Chapter 792: The Asian Qualifiers Top 12 Ending Early, Returning to the Champions League to Pad Stats

Manchester Evening News: If TY does not participate in the final round match against Oman, he will have the opportunity to play in the second leg of the Champions League Round of 16.

"This is obviously a better choice for the player himself, since China has already secured a World Cup ticket," said the Manchester Evening News reporter.

With qualification for the World Cup already confirmed, returning to protect their Champions League standing is more important than participating in the qualifiers; the Manchester Evening News reporter's statement was clearly without fault.

But even so, he was quickly refuted.

The one refuting him was that familiar commentator, Dawson Jensen from Sky Sports UK.

Commentator Jensen: TY has remained with the national team to participate in the qualifiers; Manchester United already leads by five goals in the first leg of the Champions League Round of 16, and Ten Hag no longer needs help.

Hmm...

It's hard to say how, but Jensen always gives people the feeling that he really wants to see Ten Hag make a fool of himself, which is truly unmatched.

However, analyzed from an objective perspective, this line of thinking is actually very unreasonable.

For a renowned coach like Ten Hag, who has won the Champions League and several Premier League titles, making a fool of himself is obviously not an easy thing to do.

To avoid suspicion of targeting Ten Hag, later in the video Jensen approached the matter from the perspective of the Chinese national team, analyzing the entire situation more deeply to provide reasons why Tang Ye should remain with the national team.

First and foremost, of course, is the Chinese national team's FIFA ranking.

A higher FIFA ranking could mean a more favorable group draw for the group stage.

It is currently difficult to calculate the gap in FIFA points between Japan and the Chinese national team (because the difference is indeed very small); under these circumstances, winning one more match and gaining another three points is naturally good for the Chinese team.

Additionally, according to estimates by Jensen and several experts at Sky Sports, this match against Oman holds very significant meaning for the Chinese national team's FIFA points.

Then there is the club side.

"From what I understand, TY is not a player who likes to pad statistics; unlike Messi, Ronaldo, and others, TY does not pad stats."

Jensen stated firmly: "If someone is willing to open betting, I am willing to wager 5,000 pounds on TY staying with the team; this is my salary for six weeks."

Ten Hag: TY needs to return to the squad; I will explain the situation to him.

Ten Hag posted on social media, at which point everyone felt the matter was finally settled.

But matters were obviously not as simple as everyone imagined.

Approximately an hour and a half after Ten Hag's social media post, Escrivá posted a "GG Bond staring wide-eyed" emoji in the comments section, then deleted it about 30 seconds later.

Escrivá's maneuver was obviously intentionally displayed for fans and reporters to see; it could be described as utterly disgusting.

The most interesting part is that the origin of this "GG Bond staring wide-eyed" emoji is actually China.

The Chinese national team was located at a hotel in Changsha.

They were set to depart for Oman tonight, the venue for the Chinese national team's next Asian qualifier match.

In less than ten short hours, there was still one very important matter within the Chinese team that had not been decided.

Should they really go all out against Oman for the sake of a possible FIFA ranking?

"Will the FIFA rankings be updated before the World Cup?"

At breakfast in the morning, Tang Ye looked at Wu Lei across from him; the latter indicated that an update was highly probable.

"Then what if it doesn't get updated? Won't we be completely screwed?"

"Haha! It's impossible for it not to be updated; when I say 'highly probable,' I basically mean it's certain."

"Alright."

Tang Ye sighed: "I don't even know what to do when the meeting starts later; if we beat Oman, can we really return to being number one in Asia?"

"Well..."

Before Wu Lei could speak, Zhang Zhang Yuning directly interjected from the side: "I think... even if we lose to Oman, it's fine; during the previous 40-team qualifiers, Japan went on a winning streak and their ranking surpassed ours directly. Isn't the prestige of the 12-team qualifiers higher than that of the 40-team qualifiers? I feel our ranking is already higher than Japan's."

"But it seems someone on Dongqiu Di brushed the stats suggesting we haven't surpassed Japan yet; we're still a little short."

Wu Lei made a "just a little bit" gesture with his hand.

"Then I don't know."

Zhang Zhang Yuning shrugged.

Well, after all that trouble, it turned out he didn't know anything either...

"So, are you going or not?"

Tang Ye asked Zhang Zhang Yuning for his thoughts, but this time it was Wu Lei who answered: "Actually, I feel this isn't about who goes or stays; it mainly depends on Escrivá. We should either all not play, or we go all out—just pick one of the two options and do that."

"That's true."

After breakfast, the Chinese national team players chatted for a while in the cafeteria, then proceeded together to the conference room.

Ultimately, the decision rested with Ferran.

Let's see what his thinking was.

"My meaning is, we still need to play this match."

Escrivá paced in front of the tactical board: "Last night, Ma Ti and I calculated the points; if we can achieve eight wins and two draws in the group stage, there is a high probability we can still surpass Japan, so my idea is to take a gamble."

Just as the players were surprised that Escrivá would make such a decision, the Spaniard suddenly changed his tone.

"However."

"This is not a requirement; I am merely telling you my hope."

Escrivá's gaze swept sequentially over Wu Lei, Zhang Zhang Yuning, and Tang Ye: "After all, this is the national football team; many of you come from powerful clubs, and club matches are very important to you. Even... for some players, they are indispensable to their respective clubs."

"I hope you will stay and play one last match against Oman; just treat it as a warm-up for the World Cup."

Escrivá glanced at Ma Ti.

Obviously, this decision was made by the two of them together.

And the decision made by Escrivá and Ma Ti was to hand the power of decision over to the players themselves.

"Hmm... you have two scenarios."

Escrivá held up two fingers: "One, either all main players stay; by 'main players' here I am referring generally to all starting players."

"Then there's the second option: the entire starting lineup returns to the club."

Escrivá's maneuver was actually quite extreme.

Either use the core squad to crush Oman, or simply tank and forfeit the final round of matches.

"Aren't you going to make a decision?"

Tang Ye looked up and suddenly asked, but Escrivá could only sigh helplessly.

Although they topped the group, the national team's current situation was indeed somewhat complicated, and quite awkward.

In other words.

Ferran truly had no moves left.

"..."

Creak!

Several coaches of the national team left the meeting room, leaving only the players inside.

Here, Escrivá made a very subtle move: he kept even the substitute players, who seemed unrelated to this matter, behind as well, having them communicate alongside the starters.

The room was very quiet; the Chinese team players first looked at each other in bewilderment, then unanimously turned their gaze toward Tang Ye.

Escrivá's original intention was for the national team players to communicate with one another, but that scenario was somewhat too idealistic.

A sports team is, in essence, a "jianghu" with a distinct hierarchy. Expecting starters and substitutes to communicate freely is basically impossible.

The substitutes wanted the starters to stay, but they could not proactively raise matters detrimental to their senior teammates, for they were well aware of their own status as juniors.

And what about the senior starters?

The senior starters were equally helpless; there was nothing they could say either.

Above the big brothers, there are still bigger brothers; the lesser big brothers hold no speaking rights before the greater big brothers.