While Chen Yingxiong used a hat trick to fight back and officially declared war on Pavlyuchenko, Zenit also achieved a breakthrough victory on another front - after returning to home, they defeated the Standard Scarlet Sun 2:0 and successfully advanced to the League Cup main match.

The only regret is that Chen Yingxiong did not score a goal in this game. He came on as a substitute in the second half and only played for fifteen minutes, without any decent chance.

This is not the first time Zenit has reached the League Cup, but Chen Yingxiong is looking forward to it because this is his journey to the European war.

The group draw will be held immediately after all teams entering the main competition are released.

In the end, St. Petersburg Zenit was assigned to Group A, with Alcamar from the Netherlands, Everton from the Premier League, Larissa from Greece, and Nuremberg from Germany.

The League Cup is different from the Champions League. Each group has five teams and does not engage in home and away game competitions. It is just that each team fights against each other and ranks to determine who advances to the knockout stage game.

So although the start date of the League Cup group stage is later than that of the Champions League and more participating teams than the Champions League, they can still handle all group stage games before the winter break.

It just made the Russian League team suffer. They have to play three more League Cup group matches after the season ends, and the last round of group matches ends on December 20. This season's Russian Super League ends on November 11.

Teams that do not need to participate in European games will naturally disband directly and let the players off. Teams that need to participate in European games will be in trouble and still have to train in the snow. Of course, for other European teams who unfortunately come to Russia to play away at this time, they will be even more troubled...

After the group stage opponents were released, the schedule was also announced.

Zenit's game started on October 25, playing a total of four games. On October 25, he will first face Alkmaar at home, on November 8, he will challenge Larissa away, and on November 29, he will face Nuremberg at home. Finally, on December 6, he will challenge Everton away.

In this group, the strongest one may be Everton from the Premier League, while the weakest one in the city is Larissa from Greece. The other three teams are centrists who have the hope of advancing or being eliminated.

Edvorcart needs to carefully study the opponent and decide what strategy to use in the group stage. For example, playing away to Everton is the last group stage. If you play well before and you have basically confirmed the promotion before this game, then the game against Everton will become a real friendly match - Edvorcart thinks Everton should also advance.

This hardest game may become the best one.

Although it's a game, it shouldn't be difficult to play against Larissa.

What needs to be considered is the home match against Alkmaar, as well as the home match against Nuremberg...

Play these two games well and you will be able to win the right to qualify, otherwise... it will be done!

Chen Yingxiong is not the head coach, and he doesn't care how the team will play at that time, and in which game you have to use all your strength and keep your energy. His mind is now full of thoughts to let the world know his name in the main league cup.

I want to score! I want to score more and more goals!

However, so far, the domestic league is still more important. The first League Cup group match will not last until October 25th. Before that, he has two league games to play.

On the one hand, he competed for the league championship, and on the other hand, he completely stepped on Pavliuchenko.

On October 7, St. Petersburg Zenit challenged Moscow Locomotive team away. Although this team is currently ranked eighth in the league, its strength cannot be underestimated. You should know that in the last round of the league, they defeated Moscow Sparta 4:3 at home, pulling the team off the top of the league. They gave Zenit a chance to reverse.

Zenit certainly doesn't want to repeat the mistakes of Sparta Moscow.

So in this game, Edvokat sent the strongest lineup he could.

Chen Yingxiong started and was at the forefront. His mission was to attack the city and capture the village.

Of course Edvorkat knew that Chen Yingxiong was trying to compete with Pavlyuchenko, and his goal could bring victory to the team. This was something Edvorkat wanted. Of course, he had to make good use of Chen Yingxiong's desires.

As a result, in this game, Chen Yingxiong lived up to expectations and scored another goal!

"The 22nd goal! It's incredible! He's scoring consecutive goals! He's already scoring twenty-two goals! Since its establishment, the league's top scorer can score the most in a single season by 25 goals, created by Oleg Veretennikov in the 1995 season... Can Chen Yingxiong break this record?"

Relying on Chen Yingxiong's goal, Zenit won the CSKA Moscow 1:0 away.

In this way, the pressure was transferred to Sparta and Pavlyuchenko in Moscow.

Especially for Pavlyuchenko... the pressure is quite great!

He didn't score a goal in the last round of the league, but Chen Yingxiong surpassed one goal. In this round of the league, Chen Yingxiong had already scored a goal. If he couldn't score, the gap would become bigger and bigger. In the end, it could not be compensated.

With this mentality, Pavliuchenko was looking for a goal opportunity in the game.

But there is one truth that is unbreakable, that is, your mentality is very important in football games. The more impatient you are, the less chance you will have. When you are calm, you will get many opportunities that you never dared to think about before.

Pavlyuchenko's idea of ​​teaching Chen Yingxiong on the scorer list is good, but his mentality is not well controlled and he is a little too impatient...

In the end, Moscow Starba defeated Nalchiksparta 2-1 away and continued to bite Zenit in the standings, not giving Zenit a chance to relax at all.

However, Pavlyuchenko, who had an unbalanced mentality, failed to seize the opportunity to score a goal in the game, and the gap between him and Chen Yingxiong was pulled to two goals.

It's amazing. Just two rounds of league games, he was leading Chen Yingxiong two goals in the scorer list. However, he was now his turn to be led by two goals...

On October 20, in the 27th round of the Russian Premier League, the same-city derby between Sparta and Moscow FC was very popular, with one player on each side being sent off with a red card. Pavlyuchenko finally found the feeling of scoring in this game. He scored a goal with a penalty kick, increasing his total league goals to the 21st.

It's only one ball away from the hero.

Moscow Sparta defeated Moscow FC 3-1 at home, and returned to the league first before Zenit's game. However, everyone didn't care about this, because they all knew that as long as Zenit won, Moscow Sparta had to fall from the league first position.

Sure enough, St. Petersburg Zenit did not disappoint those who watched the show.

In the league day later, they beat Chimki 4-1 at home and pulled Sparta Moscow as expected.

Now everyone thinks that's the case for this league championship. Anyway, both sides are in good shape. If they can win, the final league championship will definitely be Zenit. It depends on who makes a mistake in the end.

But the competition for the league's top scorer is different. In addition to the suspense of who will win the Golden Boot in the end, there is another suspense - Oleg Verjennikov's 25-goal record has been maintained for eleven seasons. Is there any hope this time to be broken?

Chen Yingxiong told everyone with a beautiful goal in the game - there is hope!

After scoring this goal, he has now scored twenty-three goals, only two goals away from Verjennikov's twenty-five goals.

After this game, he had to stop and rest for a while in the league with crazy goals.

The League Cup is here!

In Edvokat's plan, Zenit must win the game of Alkmaar at home, because this is a team with similar strength and the team that poses the greatest threat to Zenit.

But what is the result?

The result was that Zenit played a 1:1 match with the opponent at home...

Alcamar scored the goal in the 19th minute.

Next, Alkmaar, who played away, began to use frequent fouls to curb Zenit at home.

Especially Chen Yingxiong.

When he rushed to the front, there would always be at least two people around him, and they would defend with both hands and feet.

The price Alkmaar paid for this was seven yellow cards and one red card for the whole game - their goal-scoring hero Ali was punished.

Chen Yingxiong was unable to score in this game because he was restrained by the opponent's foul tactics.

Captain Timoshchuk helped the team equalize the score just at the beginning of the second half.

Alkmaar's foul tactics were still the same. Because they lacked one person, they retreated all their troops. The foul was added to the defense, which made Zenit's attack fall into a quagmire.

Obviously, Edvorkat did not expect his team to encounter such tenacious resistance at home. He lacked changes and could not come up with an effective way to go.

Chen Yingxiong also fell into the misunderstanding of competing with the other party in physical competition, blindly reflecting his strength, but forgot to shoot.

In the end, Zenit could only regretfully accept the result of a 1:1 draw at home.

Although Chen Yingxiong is looking forward to it, his first goal in the League Cup has not yet arrived.

The 1-1 draw by Alkmaar at home, which casts a shadow on the prospect of qualifying for the group stage of St. Petersburg Zenit.

If you can't even pass the group stage, what else can you talk about the hat trick in the knockout stage?

Chen Yingxiong was not too frustrated when he left the scene. He frowned and anger was faintly visible on his face.

He was not angry at his teammate's performance, he was angry that his performance was not good enough and failed to score a goal to help the team win.

He must advance to the knockout stage of the League Cup, which is his dead goal set for himself.
Chapter completed!