“Captain. Don’t send the youngest to interviews next time.”
“Why? He did great.”
“The problem is he did too well. My wife cried reading the article, you know? She says we should bring him over sometime. Says she wants to cook him something nice.”
“Now I’m losing to the kid even in interview skills. Sigh. I should retire when I’m old.”
“Really? Then do I become a starter?”
“Yeah. In five years.”
Inside the locker room, my ears burn as I overhear my seniors’ conversation while tying my shoelaces. The match is about to start, so it should be the time we’re most on edge… but everyone is busy laughing and chatting.
It was all because of the interview I’d given two days ago.
“Anyway, I almost cried too. I thought he hated us since he always just teases us.”
“Right? We had no idea he cared about us like that.”
“What did that reporter say again?”
“Something like, doesn’t it suck playing with low-level teammates? Our youngest told them all to shut up.”
“If it were me, I’d have gone along with it. I’d have given him a thumbs-up, calling him a reporter who knows his football.”
“The way he said he protects his hopeless seniors who lose immediately without the youngest—it was so touching.”
Hmm.
Honestly, I’m regretting it a little. It was a question I could have easily passed on, yet I’d answered it emotionally. Thanks to that, I can’t stand the embarrassment. My seniors look at me with moved eyes; I’d rather they teased me like always.
If I were to make excuses, I was in a sensitive state. I knew that people with cameras and microphones love to fabricate stories and blow small things out of proportion. But people blabbering about things they know nothing about really disgusted me. If they had only disrespected me, I could have endured it. But it was hard to endure them disrespecting my seniors and our team.
Whether it was that hack commentator who treated my seniors like fools during the Lazio match, the opposing team spewing rude remarks, or the reporters intentionally blowing it up—they were all just blabbering without knowing a thing.
How dare they look down on Fiorentina.
If I had played for another team, I would never have been able to play like I do now, nor would I be scoring goals. I can guarantee it. My time at Juventus is the proof.
I came here, met good kids, and met teachers in Coach Tony and Coach Luca. Thanks to them, I grew attached to this land that had once been nothing but frightening, and came to feel as if unfamiliar Florence was my home.
It was the same after I was promoted to the first team. The coach and the seniors all helped me adapt. They approached me first, a brat who was nothing, and taught me. Moreover, when I was struggling and couldn’t run, everyone ran an extra step for me.
The reason I am where I am now is not because I’m great. If not for the shade created by Coach Tony and Coach Luca, I would have withered and twisted under the scorching sun. If my seniors hadn’t become the soil and shared their water, I wouldn’t have even gotten the chance to sprout.
Because I met them, I was finally able to become a flower bud. I, who was fated to wither and become soil, could become a flower bud because I met Fiorentina.
Well, someone listening might think even this is arrogant. Comparing oneself to a flower—it’s not strange to find it funny.
But I truly think a flower is nothing. It merely catches the eye a bit from the outside. A flower can do nothing on its own. It can’t absorb nutrients like the roots, can’t serve as a pillar like the stem, can’t volunteer for the hard work like the leaves. All a flower knows how to do is look showy.
I became a flower not because I could do more than others, but because this was all I could do. I can’t be a root like the coach, can’t be a pillar like the captain, can’t be leaves like the defenders or midfielders. I merely receive their help and pretend to be showy on the outside.
So when ignorant people blabbered on, I was angry and ashamed at the same time.
I’m truly nothing.
“Alright, let’s head out.”
“Let’s go, let’s go!”
At the captain’s words, they stand up one by one, and I too tighten my laces and stand.
In the end, there’s only one thing I can do.
To bloom as showily as possible.
Making sure the fruits of everyone’s labor don’t look worthless is what I must do.
“Let’s go, let’s go!”
I nodded, slipped out of the tunnel, stroked the lily—the symbol of Fiorentina—emblazoned on my chest, and ran out onto the field.
*
“Try to get under his skin. Provoke him into getting emotional. Got it?”
“Yes—”
Atalanta BC manager Pierre Gasman says to his players and nods.
It was about Ijian.
*If only he’d rested one more match. Why now.*
The moment he checked today’s starting lineup, Pierre Gasman pressed his temples. Because Ijian, who had missed the last match and was suspected of injury, was included in the starting lineup.
From an opponent’s perspective, Ijian was a massive headache. It was obvious. It was hard to find a player as versatile as Ijian in the current league. Sometimes he orchestrates the match like a conductor, and sometimes he becomes the crack himself and stands at the forefront. It was simply astounding how such a young player could put on that kind of performance.
Even teams like Juventus and both Milan clubs couldn’t properly stop that Ijian; it seemed difficult for his own team, far below them, to stop him. That’s why seeing the starting lineup gave him a headache.
However, after seeing the interview he gave before the match, he was able to grasp a slight clue.
That clue was that he was still young.
He had said things while preparing for this match against Fiorentina. That their head-to-head record against them was better, and that as proven in the Lazio match, if you exclude him, the rest of their players were inferior to theirs—things like that.
It was the usual psychological warfare. Hard to even call it a provocation—just words meant to boost team morale.
But hearing those words, Ijian had reacted quite emotionally. Was it because he still didn’t know better? He had clearly taken it as a serious provocation. Being young, he wasn’t skilled at controlling his emotions.
So he thought he’d poke at that. Provoke him moderately and hope he lost his pace. If Ijian wavered, Fiorentina was nothing.
“Be-e-e-ep-!”
Therefore, around when about five minutes had passed after the match started, an Atalanta defender spoke to Ijian.
*
“You’re way smaller than I thought.”
“…?”
“Why couldn’t other teams stop a kid like you?”
I’m standing with my back to the defender when I hear him muttering behind me. He talks like he’s speaking to himself, but anyone can tell it’s directed at me. I glance back to see a big, scary-looking defender snickering.
“…”
Hmm.
Too bad. If he were just a bit smaller, I’d have said something back. He should count himself lucky.
Tap-tap-tat—
Not having the patience to keep listening to his big mouth that doesn’t match his size, I move. From center to right. I switch with Romero.
“Where you going? What changes if you move here?”
But cringe. His brazen yap follows me and keeps flapping. Was he instructed to man-mark me? I don’t like the clingy type.
“Why so quiet? You mad?”
He sticks right behind me and lets out a “hehe” laugh, which makes my skin crawl even more.
*Don’t tell me there are guys like this at Jiu’s school too. If there are, I’ll take Milenkovic senior and pay the school a visit.*
Stalking is a bad thing, after all.
“Where to now. Annoying.”
I move again, but the stalker still follows me. So annoying. Why can’t ears close at will like eyes or mouths? I want to slam them shut. Can’t he just focus on the game quietly?
“Must be tough for you too. Running around with those guys is why you’re so busy. Without you, your team kids can’t do anything.”
…Hmm.
This won’t do. If I can’t close my ears, I have no choice but to close this stalker’s mouth.
“Ooh, scary. Looks like he’s really mad.”
I glance over and see him snickering and flapping his gums again. Seeing that, I feel blood rushing to my head. Thanks to that, my head starts working faster than usual.
“…”
I look around, taking in the opposing players’ positions, then place white magnets on the field unfolded in my mind. A defensive 4-4-2 based on the 4-4-2 formation, with the backline and the line in front set flat. To counter it, I stick purple magnets on the opposite side. This side is in a 4-3-3 shape.
I transfer my teammates’ current positions onto the mental field exactly as they are. And I move the purple magnets around one by one. If one purple magnet moves here, the others will move like this… And in response, the white magnets will move like this…
Soon the hands moving the magnets multiply, and I start moving several at once. The more I do, the hotter my head feels. It keeps getting hotter as more magnets move. But I can’t stop.
At the moment I worry my crown might burn and I’d go bald like the coach…
“…!”
It feels as if my crown has been pierced through—a refreshing sensation. At the same time, the magnets I was moving by hand start moving on their own. Without me moving them directly, all the magnets come alive and traverse the field.
And I look down at all of it from above.
“…can… hear…?”
Before I knew it, the bigmouth’s babbling that didn’t match his size couldn’t pass through my ears. I had no nerves to spare for worthless babbling. I was too busy observing the movements of the magnets unfolding in my mind.
Tap-tap-tat—!
The purple magnet bearing the number 20 runs toward where it must go. Near the halfway line. It drops toward a point where it can receive the ball. At the same time, the chain effect that would occur from my movement unfolds in my mind.
While running, I turn my head to check if it matches reality.
Confirmed.
Whoosh—!
I trap the pass coming to me, then push the ball to the right to set it up for a left-footed strike. And immediately, I hit a long pass.
Whiiiiish—!
Confirming the pass stretching into open space, I turn my body and run forward. As I do, I accelerate the simulation unfolding in my mind to 1.5x speed and turn it in multiple directions. I select the one simulation with the best result. And I trace the exact route I had moved in that simulation.
Tap-tap-tat—!
I run along the right half-space. Then, around when Senior Saponara, who received the ball on the left, turns his gaze to the center.
Tap-tap-tat—!
I change direction and rush left. I cut diagonally from right to left toward the front of the goal. At the same time, I shout.
“Hey—!!”
Whoosh—!
The pass moves ahead of my direction of advance, and I run to meet it. I had to run a bit faster than I’d pictured in my mind. The pass was a bit long. But it was fine. Because I could modify the plan.
Tap-tap-tat—!
A few steps before the point where the ball and I meet, I adjust my stride long. The angle is tight, but it’s a position where I can strike it cleanly enough. The opponent will know that too.
Shhh-reeek—!
A sound of grass and uniform scraping together. The defender following me throws his body and stretches his leg. It was a desperate lunge to block the shot, but instead of shooting, I checked the ball.
Whack—!
When I cut the ball completely with my left foot, the defender passes in front of me. At the same time, I draw back my right foot.
Direction… toward the far post.
Whiiiiish—!
Lightly, like a pass, I pushed it with the inside of my foot. Thanks to that, the shot headed exactly, precisely in the direction I wanted.
Shoooooo—
Thwack—!!
The net shakes.
But not all calculations are done yet.
What should come next is…
Waaaaaaaah—!!!
Yes. This is it.
Only after I felt the enormous roar burst with my body could I stop my head.
After that, I simply moved as my body led.
My hand tapped the lily on my left chest, and my legs ran along the stands.