CHAPTER 162: CHAPTER 136 AWAKENING [CHESSBOARD INSIGHT] REWARD! FOOTBALL IS AN ART ABOUT SPACE!

This is like football and everything in life: you need to search, you need to think, you need to move, you need to find space, you need to help others. Finally, winning the game becomes very simple. - Johan Cruyff

On Tang Long’s desk, there is a biography of the Dutch football prophet, Cruyff.

"Football is an art about space".

This was given to Tang Long by Chiwo, and it has always been placed on his desk for him to read.

Opening this hefty book, the profound theories come with the scent of ink, wafting through the air.

Almost every blank edge of the page has dense notes written by Tang Long.

While reading, a phrase often told by teachers to students is to learn how to make a thick book thin.

Through summarizing, Tang Long indeed made this thick book thin.

He summarized this book of over 600 pages into two sentences!

Tang Long believes these two sentences best represent the essence of Cruyff’s thinking.

[Make the space bigger on the field when attacking, make the space smaller when defending]

How to understand these two sentences?

Within limited time and space, by gaining more effective control time and creating additional space, it is possible to gain an advantage and decide whether a team can succeed on the field.

Space can be divided into three types.

The first type refers to a football field with a length of between 100 to 110 meters and a width of between 64 to 75 meters.

The second type refers to the goal, with a distance of 7.32 meters between the two posts, and the bottom edge of the crossbar 2.44 meters above the ground.

The third type is the aerial control brought by the player’s height and jumping ability.

During attack, players must fully utilize the width and depth of the field, encouraging lateral movement of the opponent’s formation, making the gap between opposing players larger, and allowing exploitable openings to appear locally — this is making the space bigger during attack.

While defending, it involves compressing the opponent’s space as much as possible, making the "smaller" goal directly exposed to the opponent — this is making the space smaller during defense.

Offense and defense are two basic methods of warfare.

In this sense, they are interconnected and transform into each other.

Offense is the best defense—whoever controls more effective possession time within the limited game time has more opportunities to create additional space and more possibilities of scoring goals.

This spatial utilization is reflected not only in the team’s overall tactics but also in the player’s personal skills and awareness.

For example, when a player holds the ball, he needs to observe distant teammates and try to pass to the teammate positioned deepest and furthest forward to stretch the opponent’s defense;

Non-ball holding players need to create space for passing and shooting through running and positional changes for their teammates who have the ball.

Cruyff’s spatial theory has become the cornerstone of modern football.

After this, the coaches of AC Milan’s Sacchi, Barça’s Rijkaard, and Guardiola have all adjusted and modified Cruyff’s spatial theory, blending it with the modern football trend of emphasizing running and pressing.

But everything changes without departing from the original principle.

The division of space on the football field is like cutting precious gems with a cutter; every step a player takes should be precisely measured with understandable intent.

Tang Long is a loyal follower of Cruyff because he discovered that in the game, the AI system’s predictions are actually fully calculating the spatial changes on the field!

A football field, 22 players, except during the kick-off when players are static, spread out covering the field.

At any other time, players are in motion!

This movement causes the field space to be continuously and dynamically divided.

When a goal kick is taken, the goalkeeper waves his hands forward, signaling teammates to approach the central midfield.

When taking a corner kick, most people gather in the penalty area, with two fast full-backs staying back to guard against counter-attacks by the opponent.

In a typical midfield battle, a common phenomenon is that the team will deliberately attack one side of the opponent’s field based on the pre-match coach’s instructions.

Correspondingly, defensive players will also tilt towards that side.

If viewed from a bird’s eye perspective, the formations of both sides resemble a goose with unevenly developed wings, one side large and thick, the other thin like a cicada’s wing.

However, this might only be a temporary illusion.

When encountering this situation, Tang Long will increase the pace at this time, transferring the ball to the less populated side of the field!

Many times, the wide players like Santon (or Yuto Nagatomo, Shaqiri, Podolski) will gain ample space to receive the ball and quickly advance.

And the opponent’s formation, after being dragged significantly apart, will immediately adjust and shift.

Thus, the two wings of the goose, one large and one small, swap positions instantly.

Cruyff once used a very vivid analogy: the art of spatial division on the football field is like playing chess.

The field is the chessboard;

The players are the chess pieces.

Every movement of a player to a small square brings them closer to or further from the opponent (or teammate).

The chess pieces continuously divide space, and the space flows like water, constantly changing.

This analogy is very vivid, beautifully integrating the seemingly different activities of chess and football!

However, the chessboard is too small, only 8 times 8 squares, with limited space to divide.

Therefore, when Tang Long appears on the AI Cloud Training Ground and awakens the [Chessboard Insight] reward, he finds the field has turned into a Go board!

This corresponds with the folding fan given by Old Nie, the Chess Saint.

Whoosh!

A gust of wind blows across the training ground, and Tang Long returns to the concluded match with Turin from last week.

Except now, on the field, all 22 people are standing still, expressionless, exhibiting a dull manner.

No need to think, this is the state where the training tools have not yet been activated~

black lines emerge from the baseline behind Goalkeeper Handanovic, spreading forward parallelly.

Meanwhile, the sideline where Coach Mancini stands similarly emerges with 19 black lines spreading toward the opposite sideline.

black lines intersect, dividing the field into 361 intersection points, 324 squares.

"Ding!"

"Congratulations to the host for awakening the [Chessboard Insight] reward!"

"Reward description: During the match, the marked intersection points on the field will connect with different colored glows, providing position, passing, and shooting guidance for the host!"

"At the same time, special area squares will light up, offering real-time prompts for the host!"

In the next instant.

On the displayed chessboard of the football field, within the 324 squares, further self-division begins!

Each rectangular square’s long side has 19 lines emerging, the width side has 19 lines emerging.

lines intersect, further dividing inside the squares into 361 intersection points, 324 squares.

In this way, on the football field with a length of approximately 105 meters and width of 67 meters.

An area of close to 7000 square meters is divided into 130321 intersection points and 104976 squares!

On average, there are 18.6 intersection points and 15 squares per square meter.

Tang Long looks down at the dense black lines, weaving underneath his feet, like fabric weaving.

Looking up again, he is almost startled~

The opponents are no longer opponents, they have transformed into white Go stones;

Teammates are no longer teammates, they have transformed into black Go stones.

Everyone looks the same.

The only difference is that taller and stronger players appear as larger Go stones, while shorter and weaker players are smaller Go stones.

For example, the 192 cm tall Handanovic is larger than the 170 cm tall Yuto Nagatomo.

The main referee is represented as a red stone.

"Now entering the internal Beta version, the AI system will improve continuously according to the host’s adaptability; After the match begins, all functions will be tested simultaneously, the test intensity is high, make sure the host is ready!"

Whuut—

A whistle blows!

Suddenly, various intersection points on the chessboard light up, with trenches crisscrossing, some yellow, some green, some long, some short, some straight, others winding, and even some crossing.

Numerous squares gather collectively flickering, including squares, rectangles, triangles, ovals, diamonds, trapezoids, and many other hard-to-describe irregular shapes.

With constantly moving black and white stones, moving on the intersection points and squares.

Tang Long feels his head is about to explode, as if watching a complex circuit board.

Come, let’s try the power of the new golden finger!