In the 17th round of the Chinese Super League, Shanghai Port continued to make great progress, and in the face of the Zhejiang team, they still did not disappoint the Shanghai Port fans, defeating the Zhejiang team with a score of 3:1 and winning 10 consecutive victories in the Chinese Super League. Wu Lei, the first local striker, ushered in another big outbreak, kicked with his head and feet, scored a hat trick.
In addition to Wu Lei's outstanding performance, the performance of local central defender Wei Zhen in the back line is also remarkable, and this campaign also delivered a satisfactory answer. In the face of the Zhejiang team, Wei Zhen not only defended steadily, but also showed a good ability to advance in the frontcourt. I have to say that the double center-back combination formed by him and naturalized international player Jiang Guangtai has gradually become the standard configuration of Shanghai Port's starting lineup.
Wei Zhen is also very excited about his increasingly stable performance in Shanghai Port. After the game, in the face of an interview with reporters, Wei Zhen said very happily: After these games, I feel good, and I have become more and more tacit with him. The "he" in Wei Zhen's mouth naturally refers to his current central defender partner Jiang Guangtai.
Wei Zhen is 27 years old and is in the prime of his career. He, like many SIPG players, is also Xu Genbao's proud disciple. Although Wei Zhen entered the first team of Shanghai Port in 2017, due to the abundance of talent in the back line of SIPG, he has never been able to be really reused, and he has always been a chicken rib player of the team, and it is difficult to even get a stable playing time. It wasn't until the arrival of the new Australian coach Muscat in the new season that Wei Zhen finally came to his heart's content and was gradually reused. With Wei Zhen's solid performance in recent times, especially the increasing level of tacit understanding between him and Jiang Guangtai, he is fully worthy of occupying a main defender position at Shanghai Port.
And as Wei Zhen gradually sits in the main central defender position in the SIPG backline, a meritorious veteran in the team is a little bit forgotten by Muscat. This person is Zhang Linpeng, a veteran of the national football team who has been plagued by injuries this season. Objectively speaking, Zhang Linpeng's state is not as good as before with the increase in age, although Wei Zhen's comprehensive ability and competition experience are not as good as Zhang Linpeng, but he is young, full of physical energy, and dares to fight, Zhang Linpeng is indeed time to give way to Wei Zhen.
Recently, Zhang Linpeng has been sitting on the bench most of the time due to injuries and has become a marginal member of the team. However, judging from the full game of the FA Cup, Zhang Linpeng was not unable to play the Chinese Super League game because of injury, but because coach Muscat was deliberately snubbing the Shanghai Port meritorious veteran and giving Wei Zhen more opportunities to perform. Therefore, even if Zhang Linpeng completely recovers from his injury in the future, I am afraid it will be difficult to return to the main position, and there is a high probability that he will have to play as a substitute for his junior brother Wei Zhen.