Chapter 74 - The Late Starter (1/2)

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation  Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

Under surprised gasps, the ball darted between Xia Bo and Zhang Jun. Both of them did have a hold on it. Xia Bo then slipped outside the box, while Zhang Jun jumped to the left and rounded to the right in pursuit of the rolling ball.

He got to it at a tight angle and turned to shoot!

It flew over Cao Po’s foot before deflecting off the post and flying into the net!

The loudspeakers exploded after a second of stunned silence. “It’s in! The ball went in!”

Li Yongle immediately rose from his seat and raised his hands triumphantly in front of the middle-aged man beside him.

Liu Qi waved a huge flag energetically; the Shu Guang cheerleading team heated up!

Ren Yu De, Wang Ning as well as a bunch of teammates whooped and ran to join Zhang Jun in celebration by the corner flag.

Kaka remained where he was. “Pele?” He sighed. Zhang Jun’s goal had made him recall memories of Brazil’s golden days. In the 1970 World Cup game between Brazil and Uruguay, Pele had used a similar move albeit missing his target towards the end. The World Cup legend was so disappointed that he pouted and rolled on the ground right after.

However, Zhang Jun made his mark! Kaka’s vision became hazy because Zhang Jun’s back seemed to be overlapping with Pele’s. And he found himself being unable to differentiate the two for a while.

That was when Zhang Jun ran towards him, snapping Kaka out of his trance with a hug.

“Hehe! Great pass! I really didn’t know how to get past the keeper, so I simply feinted. But he fell for it!”

It appeared that the captain was unaware that he had imitated the Samba legend’s move perfectly—save for the outcome, naturally.

They had been teammates for some time now, but Kaka finally realized how formidable the ever-smiling boy truly was.

Awed gasps sounded from the stands as the silver screen replayed the goal.

So, soccer could be played like that. Without a touch on the ball and just relying on feet movements, Xia Bo was shaken off. On top of that, the ball was thumped in from a miniscule angle. It was as if the gods wrote the script.

Liu Wei stared at the display and groaned inside. There was no complaining against that; Zhang Jun had beaten the offside trap designed exclusively for him. He virtually did it all by himself before scoring such an exquisite goal.

Li Yongle sat and turned to Zhang Lintao.

Knowing what he was going to ask, the Zhongyuan keeper shook his head. “I would have been fooled just the same. Although I would foul him by pulling him down.”

“Hey, hey! That’s going to be a red card!” Zhang Yang called out.

Closing his eyes to consider, Zhang Lintao continued, “I would do that in such a moment. That kind of play would make any keeper lose their cool. ‘I can’t let him score. I’ll do whatever it takes!’ That would be my train of thought in such a scenario.”

The referee whistled for the restart even though the crowd had yet to calm down from Zhang Jun’s sensational goal.

Still, the most the goal had done for Shu Guang was level the scores; it did not deal a huge blow on Dingding’s morale. That was clear on the restart—they attacked, intending to take the lead again.

This time however, they had to be prudent.

At this point, they had to heed Zhang Jun on the counter along with Ren Yu De’s penetrating dribbles. Even if the latter was running on fumes, he was still an unnerving sight for the Dingding defense. As such, their defense was unable to support their forwards going upfield, significantly weakening their offense.

Still, Shu Guang’s attack was not very threatening as well since both Zhang Jun and Ren Yu De were now completely under “intensive care” by the other team.

The match entered a period of a stalemate for another five minutes.

Ren Yu De was almost at his limit.

He was left gasping for air even when he was essentially standing still, completely unable to participate in the team’s attack. It was Liang Ke’s cue to sub him off; there was still a match next week.

“Yuan Shuai, start warming-up,” he called out.

Yuan Shuai stood up and prepared to take his jacket off when a voiced stopped him.

“Wait.”

Fan Cunjie dribbled the ball away from Wang Ning and passed it just ahead of the menacing Li Hao.

The ball reached Bin Fei’s feet and the striker stopped with his back facing Shu Guang’s goal. Li Jieguang was pressuring him too much; he could not turn and he was forced to return the ball to Fan Cunjie, who was coming up.

Dingding’s captain raised his foot and thumped it from outside the box.

Not risking it, An Ke dived towards it. But it went off the bar, not before causing a few hearts to skip a beat.

The referee whistled to signal a substitution.

Everyone looked at the fourth official who stood by the technical area. He first raised a board with the number “9”, and then another with the number “7”.

A commotion formed from the stands near the technical area. The spectators there had seen the player, who was wearing a white jersey and standing beside the fourth official.

It was Shu Guang’s captain—the one who clocked in at 10.52 seconds in 100-m dashes and fired 180 km/h shots—Yang Pan!

The commentator excitedly announced, “Shu Guang substitution: No.9, Ren Yu De is off and No.7, Yang Pan is on!”

At his words, the Shu Guang cheerleaders blew up in a thunderous applause, drowning out the jeers from their Dingding counterparts.

Liu Wei tensed a little. Zhang Jun alone was troublesome enough, and now there was Yang Pan; the tiger that was Shu Guang was finally baring its fangs and claws.

In his corner, Chen Huafeng still found it hard to wrap his head around why Yang Pan was only subbed in at this point of the game. Nonetheless, he breathed a sigh of relief. Switching the weary Ren Yu De for the sprightly Yang Pan, Shu Guang’s firepower would be increased.

“Yang Pan’s finally up!” Zhang Yang chirped excitedly. “Been looking forward to this!”

“Aren’t you just here to see him shoot both keeper and ball into the net?” Li Yongle grunted.

Zhang Lintao ignored his friends’ banter. He straightened himself in his seat, glaring at the No.7 player who was preparing to enter the pitch.

“Yang Pan…” he murmured quietly.

According to Liang Ke’s instructions, Yang Pan would be taking over Ren Yu De’s position as striker. Additionally, he would be switching flanks with Zhang Jun—he would play on the right while Zhang Jun would move to the left.

That being said, Ren Yu De was a little too slow in getting off the pitch. Kaka quickly went over to help him.

“Thanks,” Yang Pan took over and whispered in his teammate’s ear.

Wearily, Ren Yu De raised his head and smiled. “The rest is up to you…”