Our men's soccer team, according to the scheduled schedule, will assemble in the middle to late this month to fully prepare for the last four rounds of the upcoming Qatar World Preliminary 40. The coaching team has already screened a list of about 60 candidates for the national football team, through the two phases of training this year and the first stage of the new season of the Chinese Super League observation, most players have a new round of understanding, therefore, for the 40 strong lineup, head coach Li Tie has a clearer conception. Wu Lei, who plays for Spanish B club, will return home to help the national soccer team in the Top 12 as he does not need to go through the investigation. It is reported that he is expected to arrive in Shanghai on the 18th of this month.
Affected by the epidemic, Wu Lei has not been able to participate in the national team training since November 2019, when he joined the team for the Top 40 match against Syria in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. In that time, the national football team has completed six training sessions and eight warm-up matches under new manager Li Tie. Li Tie has conducted a detailed investigation into the ability and form of the candidate international players through the various training sessions, laying the foundation for the lineup for the second half of the 40-team tournament.
Although Wu Lei missed the first six training, but his ability and attitude has long been recognized by the new coaching team of the national team led by Li Tie. When the national football team set up the WeChat exchange group of training personnel, Wu Lei was always "pulled into the group". It can be said that Wu Lei has always been an indispensable key player of the national football team.
The remaining matches in Group A of the 40-team tournament will be played from May 30 to June 15 in Suzhou, according to the schedule released by FIFA and the AFC. The national soccer team plans to regroup at least 10 days before the tournament. Wu Lei, who is returning to the team, will need to return to his home country early to make all the preparations for the match and the tournament.
Up to now, 37 rounds of Liga B have been played. Espanyol is currently leading the table with a 6-point advantage, and with 5 rounds left in the league, they have a high hope of being promoted to La Liga. Despite the difficulties he is facing at Espanyol, Wu Lei hopes to join the team in the La Liga, but considering his loyalty to the national soccer team, he has to go back to his home country before the end of the La Liga B league.
The schedule shows that the 39th round of the Liga B match between Espanyol and Cartagena will be played on the afternoon of May 16th local time. Wu Lei is likely to temporarily bid farewell to the team after this round of matches, and then depart from Madrid, Spain on the 17th local time, and finally arrive at Shanghai Pudong International Airport on May 18th Beijing time.
It is worth noting that the immunization and reception of the visiting teams, foreign competition officials and other tournament-related inbound personnel for the remaining matches in Group A of this 40-team tournament will strictly implement the standards of the second round of the Women's Olympic Preliminary Round playoff matches between the Chinese and South Korean women's soccer teams. In other words, from the time these people enter the country to the time they leave the country after the match, they will always be in a strict closed loop of epidemic prevention.
For health and safety reasons, Wu Lei may take a chartered flight back to his home country. After entering the country, he will be sent to the designated isolation point, after all the physical examination and necessary medical isolation observation, he will be sent directly to the competition area, i.e., directly into the completely closed tournament "red zone".
Despite not being able to join the team for more than a year, Wu Lei has always been a "plug-and-play" type of player that successive national soccer managers have fully trusted in terms of ability and experience. For Wu Lei, the important thing is to relieve the fatigue of long distance travel as soon as possible.
