; Umtiti could no longer keep an eye on Torres and had to chase Hazard.
Hazard, who doesn't eat hamburgers, is indeed world-class number three.
As Umtiti closed in, Hazard suddenly braked and shifted direction, gliding past Umtiti like a fish in water.
Braking and changing direction looks simple but is not easy to execute—the best at it is Yossi, with a low center of gravity and stable base. Hazard is tall, so to do it so smoothly shows he's in a different league.
Just as Hazard brushed past Umtiti, Arsenal goalkeeper Martinez came rushing out aggressively, trying to block Hazard's shooting angle and narrow his space.
Hazard quickly assessed and instead slid the ball across; it reached Torres at the near post.
Torres sprinted through the middle and, as he planted and prepared to shoot,
a black shadow flicked at his feet and the ball was hooked away.
"Hazard got past another man, Martinez has come off his line! Pass! Torres!!"
"Chance! A glorious chance!"
"Shoot…oh!"
"Beautiful!!"
"Gustavo chased back and hooked the ball out for a corner."
"Home-side Chelsea almost scored first! Gustavo saved the day! What a resolute defense!"
Arsenal fans in the stadium and watching on TV all let out nervous breaths; though the ball was cleared for a corner, their hearts were still pounding wildly.
On the pitch, Martinez immediately pulled Gustavo to his feet and gave him a big hug; other players ran over to slap hands in celebration.
Wenger stood on the touchline clapping, his face still showing the relief of escaping near disaster.
Mourinho, pacing and terse, waved his arms angrily at the touchline—muttering, his lip reading suggested F-word invective.
Play resumed.
Lampard took the corner; Martinez punched with one hand.
The ball flew out of the box; Essien was about to meet it with an overhead clearance when De Bruyne suddenly burst out, getting in front of Essien and flicking a toe.
The ball vaulted from Arsenal's half into Chelsea's half.
Balotelli leapt at the circle and chest-trapped, but was robbed by the two-on-one of Terry and curly-haired Luiz, who ruthlessly won the ball.
De Bruyne's inspired pass came to nothing.
De Bruyne, dissatisfied, pounded his chest and yelled toward the Chelsea bench like a raging king.
Mourinho gave an awkward smile and turned his head away…
Afterward, the two sides entered a grinding, all-over tussle—nearly ten minutes without a single shot on goal.
Destruction was the theme on the pitch;
players were either breaking up attacks or on their way to break up attacks…
In the 25th minute, De Bruyne finally capitalized on a Chelsea mistake and sent a ball into Chelsea's box.
But the delivery had no designated target,
so chaos reigned in front of Chelsea's goal—people headed it, everyone headed it; the ball was flicked from left to right, from right to the middle.
In short: utter chaos!
Chelsea fans watched with white-knuckled hearts; some hurriedly dug out quick-acting heart pills.
Xia Qi finally realized the gap between him and Al; under Terry's disruption, the header that should have been a headed shot was flicked off target.
If this had been an automated game system, that mis-heading wouldn't have happened.
After the frantic scramble, Chelsea still had the numbers advantage; Luiz headed the ball out of the box.
At the edge of the arc, Essien crouched, drawing his bow to launch a counterattack.
But—
Luiz's header was not very high, and it was on a flat trajectory. The moment it left the box,
Xia Qi suddenly burst from an angle, stepping on the edge of the penalty area and leaping high, like a second-kick firecracker popping straight up, like a sea lion leaping from the water—using the crown of his head to meet the ball.
"A headed lob!"
The ball traced a high parabolic arc, like half a McDonald's arch, falling toward Chelsea's goal.
Chelsea goalkeeper Petr Čech shuffled his feet on the goal line then leaped up—but still couldn't reach the ball.
The ball grazed the underside of the crossbar behind him and fell into the net.
"Goal!"
"Čech leapt too early—his timing was off."
"This was a very difficult save—almost a lob at the limit."
"Xia Qi's headed lob from 16 meters; the assist came from Chelsea's David Luiz."
"Xia Qi's header-lob was spectacular, but more miraculous is how he got there—how did Terry miss him?"
"This is what we call goalmouth instinct and off-the-ball movement…"
Inside Chelsea's box, every player glared at Terry like iron-faced men.
Chelsea's captain could only shrug helplessly, hands up—tired. Xia Qi was even harder to handle than last season; a moment's lapse and he'd scored again.
Last season it was ferocious; tonight it's slippery!
Xia Qi watched the ball slip through Čech's outstretched fingertips into the net, then rushed to the corner flag and slid to his knees.
This was truly a Premier League first goal.
No wonder he was ecstatic!
De Bruyne and Balotelli slid in behind him; the three of them formed a triangular formation at the corner flag, arms folded across their chests…
After the pose, De Bruyne put an arm around Xia Qi's shoulder as they walked back, saying, "I was already getting back to defend and I saw you burst out of the crowd…"
Balotelli took credit, "I distracted the big-haired one so his header clearance looked like a pass…"
Xia Qi put an arm around Balotelli's shoulder: "We're brothers—one lures them, one finishes. Everyone shares the war medals."
Clear words—every teammate gathered felt proud.
The whistle blew, Chelsea kicked off.
Torres passed to Oscar, Oscar fed Hazard.
Hazard was Chelsea's big-name; his left flank was Chelsea's main attacking channel.
One goal down, Chelsea threw everyone forward!
Ivanović arrived at the far post, took the ball and surged forward.
After two wall passes with Hazard he advanced to Arsenal's left corner of the box.
Hazard slid the ball to Oscar; Oscar "no-look" passed a diagonal through ball, Torres continued into the box and struck a powerful shot.
Martinez quickly dived across, but at the moment Torres struck,
Arsenal left-back Luke Shaw bravely put both hands behind his back to block with his body.
Brave it was,
but
it actually made things worse.
Luckily for Arsenal, they had a slice of luck tonight.
The ball bounced back to the middle and Mertesacker won the first header.
The ball flew to De Bruyne.
De Bruyne launched another "east wind missile," the ball shot from Arsenal's backline into the front.
In Arsenal's front third,
Balotelli sprinted at full throttle toward the ball, readied and fired a volley.
Terry,
ignoring danger, threw himself toward the ball without hesitation.
But Balotelli's shot had a slight arc and skimmed past Terry's left side.
Čech stretched in a desperate dive; the ball barely slid past his outstretched fingers, and as Čech despaired,
a thunderous sound came from behind: "Boom!"
For Chelsea that was like heavenly music. But Chelsea fans, with a godlike vantage, all shouted at once: "Danger!" "Watch Xia Qi!"
Under their eyes, Xia Qi charged toward the rebounding ball…
Luiz, alerted by the fans, turned to see Xia Qi sprinting toward him and, without thinking, grabbed Xia Qi's arm.
It was a subconscious action—if Luiz raced Xia Qi for speed, his sixth sense told him he'd lose possession.
If that happened, of course it would be a free kick in the attacking third—though that spot was dangerous too.
Sure enough,
the referee's whistle sounded; Taylor ran up to Luiz and showed him a yellow card, then took a spray from behind his back to mark the free-kick spot.
As he ran back to the field,
it turned out Terry's collision with Balotelli had been heavy.
Because he and Xia Qi were teammates training together every day, and Balotelli—sturdy as a bull—didn't crumble like in another timeline; training with Xia Qi made him even more like a bear than a bull.
Terry felt he'd hit a wall; he sat on the ground rubbing his chest hard and gasping for breath.
Referee Taylor saw him not getting up and with play halted he ran over to check.
Chelsea's club physio was the most famous beautiful team doctor in Premier League history—extraordinarily good-looking and with a perfect figure. Her name was Eva.
She had been romantically linked with many players and was dubbed by fans "football's Ma Rong" (a notorious tabloid reference).
At this moment she sprinted onto the pitch with a medical kit like lightning.
By the rules, team doctors must obtain the referee's permission before entering the pitch.
In practice, if a player appears to be in an emergency and for player safety, team doctors sometimes race in without waiting for permission.
Over time a tacit rule formed: if a team doctor enters the pitch without permission the player must come off. Of course you can break this tacit rule,
but you'll be carded and the club will be fined.
Now Terry was embarrassed!
He had only collided hard and needed a moment to catch his breath—not to be subbed off for treatment—but Eva had already entered the pitch. What could he do?
He could only go down with team doctor Eva—after all, he couldn't stand by and watch the beautiful woman he'd been involved with be sent off.
At this moment Arsenal had a free-kick on the left side of the big box; Terry coming off for treatment meant Chelsea would be a man short when Arsenal took the free kick.
And he was a defensive specialist—how could Mourinho, who demands perfection, allow such a foolish thing to happen??
When Eva left the pitch, Mourinho angrily cursed at her: "You filthy bitch, get out of here, this is fucking ridiculous!"
After the match Mourinho started to blacklist Eva, banning her from Chelsea's substitutes' bench in future games.
Eva, as a Premier League internet-famous team doctor ( Eva became a top PL team doctor in 2011—not for medical skill but for scandals), was not someone who would take that lying down.
Eva fought back—court cases, the media, feminism… from time to time explicit photos with Chelsea players leaked.
Affairs like this can be done but not spoken of; when Eva struck back like this, the players' private lives burned, the squad's training and focus plummeted,
and Chelsea's results tumbled accordingly. The media dubbed it "Eva's curse."
That's a story for later—skip it for now…
Back on the pitch, De Bruyne stepped up to take the free kick. From this position it could be struck directly at goal, and the wall was missing a key aerial man…
(END CHAPTER)
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