Chapter 20 Rangnick feels like he has fallen into a cesspool

Chapter 20 Rangnick feels like he has fallen into a cesspool

Chapter 20 Rangnick feels like he has fallen into a cesspool
At the press conference after the game, Li Chen was obviously not as excited as when the game just ended, and he looked a lot more serious.

A group of reporters looked at each other in bewilderment, not knowing why this popular guy suddenly looked so gloomy, causing them to be more restrained in their questions after the game.

After seeing Li Chen's emotional changes, the excitement of Manchester United's players faded a lot, and they thought that their head coach was not very satisfied with the content of today's game.

However, Li Chen quickly used his actions to tell the players on the return bus that his mood changes were not linked to their performance.

The heartfelt praise and the notice of a holiday tomorrow put the Manchester United players at ease, and the atmosphere in the team became hot again.

After returning to the training base, Carrick became the second coach in the Manchester United coaching staff to receive news that the management did not plan to recruit players in the winter window.

"I just wanted to bring up this topic so that the management team could prepare for the market selection in advance, but Ed told me that the management had no plans to recruit players in the winter transfer window at all."

By the time Li Chen sat in the office chair, his mood had calmed down, and he calmly told Sandezi the confirmation information he had received.

Carrick thought it was nonsense at first, but seeing that Li Chen didn't look like he was joking, he couldn't hold it in and burst into swearing!
"Are their heads full of shit?! What do you mean the team is doing well so there is no need for winter transfers? What a bullshit excuse! Can't they see the serious injuries that still exist in the main lineup?!"

Li Chen waved his hand, motioning Carrick to sit down first and not get angry about this.

"You also think this reason is ridiculous, right?"

"This is complete nonsense! I think their brains are all broken!"

"Well... isn't that what they are supposed to do? They just do whatever they want."

When Li Chen said this, Carrick was also stunned.

Isn’t it!?
If the top executives of Manchester United were not mentally ill, they would not have done so many outrageous things over the years, spending so much money and ruining the team.

For a moment, there was silence in the head coach's office.

Li Chen looked at the dark training ground outside the brightly lit office with a calm face, not knowing what he was thinking.

Carrick covered his cheeks with his hands in annoyance. He really didn't have the mood to complain about the management's stupid operations anymore.

After a while, Li Chen asked Carrick to compile a technical analysis report on the available youth players tomorrow, and also help him see if there are any young players returning on loan in this winter window.

Then he asked Carrick to go home and rest first, and send him the sorted information before five o'clock tomorrow afternoon.

Now that things have come to this, there is no need to think about anything more. Just sort out the number of players available and take it one step at a time.

He had no interest in convincing Manchester United's top brass.

If the current senior management were a little more reliable and willing to listen to advice, Solskjaer and even Mourinho would not be dismissed in a hurry.

Thinking of this, Li Chen felt inexplicably relieved.

He is more accepting of the club's technical director who will take office soon than before.

Perhaps, he really needs a technical director who is highly professional and stubborn to stand on the same front with him to put pressure on management.

Even if the pressure fails in the end, at least he will feel better if he can disgust these management personnel.

After pondering for a moment, Li Chen decisively picked up the phone and dialed the private number of the new director that he had asked Sandezi for.

After a while, with a slightly puzzled inquiry, Li Chen and Rangnick, who was about to become Manchester United's technical director, started their first formal conversation before the meeting...

Two days later, accompanied by Woodward and some staff, Rangnick, who had just arrived at Carrington, only had a quick look around the training base and then asked to go directly to the training ground.

The German old man was very energetic and went straight into work mode without even changing his clothes.

On the training ground, beyond Woodward's expectations, he quickly got into a good conversation with Li Chen!
You know, even though the sports director is already an important part of the current club operations, there are still many head coaches who do not want to share power with such managers.

Especially for a young coach like Li Chen who learned from a famous coach of the previous generation, his desire to control the team should be stronger.

However, although the development of things exceeded Woodward's expectations, he is also happy to see that the head coach and technical director, who are destined to interact frequently in the future, can maintain a good relationship.

After formally introducing the two men to each other, Woodward left the rest of the time to the two of them and quickly went off to work on some business collaboration.

Rangnick stayed on the sidelines and watched the entire Manchester United training match, and then went directly to the head coach's office with Li Chen.

"The training content is great! I thought I wouldn't see too many training scenes related to ground control and high pressure, but now it seems that I was worrying too much. You think very long-term, Li, I am very happy that you have the same idea as me to push the team to rebuild."

"Yes, Manchester United has reached a critical point where it needs to be younger and more technical. Too much suppression and cleansing will cause turmoil in the internal locker room, so I plan to use three to four transfer windows to complete the team's replacement. This should be a relatively smooth reconstruction process..."

The two actively exchanged ideas on team building in the office. Even though Rangnick felt that Li Chen's plan was still too cautious and conservative, he had to admit that Li Chen's ideas could indeed stabilize the locker room and the morale of the team.

What made Rangnick even more satisfied was Li Chen's generosity in delegating power in terms of reconstruction and selection.

This is quite rare.

Rangnick thought that he would need to work hard to convince Li Chen in this regard, but he did not expect that Li Chen would be so understanding.

The only requirement is that the players selected subsequently be as young and hardworking as possible, and have the potential for training and transformation.

And this is not a problem at all for Rangnick.

After all, the "Red Bull" players he wanted to bring in were well-known in the football world for their youth, diligence and coaching potential.

The so-called request put forward by Li Chen seemed too reasonable to Rangnick.

After a second detailed conversation with Li Chen, Rangnick's confidence in successfully rebuilding Manchester United increased exponentially!
After all, in his opinion, the most difficult hurdle in rebuilding the team is the head coach.

There are always big differences in the way people think about doing things.

Even if the general idea of ​​the solution to the problem can be agreed upon, there will still be significant differences in ideas when it comes to the specific plan.

Fortunately, Li Chen is very confident in his ability to coach the players in a way that suits their taste and is willing to make more concessions.

This made Rangnick, who was used to coordinating the overall situation and taking on a lot of responsibilities, feel very comfortable.

As for the Manchester United top management.

In his opinion, since Woodward invited him to be the team's technical director so sincerely, he must be willing to delegate power and invest a large amount of money.

The green light for relevant rights must be open all the way, otherwise why invite him over?

Wasting a lot of money in vain? Rangnick thinks that Manchester United's top management was not very reliable before, but now they must have been forced to make changes.

He was not worried about his prospects of working at Manchester United at all. He was full of energy in the next few days, following Li Chen closely and observing the technical level of the current Manchester United players.

There are definitely satisfying aspects.

The training atmosphere of the entire Manchester United team is very hot now, which is of course related to the team's recent winning streak.

The team's mental outlook is very positive and the players are quite confident.

There are still several talented young players in the team, such as Greenwood, Sancho, Rashford and Dalot.

Elanga and Diano, who were promoted from the second team by Li Chen, are also good rotation players in Rangnick's view.

But in comparison, there are too many problems with the team that makes Rangnick dissatisfied.

The two core players in the frontcourt are too old, there are serious injuries in the main lineup, there are quite a few players with "biased" skills, and De Gea's quality of passing the ball from the backcourt is not high enough...

The rigorous Rangnick recorded these questions one by one in his notebook.

On December 12th, Li Chen took B Fee to attend the pre-match press conference of the 15th round of the Premier League.

After arriving in Manchester, Rangnick also took the initiative to find Woodward for the first time to make his initial work report.

He originally thought that such a work report would be conducted in a serious team communication environment.

The result was beyond his expectations. In the end, only two senior Manchester United executives, including Woodward, talked to him.

Woodward and another Manchester United senior executive listened carefully to his work report.

Although I listened, I didn't give any positive feedback or ask any questions. It was as if I was just going through a process with him.

What made him even more dumbfounded was that when Woodward faced the list of signings he gave, he said with a smile that the team had no plans to recruit any players in this winter window.

"No plans to recruit new players?! But the first team is facing injuries now..."

“Lee has solved it, hasn’t he?

Several of the original key players were injured, but now Lee has created a new starting lineup, and I don’t think injuries will be a factor in our path to qualifying for the Champions League.”

"what?

...What about the rejuvenation of the team? Shouldn't we start to change blood and recruit new players as soon as possible?"

"The top management has already discussed this internally. Let's wait until the end of this season before we discuss it. You guys also need enough time to plan for the recruitment, right?"

"But if we don't recruit in the winter window, it will be difficult for us to keep pace in the Premier League and the Champions League with the depth of the team's current bench. If we add injuries to the mix, the team's performance will likely collapse!"

"It's not that exaggerated. If the team had such serious problems, how could we have achieved consecutive victories in recent times?"

"..."

Listening to Woodward's answer, Rangnick, who doesn't like to beat around the bush, can only express his doubts and dissatisfaction with silence.

In the end, this work communication between the two parties ended hastily in a weird atmosphere.

Rangnick felt that the communication failed, but Woodward thought there was no problem. The two were not communicating on the same channel from the beginning!

Rangnick, who was in a confused mood, did not find Li Chen to report the issue that day, fearing that it would affect the team's preparations.

The next afternoon, Rangnick and Woodward set out together and arrived at Brentford's home ground just before the game started.

Manchester United will challenge Brentford away today. Rangnick will also make his first public appearance with Woodward after becoming Manchester United's technical director.

However, facing the frequent attention of the live camera, Rangnick today sat in the box slightly silent and serious, forming a sharp contrast with Woodward who was smiling silly beside him.

The game started at 4 o'clock in the afternoon. Brentford, who kicked off first, took advantage of the home field and launched a direct offensive against Manchester United!

Manchester United, who changed to a 4231 formation today, relied on their solid midfield defense to curb Brentford's tactical intention to grab a head start.

Rashford, who has been training hard with Ronaldo for a week, got the chance to start today.

Li Chen did not let him play in a position he was not used to, and directly arranged for him to start on the left.

In front of him, Ronaldo helps to create offensive space, and behind him, Luke Shaw shares the tactical task of holding the ball and advancing.

Rashford reaped a lot of tactical benefits today. Li Chen also gave him reasonable firing rights and did not force him to act as a supporting role to pass the ball to Ronaldo.

Under such a tactical system, Rashford, who was willing to run, finally regained some of his form.

Apart from other aspects, the moment he got the space and cut inside to shoot was still quite threatening.

Brentford's defensive level is still good, but under Manchester United's repeated attacks on both wings, their side defense line was eventually opened up!
In the 26th minute of the first half, Luke Shaw dribbled forward and Ronaldo suddenly moved to the side, seemingly trying to meet Luke Shaw's move, which directly drew the attention of Brentford's right-back.

At this time, Rashford walked inside and moved his body inward. The moment he burst into speed, Luke Shaw's cross pass arrived as expected!

Rashford, who had obtained Li Chen's permission to shoot before the game, did not hesitate. He dribbled sideways in two steps to make adjustments, and then completed a long-corner shot with a stretched posture before the opponent's central defender could steal the ball!

This is exactly how he scores!
The football was spinning rapidly in the air. Brentford goalkeeper Lesler did not dare to be careless and made a predicted move and jumped in advance!
His long arms finally helped a lot. His outstretched fingertips touched the football at the critical moment, causing it to hit the far post of the goal and bounce back into the penalty area!
But the next moment, Ronaldo, with his clever movement, was on the other side of the goal just in time to meet the ball and block the shot!
The football flew into the half-empty goal without any suspense!
In the box, Woodward smiled triumphantly, looking at Rangnick and clapping his hands vigorously, as if to say:
"Is there anything wrong with what I said? The team is now on the right track. If there really is a problem, how could it have scored goals and won games one after another? You should wait until next year to make a plan for recruiting players, and don't worry about it as soon as you take office!"

Rangnick could only stand up and applaud Manchester United's first goal.

He was indeed happy that Manchester United players were in such a hot state now, but he also felt a little helpless.

Li Chen is excellent in coaching and integrating the team's strength, but this does not mean that Manchester United is fine now!

The point is that he now has even less reason to convince Woodward...

Vaguely, Rangnick had a bad idea in his mind.

Manchester United is still Manchester United, and these senior executives have not changed their thinking at all.

He felt as if he had fallen into a sinkhole!
(End of this chapter)