"Is this Dortmund's home ground? It really is terrifying!"
Dortmund's home fans were incredibly passionate, making it one of the most notorious devilish home grounds in European football.
The stadium could hold eighty thousand spectators, and Dortmund's home matches were almost always sold out.
Especially the South Stand—more than thirty thousand fans packed it to capacity every match.
Wearing Dortmund's yellow jerseys with black trim, they waved all kinds of flags and sang Dortmund's anthem at the top of their lungs. Their song soared into the skies and never seemed to end.
This home atmosphere was far more terrifying than Bayern's Allianz Arena.
"Don't let outside factors affect you. Dortmund's home ground has always been like this. If you focus too much on this sort of thing, you'll fall right into their trap!"
Captain Fritz saw that the younger players had been intimidated by Dortmund's home atmosphere and hurriedly spoke up to remind them.
People often said that home fans were a team's twelfth man.
There was a reason for that saying!
When playing at home, tens of thousands of fans could cheer and applaud for their team, encourage them, ignite their fighting spirit, and make their blood boil with battle fever.
For away players, however, they would be met with the home fans' boos the moment they got the ball. Those deafening jeers could make anyone irritated and cloud their judgment.
If their mentality was a little weaker, they might not even be able to control the ball under the booing, leading to all kinds of mistakes.
Not only that, the fans' shouts and cheers could also put pressure on the officials, causing their decisions to favor the home team.
All of these factors combined formed football's home advantage.
This advantage was actually very obvious, which was why leagues around the world often had teams with formidable home records.
Facing a team like that made matches extremely difficult.
Unfortunately, Dortmund was precisely such a home fortress!
Of their seventeen Bundesliga home matches last season, they lost only one. That record ranked first among all eighteen Bundesliga teams, with a huge gap over second place.
Beating them at their home ground was even harder than conquering Bayern's home stadium!
The historical head-to-head record was also extremely unfavorable for Werder Bremen. In nearly ten matches over the past two years, Dortmund held an overwhelming advantage with seven wins, two draws, and one loss.
Their dreadful fitness condition, their opponent's terrifying home advantage, and the opponent's overwhelming historical record.
Everything pointed to this being an exceptionally difficult match for Werder Bremen.
Schaaf understood that very clearly, so he came up with an exceptionally bold plan.
"Press hard for the first five minutes after kickoff and try to break through their goal. Once we succeed, immediately fall back and defend for our lives until the match ends!"
Dortmund's players were very young. They were energetic and full of drive, which was a good thing.
But young players had one not-so-good flaw: their mentality was not stable enough.
If things went their way, they had no psychological burden and could often produce godlike performances.
But once they found themselves on the back foot—especially when they attacked for a long time without scoring—they would become increasingly impatient, perform worse and worse, and eventually lose the match.
The last time Werder Bremen defeated Dortmund, it was thanks to Silvestre's rapid goal just five minutes into the match. It disrupted their mentality, made them more and more anxious as they played, and ultimately caused the entire team to underperform, allowing Werder Bremen to snatch a fortunate win.
Therefore, if Werder Bremen wanted to win, they had to seize this weakness and exploit it ruthlessly.
If their tactics worked, they would still have a chance of winning this match.
If their tactics failed, it was no big deal. Their chances of victory had never been high to begin with.
Thus, when Coach Schaaf presented his plan, all the players agreed. Everyone was willing to take a gamble!
"China Central Television, China Central Television. Dear viewers, this is the final of the 2012 German Telekom Cup, brought to you by China Central Television: Dortmund versus Werder Bremen."
"I'm commentator He Wei!"
"I'm commentator Xu Yang!"
"The match is about to begin. First, let's take a look at both sides' starting lineups:
Dortmund have number 20 Langerak, number 21 Kirch, number 15 Hummels, number 30 Ginter, number 37 Halstenberg, number 5 Kehl, number 7 Leitner, number 19 Großkreutz, number 11 Reus, number 32 Bydgosczy, and number 9 Lewandowski.
Werder Bremen are still using a 4-3-3 formation:
Their starting lineup is: number 1 Mielitz, number 23 Serey, number 5 Lukimya, number 15 Prödl, number 17 Ignjovski, number 8 Fritz, number 6 De Bruyne, number 7 Arnautovic, number 10 Lin Quan, number 41 Füllkrug, and number 11 Elia."
Because the Telekom Cup semifinal He Wei and Xu Yang had commentated on received decent ratings domestically, the two of them continued as CCTV's commentators for this match.
Before the Top Five Leagues began, a match like this was naturally an unmissable option for football fans.
Therefore, once the broadcast began, CCTV Sports' ratings rapidly soared.
And a large part of that was due to the young Chinese-descended player in Werder Bremen's squad.
Lin Quan had scored a hat trick against Bayern yesterday, breaking three Telekom Cup records in one go.
They were the youngest starting player record, the youngest goalscorer record, and the youngest hat-trick record.
Although the Telekom Cup was not an especially prestigious competition, breaking all three records at his age still gave him a small burst of fame within football circles.
Moreover, He Wei had compared Lin Quan to Messi during the commentary, attracting quite a few Messi fans as well as Messi haters.
"Heh, I'd like to see whether this so-called second Messi is really as good as the commentator made him out to be!"
"I watched Lin Quan's previous match. He's absolutely the real deal—the second Messi!"
"Buddy above, I'm not very educated. Don't lie to me!"
"Exactly. You're bragging without even drafting a script. Every year, so many 'Messis' crawl out of every obscure corner. Since when did Messi become so cheap and worthless?"
"From my twenty years of watching football, Messi's ball sense is absolutely historical in its level of talent. Other players similar to Messi, if they don't have that top-tier ball sense, are merely imitations in appearance."
"Tsk, tsk, another Messi fanboy. If your Messi is so great, how did Germany shave him bald at the World Cup?"
"As if your Cristiano Ronaldo even made the quarterfinals. What right does someone who went out in the Round of 16 have to spout nonsense here?"
The original discussion had been whether Lin Quan was the second Messi, but the arrival of Messi fans and haters sent the topic badly off course, turning it into an argument about Cristiano Ronaldo and Messi.
These two were the strongest active players in world football, the most discussed, and the ones with the largest fanbases.
During this era, they were known as The Two Superstars.
Both had enormous numbers of fans, and those fans could not stand each other, so arguments between the two sides often broke out.
As the fans on both sides argued, time gradually passed.
At 7:35 in the evening, the referee blew his whistle.
The highly anticipated Telekom Cup final between Dortmund and Werder Bremen officially kicked off.
Before you continue