This evening, the 18th round of the Chinese Super League (CSL) saw a battle of the Heavenly Mountain, with Shandong Taishan playing at home against the leading team Wuhan Sanzhen. However, despite the fact that Taishan sent all their starters to face Sanzhen, who lacked four foreign aiders, they were still unable to take the lead, and even so, they are still four points behind Sanzhen with one more game to go.
Shandong Taishan's 1-2 defeat to Shanghai Shenhua in the last round of the Chinese Super League ended a nine-game winning streak and further widened the gap with Wuhan Sanzhen. With one more round to go, Taishan is four points behind Sanzhen, and if they lose to Sanzhen again, the gap will widen to seven points. By that time, Taishan will not only be out of the title race early, Wuhan Sanzhen is also expected to continue the winning streak, the sole share of the Chinese Super League history of winning streak record.
Shenhua's defeat has put great pressure on their players, and they are eager to win against a strong San Zhen side, but it will be quite difficult for them to do so. Fortunately, Fellaini and Cressan are back in the starting lineup after recovering from injuries, while San Zhen's side, top scorer Malcolm and foreigner Edmilson are out due to injuries, and midfielder Stanciu is not in the list. Malcolm scored 16 goals and 2 assists this season, Stancho contributed 7 goals and 8 assists, and Edmilson had 5 goals and 2 assists. San Zhen's offense relies on these foreigners, and their absence will have a huge impact on San Zhen.
It is worth noting that in addition to the absence of the three foreign aiders, the original starting center back Wallace was replaced by Zhang Wentao due to pre-match discomfort and failed to make the list. Sanzhen originally relied on foreign aid to create the most powerful offense and defense in the Chinese Super League, but tonight, without foreign aid, the first half still showed excellent offense, especially Gao Junyi, Deng Hanwen and Xie Pengfei's side, which caused great pressure on Taishan's defense. Taishan responded with a 433 formation, which was weak in both offense and defense, with Fellaini's influence dropping, Guo Tianyu's performance slipping badly compared to last year, and Moises pulling back to work poorly with Cressan. Taishan trailed by a goal at halftime, and Liu Yang scored a goal to equalize after a substitution in the second half, but the intensity of the game declined after that, and they ended up with a draw.
Facing the absence of four foreign aid, Shandong Taishan only gained one point, and still trailed by four points after one more round of matches. For Wuhan Sanzhen, the absence of four foreign aid but can draw away from Taishan, greatly enhance the team's self-confidence, for them, the realization of the Chinese Super League Kaiserslautern myth may only be a matter of time.
