Greatest of All Legends

Chapter 10: Halftime Argument

Jordan ran and did a sliding jubilation after his goal, while the team members of team C followed after him.

After a quick exchange of hugs and high-fives, Jason quickly dragged them back to their half of the pitch so that the match could continue.

Team A quickly kicked off once again, now even more desperate for goals, but not losing their cool anymore as they were now two goals behind in less than ten minutes since the match started.

They slowed down the pace of their attacks and tried playing a more possessive gameplay, but Team C’s carefully arranged defense and previously planned defense measures stood strong and while they got some shots away, they weren’t any closer to scoring a goal.

Meanwhile, team C stayed with their possession cum quick counter gameplay and almost punished Team B with two more goals, but due to the heroics of the goalkeeper and lack of focus from the Team C forwards the score remained 2:0 until the twenty-eight minute when George had failed to control a pass from Kurt and the left winger of Team B snatched the ball from him and began to head for the goal while cutting in from the wing.

Aarons, the goalkeeper quickly saw the approaching left winger and came out to throw him off, but the left winger instead waited until the goalkeeper was close enough and tried to curve the ball around him instead.

The ball went past Aarons and headed toward the goal but ended up hitting the goal post and coming back out, but the center forward of team B was there to catch the rebound and send it to the back of the net, bringing the score to 2:1 just before halftime.

After finally getting a goal, team B tried to use their momentum to get another goal and sent shots flying at the goal, but Team C held on till the referee blew the whistle signifying halftime.

The players stopped play and trudged off the field after hearing the whistle with each team going to different locations to rest for their ten-minute break.

On team C’s side, some of the players were comforting George as he was the one who had made the mistake that had led to team B scoring while the rest of them were drinking water and debating with the five substitutes about the players that would come off the team.

Jason wasn’t even counted among those with the potential to be substituted as he was obviously the best player on the team despite having not scored a goal in the match yet, not to mention that he was the captain of the team, so no one on the team even brought his name up when they were debating the matter.

Unfortunately, due to the nature of this team and match, there were almost none of the people on the team who wanted to be subbed off the team and this caused the back and forth to develop until the point where it almost became a fight.

Daniel and Jordan had decided to give up their spots as they had already scored and felt that they had displayed enough on the field to get offers from some of the scouts, plus if they ended up winning the game, which seemed highly possible with the way that they were playing, they would get to play another match and be able to display themselves even further.

Unfortunately, the other players who hadn’t scored didn’t have that kind of emotional security and were not keen on giving up their playing time and neither did the substitutes who hadn’t even stepped on the pitch, after all, no one knew if they would end up winning the game.

Jason saw what was happening but did not interfere as none of them mentioned his name.

He was also here for a reason and that was not to play babysitter for the kids who were on his team.

The only reason why he had even bothered setting up a game plan before the match began was so that his team could have a fighting chance and could play better which in turn would allow for his talents to shine through.

This team was temporary and there was no point in building any emotional attachments with anybody here, not that it was easy for him to do that anyway, after all, due to his strange mental state, he was always a scarily rational person… most of the time.

In the end, after a long debate that took up most of their ten-minute break, it was decided that Daniel, Jordan, George, Carlos, and Kurt would be substituted, and the five substitutes would come on into the match and this ended up bringing up a different problem.

The five substitutes didn’t play the same positions as the positions that had been freed up so it was inevitable that the formation would have to be revised and there would have to be changes in the game plan, but there was almost no time left, so Jason quickly interjected and made the necessary changes to the formation before they erupted in another useless battle of words and rights.

The five players coming in were Orland(ST), Jerry(CM), Daniel(CDM), Terrence(CB), and Jayden(RB), which didn’t exactly match up with the positions that were opened up, so Jason decided to play on the right wing instead while having one of the midfielders take over his position.

That was all he had time to do before they ran out of time and had to get back on the pitch, so he just told them to focus more on defense and hold out so that they could win the game, but he could tell from the looks in some of his teammates that they wouldn’t be listening to his advice.

‘Their loss,’ he thought to himself as he walked back on the field and moved to his new position.

He had been watching every one of the players who were here for the trial and had determined that there didn’t seem to be any player that was better than he was, so he was going to let loose in the coming second half of the match without caring if they won or not.

The only reason why he had merely stuck to just making passes and nothing else was because he knew that the youths here were very anxious about their chances… desperate even.

He wasn’t willing to take his chances and annoy them by playing them in circles, thus incurring their wrath and causing them to send some very dangerous tackles his way.

This was why he had stayed simple and not even done a simple step over and had simply passed the ball as soon as he saw a player coming towards him.

It was all to make them lose their guard around him and he was planning to reap the rewards of his actions in the second half, especially since his original style of play was more devastating on the wings.