NOVEL NEXT
Chapter 350 Japan u17 vs Poland u17 VI
Just like the rest of his teammates, Hiro too made his appearance on the pitch, walking alongside Shun.
But seemingly appearing lost in his thoughts, he appeared not to care about the noise going on around him nor did he appear to care about the glares of the opposing players he was getting without any reason.
Maybe, there was a meaning behind those glares as if they were trying to tell him that even in this half they'll keep him under their pocket like how they had done successfully in the first half.
Or maybe they were trying to figure out what he was up to.
Who knows what their intentions were?
Right now, all he could think about was how to complete his quest. Registering a goal and an assist is still doable but what would he do about the third objective?
After all, the match rating would be decided based on his overall performance of the entire match. And after that shitty display in the first half, achieving an 8.5 rating was rather a difficult task even for him.
Though Hiro didn't heed their hostile glares, Shun was replying hostility with hostility and glares with glares.
Glaring right back at them while making a face like that of a delinquent, he was provoking them without any care, "What's ya looking at, you shitheads?"
It's like after denying them any goals in the first half, he had gained indomitable confidence. Feeling like a goliath, he felt as if he could do anything at the moment. Let alone going up against those bunch of Polish players' glares, heck he could even take them on a fistfight all by himself.
So, was the adrenaline rush, he was feeling at the moment.
Though none of the opposing players could understand what he was talking about, they could still tell that he was swearing at them by the simple body cues and the tone of his voice.
Yet, oddly enough, none of them wished to engage with Shun at the moment. Well after listening to the complaints of their coach in the locker room, only a fool would try to create a fuss.
Nothing good would come by engaging in a battle of provocation with Shun.
With such thoughts in mind, they then retracted their gaze from them and parted ways, heading to their side of the pitch with their mouth shut.
Revealing a satisfied grin on his face, Shun scoffed as he continued to glare at them even after they parted ways, "Yeah, who are you trying to intimidate shitheads?"
And only after they walked quite far away from him, did he retract his gaze from them. At this point, he and Hiro had already walked quite far into their side of the field as well and he had to rush back to his position for the referee to start the game.
All of a sudden, Shun then stopped as he asked something that had been on his mind for quite a long time, "Why are you falling back so often today?"
Faced with Shun's questions, Hiro became speechless. He couldn't tell that he was doing so because he couldn't trust his teammates to supply him with the pass.
It would only make him seem untrustworthy.
Thus, for a while, he continued to search for excuses. But no matter how hard he tried to think of a reasonable excuse, he couldn't come up with any.
Noticing, Hiro's silence, Shun decided not to pester him more on that matter because of the urgency of the situation. And he knew Hiro well enough already. If he was remaining silent then there must have been something on his mind which he couldn't explain.
Instead, as the time was running out, he tried to encourage him.
"Leave the backline to me, you just do what you are good at" Saying so in a rather confident tone, he stretched his fist towards Hiro.
Though it wasn't the reason why he was falling back often, oddly enough, he still felt assured upon hearing his claims. Truly, Shun was on a roll today.
Smiling, he then bumped his fist against his as he mumbled, "Sure, let's do that"
Beep!!
The second half commenced with the sound of the referee's whistle.
By now, the sky had already transformed into a breathtaking canvas of black and indigo filled with countless stars. Alongside the shimmering stars, the crescent moon cast an eerie glow across the sky.
However, its light faded in comparison to the lights of the floodlights installed in the stadium. And rarely did anybody in the stadium take notice of it due to the ongoing match on the field.
For quite a while, the opposing team pushed aggressively. Especially, Patryk and Jakub, those two seemed even more ferocious than before.
But, despite their efforts, the score remained the same as Shun continued with his form from the first half. Making countless unbelievable saves, he held his side of the bargain.
Compared to the first half, Hiro's situation too got somewhat better. But still, he found it quite troublesome to find the back of the opposing net.
Just then in the 74th minute of the match, after making a brilliant save, Shun immediately played the ball to Takeshi who in turn sent the ball flying towards Yutaka without wasting any time.
Even now, instead of going after Yutaka or Nijichi, the opposing team rushed towards him. Sure enough, it was already visible to the audience by now that Hiro was their priority target.
Rushing towards the left flank, away from Yutaka who was charging from the center, Hiro made use of his skill, lightning steps. There was already a defender stationed at the left flank.
And one of their center back was also cutting in from the center while Patryk was chasing him from behind. Sure enough, they were trying to isolate him and outnumber him.
"Did he make a wrong pass?"
The commentator questioned as all of a sudden just before he clashed with the player closing in towards him, Yutaka kicked the ball towards the right flank where seemingly nobody was present aside from the left-back of the opposing team who was sprinting backward after failing to score a goal a moment ago by going on the offense.
Because the spotlight was focused on Yutaka, he failed to take notice of Hiro who had swiftly changed his direction midway. If not the commentator wouldn't have made that blunder.