Chapter 187: Lin Quan's Investments
After beating Finland, the next day the Spanish team took a plane and left Helsinki.
Since Group I only has five teams, after a qualifying match, the Spanish team had a break.
So, they contacted another team that was also on a break to play a friendly match.
On September 10, the Spanish team arrived in Geneva to face the South American team of Chile.
Because they had already qualified in the group, Spain focused mainly on training.
In this match, Del Bosque made major changes to Spain's starting lineup, including Lin Quan, with several starting players on the bench.
On the other hand, Chile sent their starting team, wishing to learn something from the world champion.
During the match, former Valencia player Barjas, who was awarded as Chile's best football player, was the first to help the team open Spain's goal.
Today, Spain's starting goalkeeper is Barcelona's Valdés, and he cannot be blamed for the goal, as the opponent was too fast, passing the defenders and suddenly shooting, catching the goalkeeper off guard.
"This guy is good, what skill, what dribbling!"
On the bench, several Spanish starters saw this goal and were impressed.
The way the opponent dribbled and scored seemed strangely familiar to them.
He increasingly resembled someone from their own team.
"Why are you all looking at me like that? I don't have his speed!"
When Lin Quan saw his teammates looking at him, he couldn't help but smile.
"If you had his speed, wouldn't you be invincible directly?"
Casillas tried to imagine facing an improved version of Lin Quan with more speed and felt a chill.
Just thinking about it was terrifying.
The other teammates nodded; for wingers, the faster they are, the more threatening they are.
For teams that like to play with wings, the speed of the wingers is an indispensable requirement, slow players can't play like that.
But Lin Quan's dribbling is already impressive enough, no matter if he has more speed or not, he has a hundred ways to pass defenders.
But if his speed really could increase, he would become even more terrifying on the current basis!
Despite being behind on the scoreboard, Spain did not worry, the young players on the field were a bit nervous at first, but with the calmness of the older players, they soon settled down.
In the 37th minute, Pedro made a wonderful pass and Soldado scored, equalizing the score for the team.
But Barjas was in excellent form today, seven minutes later, from almost the same position, he once again used his speed and skill to break through Spain's defense and score again.
2-1, Chile was temporarily leading.
During the break, the young players who had been on the field in the first half were nervous.
It seemed they feared the coach would scold them for their poor performance.
Before this friendly match, Spain had maintained an unbeaten streak in several tournaments over the past two years.
If only official matches are considered, the last defeat was in the first group match of the 2010 South Africa World Cup against Switzerland.
It has now been more than three years since that match.
The dominant strength of the Spanish dynasty is evident.
Precisely because of this, as members of the Spanish national team, they do not want or dare to stain the team's honor.
If the Spanish national team's unbeaten streak ends due to their poor performance, they will surely be criticized by the fans and feel uneasy in their consciences.
"Don't feel so pressured, this is just a friendly match, you played so tense in the first half, without loosening up at all, this will only make things worse!"
Del Bosque was clearly not satisfied with the players' performance in the first half, he knew these players were not weak.
The reason they didn't achieve results was mainly because they couldn't relax.
The unbeaten streak is an honor, but also a burden.
Using this burden, players tend to carry extra weight on the field, worried about too many things, they cannot play freely and naturally, leading to a defensive position.
"The coach is right, this is just a friendly match, play without worries, and if you really can't, leave our starters 30 minutes to fix things."
Seeing that the players didn't respond much to Del Bosque's speech, veterans like Xavi and Casillas stepped forward and said with a smile.
As the current world champions, they naturally must have confidence in themselves.
Spain's offensive power may not have been as exaggerated before, but now, after the addition of Lin Quan, the team's offensive power has completely improved.
Therefore, they have every reason to say that!
The young players, who were a bit nervous, felt relieved hearing what the veterans said.
Yes, with the veterans backing them, what are they afraid of?
Once they thought of this, the mental weight of the players was completely lifted.
After starting the second half, the performance of these young players improved significantly compared to the first half, and they began to show the typical Spanish combination.
This allowed Del Bosque to relax a bit.
Having veterans in the locker room is like having a treasure, the locker room atmosphere needs players like Xavi and Casillas.
In the 65th minute of the second half, after twenty minutes of attack, Spain finally equalized the score.
The goal was scored by Isco.
After equalizing the score, the young players on the field hugged each other excitedly.
Without many starting players present, with their own effort, they managed to hold the powerful South American team and, on two occasions after being at a disadvantage, managed to equalize the score.
This really wasn't easy!
Del Bosque also felt it wasn't easy for them, so he changed eight players at once, replacing all the young players on the field.
The starting players entered one after another, taking control of the game.
Although Del Bosque said he didn't care about the myth of the unbeaten streak, his action was very sincere.
Changing all the players with less than 30 minutes left in the match is simply underestimating others' intelligence if he didn't want to win.
The Chilean coach, seeing this change of players by Spain, could barely avoid a wry smile.
Although it's a friendly match and there are no limits on changes, don't their players need to warm up?
Replacing all their players suddenly, aren't they afraid we'll take advantage of the fact that their players are not yet familiar with the game's pace and catch them off guard?
Spain really isn't afraid!
After these starting players entered the field, they quickly took control of the game.
The Chilean team tried to make a surprise counterattack, but they ran into a steel wall.
Not only did Spain contain their attacks, but they also quickly launched counterattacks.
The game's intensity after the starting players entered was completely different from when they faced a group of substitutes.
The last 25 minutes of the second half almost turned into a Spanish attack and defense drill in the Chilean midfield.
They surrounded Chile's goal for more than twenty minutes and finally won the match with a score of 4-2.
In the stands, the substitutes watched as the team's starters crushed the opponent on the field, scoring two goals in just over 20 minutes, and they deeply admired them.
The team's older brothers really weren't boasting!
Even if they hadn't equalized the score, they could have easily beaten the opponent after the starters entered the field.
After the friendly match with Chile, Del Bosque announced the dissolution of the national team.
The players dispersed, returning to their respective teams.
The next national team match will take place in a month, but since they have already qualified in the group stage, Del Bosque might not call up as many starters for the matches in Eastern Europe.
Therefore, it may be several months, even half a year, before they meet again.
After returning to Manchester, Pere went to see Lin Quan.
"Earlier, you mentioned something about investments, so I did some research on my own. Take a look and see if there's any project that interests you."
Pere handed Lin Quan a document he had prepared with investment projects.
Lin Quan took it and reviewed it with curiosity. It was evident that Pere had worked carefully. The information he had gathered was very detailed and included various types of investments, such as real estate, futures, stocks, and more.
"After the 2008 financial crisis, the European real estate market plummeted, but in recent years it has been recovering. Property prices across Europe are on the rise. Additionally, Middle Eastern funds have been heavily investing in European lands, further driving up real estate prices. I've calculated that, based on the investment returns of the past five years, the return rate on real estate investments could reach approximately 10%, which is a pretty good return!"
Lin Quan remembered what had happened when he bought a house in Munich. According to the Germans, collaborations between Middle Eastern funds and them were quite frequent.
The oil magnates had made a lot of money due to the high oil prices in recent years and, having so much money, they were buying properties worldwide.
However, Lin Quan knew that with the outbreak of the conflict in Ukraine next year, the European economy would falter. At that time, the fervor for investments would quickly diminish, and those entering the market now might end up buying at high prices.
Therefore, he rejected this project.
"Real estate investments are too risky for us, given our limited capital. We better not get involved in that."
100 million pounds might seem like a lot, but in the face of high housing prices, it's actually not enough.
Hearing Lin Quan's words, Pere understood more or less his concerns.
He belonged to the type of conservative investor who despised risk and preferred low-risk investment products.
So, he said:
"The vineyards in France are a good option. The demand for wines in the international market is growing and the market's future is promising. Moreover, the entry prices are not high. What do you think?"
Investing in vineyards was something many Spanish footballers were involved in.
"You can invest a bit. How much does a medium-sized vineyard cost?"
"Probably several million euros."
"Alright, invest a portion for me, but make sure it has a vineyard."
Making money was secondary; having his own vineyard was his main goal.
"And what do you plan to do with the rest of the money?"
He had only invested one percent of his assets, most of it was still unspent.
"Divide the rest of the money into two parts. One half to buy shares of this company. The other half I'll handle myself."
There were some things Lin Quan didn't want to tell Pere, not because he didn't trust him, but because he wanted to avoid trouble.
If Pere knew, it would mean Guardiola would also know.
Guardiola was quite talkative and Lin Quan didn't like hearing him brag.
"Alright, I'll take care of it right away."
Pere looked at the name of the company Lin Quan wanted to invest in and nodded slightly.
It was an American Internet company, and at this time, investing in Internet companies was a trend.
Although he didn't know much about the Internet, he knew that investing in this sector in Europe was a high-quality investment. Moreover, the U.S. stock market had been steadily rising in recent years.
If this company didn't go bankrupt, the investment would be basically safe.
Thinking about it, Pere also felt a bit excited. When he returned, he planned to research more about this company and see how its future looked.
If the market evaluated the company well and its future was promising, he also planned to invest some money along with Lin Quan.
After Pere left, Lin Quan turned on his computer and searched online for the latest Bitcoin price.
Currently, the price of Bitcoin was 112 dollars each, which was very cheap compared to ten years later.
But at this moment, that price was quite high, almost twelve times more expensive than last year.
Many experts claimed that the price of Bitcoin was overvalued and that the trading volume was very low, saying it was just a scam to deceive people.
After a quick search, he found that most major online media had a negative attitude towards Bitcoin, and almost no positive opinions could be found about it.
He could understand it, he himself thought that this thing was unreliable.
However, the time traveler's memories told him that in 2013, nothing offered as high a return as investing in this.
Although in the last year, its price had increased more than ten times, which seemed quite excessive.
But that didn't mean the Bitcoin craze was over.
This virtual currency would skyrocket hundreds of times in a few years. If he bought now at this price and sold in 2017, he could get a nearly 200-fold return on his investment.
If he was a bit greedier and waited until the peak in 2021-2022 to sell, he could even get a return of five hundred or six hundred times his investment.
Of course, like most people, he also thought this had the risk of being a pyramid scheme.
Therefore, he didn't plan to hold it long-term, just to make a good profit and then leave.
But the time traveler's memories weren't necessarily reliable, and considering the butterfly effect, Lin Quan didn't dare to assure if Bitcoin in this time and space was as crazy as in the original world.
Therefore, he only dared to take out half of his money to invest in this project, and use the other half to make some safer investments.
At this moment, the shares of some Internet companies were still relatively low. After seven or eight years, when the prices increased tenfold, he could also gain considerable profits.
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