In the 21st round of the Chinese Super League, Wuhan Sanzhen, as the current champions, experienced a not so easy victory at home, defeating Henan 4-2. From the course of the match, what should have been a 4-0 win turned into a 4-2 victory for Wuhan Sanzhen, and the two goals conceded seemed to reveal the inadequacy of Wuhan Sanzhen's goal-line performance, as national team player Liu Dengzheng gave away two excellent chances, but failed to make the saves that led to the two goals being conceded. What's more, the two shots were of average quality and not very fast, but Liu watched the ball go into the net.
On the offensive end, Wuhan Sanzhen became stronger and stronger, getting rid of the wave of shots that led to a 1-2 loss to Zhejiang in the last round. Facing the relegated Henan team, Wuhan Sanzhen coach Gao began to use the 4231 system, Aziz returned to the starting lineup, playing center forward, Xie Pengfei, Yan Dinghao, Tao Qianglong partnering the three forwards, Stanchu, He Chao partnering the double midfielder, Jiang Zhipeng, Renhang, He Habit, Deng Hanwen partnering the four defenders, goalkeeper Liu Dianzha, Malcolm, Davidson, Duan Liuyu, Li Yang, Zhang Xiaobin 5 substitutes.
Wuhan's Three Towns took full advantage of their home field and lineup to break the deadlock early on. In the 11th minute of the match, Stanciu cut inside with the ball on the left side of the penalty area to complete a shot, the ball changed lines into the net, Wuhan Three Towns beat Henan 1-0; in the 53rd minute of the match, Zhong Yihao inserted a direct ball from a teammate in front of the left rib, entered the penalty area, and took a direct shot to the near corner of the net. Liu Dengzuo realized that the near corner was blocked, but his body reacted sluggishly and could not jump. The ball flew directly into the net over his head and the three Wuhan towns beat Henan 1-1.
In the 56th minute of the match, Aziz found two penalty kick chances in the chaos of the penalty area and added a direct shot to make it 2-1 Henan for Wuhan Sanzhen; in the 63rd minute of the match, Denizi pushed a shot near the top of the penalty area arc and the ball slowly rolled into the net. Once again, Liu Dengzhi was slow to react and was unable to make contact with the ball. Wuhan Three Towns beat Henan 2-2; in the 79th minute of the game, substitute Golden Boot scorer Malcolm filled the hole, denied the 2-2 score and quickly took over the game with a direct header; in the 89th minute of the game, Davidson countered a long drive with a direct assist and Malcolm scored a solo shot to the goal, defeating Wuhan Three Towns 4-2.
Throughout the game, the three Wuhan towns had 49% possession, 14-10 shots compared to Henan and 7-5 shots compared to Henan, making it a 4-2 victory. Malcolm staged the return of the king, substitutes appeared at the level of the Golden Boot, two key goals supported him to win the Most Valuable Player, the game score of 8.0, the highest score of the game. The standings show that Wuhan Sanzhen held the bottom line and moved up into the top five, temporarily ranking fifth with 33 points, realizing the goal set at the beginning of the season to keep six and fight for three.
After the game, Head Coach Ko Hatake Veng believed that the team's victory was not easy to come by and that there are still many aspects that need to be improved, especially the precision of tactics. He hopes to improve the team's performance through constant matches so that the team can be more proactive in the game and get rid of the ups and downs of their results, and looks forward to consecutive victories.
