Complex warm-up effects
In the late afternoon of July 20, the Chinese women's soccer team defeated Chinese Taipei 2-0 in the second match of the first round of the East Asian Cup Women's Soccer at Toyota Stadium. This result was both unexpected and reasonable. Observation of the whole tournament program, the Chinese women's soccer team's "preparation for the game" initially reached the desired goal.
The first battle is practice!
As the Asian Cup champions, the Chinese women's soccer team is carrying high expectations from the outside world. However, the players, including head coach Shui Qingxia, have kept a low profile, emphasizing the importance of "preparing for the World Cup" and "practicing and warming up". This is not difficult to understand, although the competitive level of the East Asian Cup is slightly higher than the Asian Cup women's soccer tournament, but the opponent is limited to the Asian region. Looking ahead to the World Cup, the Chinese women's soccer team will face more European, American and African teams, and strong Asian teams to play is a good opportunity to exercise, especially for young players to accumulate high-level game experience, which will be beneficial to their growth.
The match against Chinese Taipei is essentially a "warm-up" for the Chinese women's soccer team. After winning the Asian Cup, the women's soccer team has not played any international warm-up matches. According to the schedule of the tournament, the next South Korea and Japan is the real test. Therefore, this match against Chinese Taipei is undoubtedly a warm-up match from the women's soccer team's own point of view. In fact, from the point of view of the starting lineup, the intention of training young players and confusing the opponents is very obvious.
Looking back at the Asian Cup in February this year, the Chinese women's soccer team also played against Chinese Taipei. Comparing the starting lineups of the two matches, you can see the changes. For example, the Asian Cup women's soccer team used 442 formation, and this game has become 4231. Wang Shanshan and Zhang Linyan was a double forward, but this game Wang Shanshan forward, Zhang Linyan was moved to the left flank position; Zhang Xin from the left defender into a defensive midfielder; Lou Jiahui, replaced in the second half, from the Asian Cup's right back to the left flank of the game, replacing the next is Zhang Linyan. Yao Wei from the Asian Cup left back to the game's attacking midfielder, roaming behind Wang Shanshan. Such a "big adjustment" is undoubtedly to the opponent's confusion.
It's also much easier to understand that the many young players starting the tournament will allow them to experience more of the atmosphere of an international tournament.
Therefore, judging from such an arrangement, the result of this game is not really important, because with the strength of the Chinese women's soccer team, winning the game can almost be said to be logical. The only suspense is how many goals they can score. The score of 2-0 is naturally acceptable.
Even when substitutions and adjustments were made in the second half, they were in preparation for the next game. For example, Wang Shanshan was replaced at the end of the first half and Xiao Yuyi took over. Tang Jiali also came on after 65 minutes of the second half to find the feeling. As for Wang Shuang and Wu Haiyan, who returned to the team after recovering from injuries, they watched from the sidelines, which was easier to understand, in order to pave the way for the later matches.
As for the chances created in the second half after the change of personnel failed to be converted into goals, it is obvious that the efficiency of Chinese women's soccer in the attack still needs to be improved. In the next two matches, the Chinese women's soccer team may not be able to create as many chances as they did in this match. This is like the match between the Korean women's soccer team and the Japanese women's soccer team the day before. After the Korean team lost the match, the head coach, Belle, lamented that she couldn't understand the loss because she had created so many chances but failed to score more goals.
From another point of view, the Chinese women's soccer team dominates in terms of body, which is leading in the whole Asia, and only in the match against Australia did it look insufficient. But the problem is that since the Chinese women's soccer team is preparing for the World Cup, it will face more European, American and African teams in the future, and with the ongoing European women's soccer tournament, the development of European women's soccer is feared to refresh people's understanding of women's sports again. In this case, the Chinese women's soccer team needs to have a sense of urgency.
Secondly, judging from the course of the game, the Chinese women's soccer team needs to further strengthen the rationality of handling the ball after controlling it, i.e. how to make better and quicker passes in terms of switching from defense to offense, which is crucial. However, the girls of the women's soccer team were easy to be judged by the opponents because of their slow passing speed in the game. This, coupled with the fact that Chinese Taipei strengthened their defense in the second half, especially in coordinating with each other, prevented the Chinese women's soccer team from scoring more goals. The opponent's goalkeeper's heroic performance was also an aspect.
Nevertheless, since this is a "warm-up" match, there is no need to focus too much on the score or the result. Perhaps, in the subsequent match between South Korea and Japan, the Chinese women's soccer team will show a completely different side. And that, too, is what more people are looking forward to. Next, the Chinese women's soccer team will move to Ibaraki to prepare for the next two rounds of matches. Hopefully, the women's soccer girls will go further in the later matches.
