Shooting Trajectory is Visible - Chapter 273



Only Noblemtl

Episode 273: Who is the true owner of Manchester?

If there’s one thing I envy about Manchester City, it’s their stadium facilities.

There was certainly a big difference between Old Trafford, Manchester United’s home stadium, and the Etihad Stadium, Manchester City’s home stadium.

If I had to sum it up in two words, I would say it’s simply obsolescence vs. cutting edge.

‘Why doesn’t a club with so much money invest in its stadium?’

I thought so as I experienced various places in Manchester City stadium. First of all, the locker room was different.

H&B’s Philip Harris says United are already opening the door to a new deal before the first season is even over.

I’m not sure if I’ll continue at Man U or not, but if the aging of the facilities doesn’t change in the future… … well.

I wonder if I really need to stay at Manchester United. There are many clubs in the world that have good facilities and are good for me.

‘If we start negotiating a new contract, I think we should seriously ask them to do something about the aging facilities.’

Every time I go on an away game, I feel uncomfortable because of the negative emotions, so I wonder how uncomfortable the fans must be. That thought suddenly occurred to me.

‘Hmm. Am I just thinking too much? I need to focus on the game.’

I feel a little embarrassed because I feel like I’m the only one thinking this while the other players are trembling at the thought that it’s the last game and everything depends on it.

Soon the coach came into the locker room and we gathered in a circle and cheered each other on.

The discussion on tactics and strategy had already been concluded a long time ago, so all that remained was team spirit.

“In the end, it’s the opponent who is nervous. Even if we draw, we can still lift the trophy, and that’s the most important thing.”

Bruno Fernandes, the captain of Manchester United, suddenly looks at me and shouts.

“We have Kim on our team, right? He’s crazy about defense, so don’t be too nervous. If it doesn’t work out, Kim will do it for you.”

I quickly chimed in. I’ve felt over the last few games how tiring it can be to rely too much on myself, so I definitely need to get things under control.

“I know what you mean, but that doesn’t mean you can leave everything up to me. I need your help. You all know that, right? Manchester City are going through this.”

“Holland is going to grind on you, Kim. Are you okay?”

Baran says with a bright smile. … What is it? You are the one who should be stopping them, so why are you talking like it’s someone else’s business?

For the sake of my teammates’ morale, I answered nonchalantly.

“Holland? If you’re going to come in, just come in straight away. I’ll give you some.”

“Wow!”

The locker room heated up at my remarks. The players’ morale seemed to have gone up, and they all had bright expressions and shouted.

And with that spirit, we left the locker room. The game that would decide the direction of the league for the year in enemy territory.

Even the striker who won the Ballon d’Or this season is gritting his teeth to overcome his slump and get revenge for the last match.

I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t nervous, but my nerves were just a pleasant thrill.

“Brother, fighting…!”

Kim Jun-young recovered from his injury, but was ruled out of today’s game by Giovanni’s decision.

I’ll be sitting on the bench, but… well, unless I have no choice, it seems unlikely that I’ll come out today.

“Junyoung. In my opinion, you really have a good fate.”

“yes?”

If you just sit still on the bench, you’ll get the benefit of winning as a running mate.

This guy, who knew nothing, just blinked his eyes with a blank expression, but he was born with great luck.

* * *

After entering the stadium, the pre-match ceremony was held. Everything else was the same, except for the time to shake hands with the Manchester City players.

Holland looks at me intently, shakes my hand, and whispers.

“I’m going to beat you up.”

The time for shaking hands was very fleeting, and I had to move on without responding because I had to shake hands with the next player right away.

Of course, I’m not the type of person to just sit still and accept something like this, but it was also difficult to go back and say anything in response.

‘Do I have to shake my butt every time I block?’

I shook my head and soon gathered in front of the camera with the Manchester United players to take a photo, then went to the goal.

The Manchester City players were gathered in a circle in their own half to cheer each other on, as this was their home ground and to burn their fighting spirit for the last time.

‘Fighting spirit is overflowing.’

Man U skipped that process.

Since we had already been in the locker room, we waited for the Manchester City players to line up and lightly warm up in our respective positions.

And after a while, the Manchester City players took their positions, and the referee looked at his watch—

Beep!

The match starts with Manchester City scoring first.

As soon as the game started, the crowd at the stadium heated up the atmosphere with whistles and cheers.

As usual, I tried to watch how the game unfolded from the back row at the beginning.

‘What is this?’

But within three seconds of the whistle blowing, a trajectory appeared in my eyes. It was a pass trajectory.

Kevin De Bruyne took the ball first and stepped back briefly, allowing four Manchester City players to run deep into the United defence.

The next scene was Deokbae’s bold forward pass.

As soon as the game started, we fell into a situation of defense 4, offense 4. It felt like this was a tactical plan planned in advance.

Erling Haaland received a pass from Kevin De Bruyne, and with four Manchester United defenders in front of him, he made a move as if he was going to pass the ball, then immediately took a shot.

‘In the opposite direction?’

The motion clearly appears to be moving to the right, but the shooting trajectory indicates that it is moving to the left.

I had a brain freeze over whether to trust my intuition or the trajectory, but I quickly made a decision.

“Ugh!”

It was a trajectory that had never been wrong even once. I ran with all my might in the direction the trajectory indicated.

And at a very tense moment, he was able to block Holland’s shot.

It was a shot that could have been a goal if he had hesitated a little longer or if he had been running late.

It was out of bounds, but I stood up in surprise.

“I almost got eaten… .”

For a moment, Holland’s confident appearance overlaps in my memory.

And it was almost like a warning not to even dream of getting through today’s game without a hitch.

Was this a kind of prologue to what kind of game would unfold in the future?

‘It might have actually worked if the Prophet’s Eye hadn’t been upgraded just now.’

Holland’s shot was so close to the edge of the area that he could have missed it, perhaps knowingly.

And we prepared for a corner kick.

I didn’t get angry at the defenders for not responding, I just yelled at them to focus.

Because even I had a hard time predicting this scene.

As the corner kick situation came and players from both teams gathered in the box, Holland approached me and said.

“How was it? Did you feel refreshed? This is just the beginning.”

This kid’s doing it again.

Then I can’t lose either.

“It doesn’t matter. I can do this all day.”

He borrowed a famous line from Captain America. It was such a famous line that Holland must have understood it and smiled. And then he said,

“Really? Let’s see if you can keep up all night.”

Yeah, the game will be over in 2 hours~

I wanted to say that in response, but it was time for a corner kick. I hurriedly prepared for defense, and this time, a dangerous situation almost occurred, but with the cooperation of my teammates and I, we were able to overcome the corner kick crisis.

And then they kicked it away for a bit of a breather, but Manchester City looked completely unwilling to kill the tempo.

They picked up the kicked ball and started to drive it again.

It was as if we were surrounded on all sides by a pack of wolves.

To put it simply, it meant that there was a crisis less than a minute after the game started.

‘You really planned it and prepared for it.’

The league will give us the Champions League and we will prepare hard for it… .

I sighed and prepared to defend again, shouting at the defenders to hurry and get back on track.

First of all, I had to get out of the current situation.

If your opponent artificially increases the tempo, just cut them off.

‘I’ll block it first, then I’ll catch the ball and drag it.’

If it really doesn’t work out, I’ll have to file an appeal for injury. If the current situation continues, it seems like dangerous scenes will continue to appear.

And as expected, the crisis came quickly.

A cross came in from the flank and our defenders were so focused on marking Holland that they momentarily missed Foden, who had moved to the opposite flank.

Foden took the ball with his head without much trouble, and I couldn’t catch it and kicked it forward.

‘this.’

He tried to hit it forward, but it missed and the ball jumped up from its original spot. Then Holland quickly approached him.

I was unable to land properly because I was blocking the jump, and I ended up lying down.

In this situation, it was Maguire who blocked Holland with his shoulder and handled the ball.

Maguire, who has been in pretty good form lately, perhaps due to the effect of his running mate, won the fight with Holland and sent the ball out.

“good!”

I got up in a hurry and high-fived Maguire. Yes. This is defense. It’s not defense if I block it by myself. That’s just a show of force.

Holland was left feeling very sorry for missing the closest opportunity to a goal, which would certainly have been dangerous had it not been for Maguire.

It probably worked because it takes time for humans to learn.

‘But in this situation, it’s natural for the defender to kick it.’

What happened just now would have been a normal situation if two or three friendly players had not been sent off.

However, I felt the depth of Manchester United’s low point, so I thought the situation just now was a blessing. Their standards have been lowered considerably.

“after….”

I sighed after overcoming a crisis once. It felt like I was locked in a small space and being spun around, then being attacked with fatal blows whenever I saw an opening.

If it had been Hannover, they probably wouldn’t have been able to do anything in this situation and would have just kept getting hit, but fortunately, Manchester United is one of the best teams in the EPL in terms of weight class.

As the momentum grew, they were unable to counterattack, but instead took an active defensive stance, and Manchester City were no longer able to create threatening situations like before.

‘I feel relieved for now.’

Manchester United are in a desperate situation just minutes after the game started. What kind of team is this that their existing tactics go awry whenever they face a strong team?

Fortunately, Giovanni also seemed to have some sense and ordered us to refrain from aggressive attacks and slow down the pace of the game.

We kept turning the ball around to fit it.

I don’t know if it was intentional because Manchester City were frustrated with this situation, but a gap opened up in their defense, and we didn’t miss that mistake and attacked.

After giving and receiving in the Central Plains, to Hoilun.

And Hoilun hits a ground ball shot with two defenders in front of him!

‘A ridiculous attempt… .’

Well, I expected that.

It was a shot that was exhausting to watch, but I still clapped my hands because it was the first valid shot.

And as if they had gained momentum, Manchester United continued to create attacking scenes.

Hoilun receives a pass from Garnazzo on the flank.

Hoilun stopped for a moment, received the ball, took a few steps forward, and shot.

This time the shot went wide.

‘Swoop.’

I think it would be better if Junyoung just came in… .

I glanced at Giovanni. He was busy too, as he was chatting with the coaches while spreading out a piece of paper.

And as Manchester United continued to create offensive scenes, Manchester United’s entire line rose, and Manchester City seemed to have aimed for this by actively pressuring Manchester United during their offensive situations to steal the ball and then counterattacking.

‘It seems like they intentionally created this situation to give us a shooting opportunity.’

As the saying goes, turn a crisis into an opportunity, in fact, Manchester City were not good at just attacking.

Rather, it was much more advantageous to create a situation where the attacking numbers were greater than or equal to the defending numbers.

If Manchester United were to just crouch down and play defense, it would be difficult for Manchester City to score a goal (especially because of my presence), so it seemed like they were deliberately giving up attacking opportunities to wait for a chance to counterattack.

If we deliberately give Manchester United an opportunity to attack and they succeed, there will be chaos, but it is a kind of high risk, high return.

I don’t know if that’s what Man City really wanted, but that’s how things went.

‘Defense 3. Attack 3.’

The Manchester City players were running in an inverted triangle formation, while our teammates were running in a diagonal straight line.

It looked like Varane was running in front, Maguire was slightly behind him, and Shaw was running further behind Maguire.

‘Fuck. This space feels so wide open.’

What happened next was clear. Kovacic, who had been circling the ball, hurriedly poked a pass between Maguire and Shaw.

It was such an open space that it seemed to me like the best attack.

Winger Bernardo Silva received the ball and quickly entered the box, looking like he was going to take a shot.

I lowered my body and watched the situation until the end, and it was fake. It was Holland who was a little further forward and next to me.

The pass trajectory suddenly appears, and the shooting trajectory also appears in a chain.

Holland was on the right side of my position, so I quickly switched positions, and when I switched positions, Holland received the ball and passed it back to Silva.

I could tell right away what he meant, because the shooting trajectory disappeared in an instant and a new passing trajectory and shooting trajectory appeared.

‘No, fuck!’

It was a split second. I ran back the other way. Bernardo Silva kicked from almost in front of the goal, and the shot hit my stomach as I was diving.

And I stretched my arms and legs forward like a spider and grabbed the ball tightly so that it wouldn’t escape.

Silva tries to kick again, but when he sees that I have full possession of the ball, he jumps over me.

It was really, really dangerous.

And it was almost the first time that the trajectory changed so abruptly.

I felt my heart pounding with nervousness.

‘Yeah. It has to be at least this much to be world class.’

A team that lifts the Big Ears should be like this. However, contrary to such feelings, my body trembled, and it was definitely an eerie attack.

The Manchester City fans sighed in despair at my save, and the Manchester City attackers also raised their hands to their heads as if they had no idea this could be stopped.

Maguire runs up to me and suddenly starts to sweep the grass, hugs me, and pats me.

“Fucking great Kim. You’re the best.”

“…I could do this all day.”

“Okay, fuck. Please.”

For a moment, I looked away, and Holland happened to be there. He was looking at me too.

Holland grins and slowly opens his mouth. Judging from the shape of his mouth, Holland says:

“There’s still time, Kim.”

I suddenly got scared when I saw Holland, who was so confident and not at all intimidated even though he had a close call.

It really felt like we were going to concede a goal in today’s game and lose the championship.

In this situation, the KakaoTalk message I shared with Kim Shin-ah suddenly flashed through my mind.

[Kim Shin-ah: If Kim Min-woo is scared of losing his first goal to Holland, he’s a dog ㅋㅋ]

‘Dog chow…’

no?

I changed my mind.

Let’s think again.

That’s just empty boasting.

He couldn’t be confident when he was in a situation where he almost lost. He must be burning inside.

So I also need to show off my majesty.

I stood up from my seat and sent a reply to Holland with my mouth wide open.

“I could do this all day.”

Holland’s expression momentarily crumpled as he inferred the sentence from the shape of my mouth. But that expression quickly disappeared and he forced a smile.

And Holland turned around and ran to hide his emotions.

I also shook my head vigorously and tried to regain my senses.

The time on the scoreboard was 24 minutes in the first half. There was still a lot of time left… .