Seeing the neighboring Zhao Rui explode again and be directly ejected for colliding with the referee, many Hongyuan fans sighed that fortunately, it was Zhao Rui who was let go back then instead of Hu Mingxuan or Xu Jie. It is known that the Jiehu combination never overreacts to refereeing decisions. Some fans jokingly say that Xu Jie often doesn't want to respond, but he's just too tired to even speak! Recently, Xu Jie's playing time has been quite exaggerated, playing 44 minutes against Zhejiang, 46 minutes against Liaoning, and also 46 minutes against Tianjin. Playing full 45 minutes in every game, the promise made by Du Feng at the beginning to "bring in a new foreign aid to share the pressure on Xu Jie" seems to have not been fulfilled. Xu Jie is exhausted to the point of being pale, while the small foreign aid Les is watching from below. The culprit is actually the general manager Zhu Fangyu!
According to the report by Guangdong's team reporter Guan Xin, Guangdong has basically decided to end its cooperation with the small foreign aid Les due to his "problematic attitude." Since joining Guangdong, Les has only played two games, totaling less than 6 minutes, scoring no points, and only getting 1 rebound and 1 steal. If you really believe Du Feng's words of "letting Les share the pressure on Xu Jie," it can only be said that both Xu Jie and the fans are too naive. Du Feng would rather have Xu Jie welded onto the court than give Les even ten minutes or so of playing time in each game. Fundamentally, it is because Du Feng thinks Les is too weak, and playing him is equivalent to not playing him, or it might even drag down the team. At this stage, Guangdong is working hard to secure a playoff spot, and every game cannot afford to lose. In order to win, Du Feng definitely dares not let Les play and will completely drain Xu Jie. All talk of "attitude problems" is false; what's real is that his skills are insufficient, and he's not even allowed into the main squad.
Ultimately, all of this can be attributed to the poor judgment of the people in charge of finding foreign players for Hongyuan, the low budget, and the low expectations. As the general manager of the team, Zhu Fangyu certainly has the obligation to save money for the boss, but many times Zhu's vision is too short-sighted, often saving small amounts of money at the cost of greater losses. Spending tens of thousands of yuan to sign a player like Les to silence the fans and Xu Jie is fine, but since the cheap foreign aid isn't good enough and Du Feng refuses to use them, Xu Jie still has to play full 45 minutes in every game. When he eventually accumulates labor injuries and suffers a major injury, Guangdong's season will be over.
In fact, Zhu Fangyu made similar mistakes a few years ago. Back when domestic players like Yi Jianlian and Zhou Peng were still in their prime, Zhu Fangyu saved money every year by inviting mediocre foreign players that even Yi Jianlian couldn't carry, causing Guangdong to suffer at the hands of Beijing with Marbury and Liaoning with Hudson in terms of foreign players. However, at that time, Guangdong still had Yi Jianlian and Zhou Peng as a safety net, and the team would never fall out of the top four no matter what. Now, without strong foreign players and domestic players lacking in strength, it's normal for Guangdong to fall out of the top eight or even only qualify for the playoffs. Competitive sports are about who can spend more money; hoping to achieve great things with little money is unrealistic.
