For some minutes the celebration continued in the training ground. Laughing, joking and clapping their hands, they continued to celebrate their team’s achievements in yesterday’s match against Maebashi Ikuei HS.
And while they were celebrating, sounds of laughter and cheers was reverberating all over the youth facility, as if somekind of festival was taking place.
Even in U-15 pitch, some players of U-15 were influenced by the uproarious celebration taking place in U-18 pitch. They were having difficulty holding back themselves from shouting out of excitement.
“They’re probably celebrating Hiro’s performance in yesterday’s match.” Shunta mumbled while looking at the direction of U-18 pitch.
“I wish I could score goals like him.” Yuya mumbled, sounding somewhat envious.
Talking such, they were totally forgetting that they were still in the middle of the training.
Upon seeing them slacking, manager Nozomi reminded them to focus on their own training, “For that you need to train hard.”
Hearing manager Nozomi’s words, a chill ran down their spine. Both of them then replied at the same time, “Yes sir” and continued their training.
Manager Nozomi however didn’t mind their lackluster behaviour and overlooked their behaviour. He then looked at the direction of the source of sound and lifted the corner of his lips, “You’ve really done it.”
Mumbling such with a smile on his face, he turned his focus towards his players.
**** ****
“Okay now let’s stop. I’ve got something to tell you all.” Manager Makoto commanded them to stop.
Frowning his brows, Makoto spoke in his deep voice while making a serious expression, “For tomorrow’s match we’ll be playing against our arch rival FC Tokyo. And we’ll be playing them in our own homeground.”
“And remember this match is very important to us. I’m speculating that there’ll be around 100-200 people in the match. And I don’t want to disappoint our fans who’ll be coming to the venue to show us their support. So just like how you’ve played yesterday, I want each and every single one of you to give your best in tomorrow’s match.” Making such speech, manager Makoto ignited a fire in his players heart.
“Yeah!! Let’s win this game.” Tomoyasu let out a furious roar.
“‘Yeah!!”‘
Following him, everybody did the same.
After that all of them started to train under the guidance of the coaches.
Determined and focused, they all gave their best in that morning’s training.
And after about two hours of rigorous training, morning training finally came to an end.
Relatively high up in the blue sky, sun was shining brightly, spreading it’s warm rays across the surface. Reflecting the warm light of the sun, the grassy green pitch of Kawasaki Frontale’s youth facility was glowing in golden colours.
Lying on the pitch, looking completely out of breath, players of Kawasaki Frontale were resting their tired body.
As usual, after the training, the coach’s were discussing the effectiveness of the training session and ways to improve the training drills to maximize the output.
Inhaling and exhaling few deep breaths, Hiro tried to stabilise his heart beat. And as he stabilised his breathing and heart beat, he then looked at the direction of manager Makoto.
‘System activate skill magic eyes.’ Looking at the direction of manager Makoto, Hiro mumbled to himself.
[Skill magic eyes activated]
[Target: Makoto Kenzaki]
[Overall grade: A-]
‘So it’s safe to say that he’s a good coach based on the assessment.’ Thought Hiro after witnessing the overall grade assessment of manager Makoto.
‘But if such a good coach of a professional team is only rated A-, then I wonder what rating those world class coach’s would get.’
‘Perhaps just like my potential, there’s a probability that A+ isn’t the highest rating. Then it must mean that there’ll be players in the world whose rating would exceed 100.’ Hiro couldn’t help but ponder.
While Hiro was pondering over such things, he wasn’t even aware that he was staring at manager Makoto, looking completely dazed.
Smack!!
While Hiro was intently staring at manager Makoto, looking completely lost, Tatsuki tried to disrupt him by hitting him on his back.
But before Tatsuki’s hands could even reach Hiro’s back, Hiro reacted subconsciously and raised his hands to block Tatsuki’s hands.
Blinking his eyes rapidly, Tatsuki was shocked by Hiro’s reaction.
“You caught my hand?” Tatsuki questioned with a dumbfounded look on his face.
Looking somewhat puzzled himself, Hiro himself was trying to figure out how he caught Tatsuki’s hand.
“I saw you approaching.” Replied Hiro after thinking of an excuse.
“I see” Nodding his head, Tatsuki murmured.
He then retracted his hands and asked again, “But why were you staring at manager Makoto? Did he say something to you?”
“Ah no.” Hiro immediately shook his head and denied Tatsuki’s claims.
Since Hiro couldn’t tell Tatsuki the truth that he was staring at manager Makoto to analyse his grade. Hiro started to think of an excuse.
“I was just wondering who he’d pick in the starting eleven in tomorrow’s match.” Hiro continued after thinking of an excuse.
“Hahaha… Why are you even thinking of such thing? You will obviously get picked.” Tatsuki laughed heartily after hearing Hiro’s response.
**** ****
Later in that same day, Hiro was sitting at his seat in his classroom, pondering about his earlier speculations.
Unable to find the answer he was looking for, he decided to ask the system directly, ‘System, is 100 the final limit of one’s stat?’
[System level not enough to answer]
[Please upgrade the system first to learn such confidential information.]
‘Tch!! This freaking system is damn unreliable. It never provide me the answer I’m looking for.’ Thought Hiro while clicking his tongue.
But such response of the system made Hiro more curious about the system.
While he was having conversation with the system inside his head, Rin entered the classroom and rushed towards him in a hurry.
“Yoh Hiro!! Our star boy. Good morning” Showing all his white teeths, Rin greeted Hiro with a big wide smile on his face.
“Good morning.” Hiro greeted him back while trying to distance himself from Rin.
“Why do you look so happy?” Asked Hiro while looking at Rin’s face.
Hearing Hiro’s question, Rin then placed his bag atop Hiro’s table and began to search for something in his bag without replying anything.
‘What is he doing?’ Thought Hiro while looking at Rin.
After few seconds, Rin then took a newspaper out of his bag. And as he took out a newspaper from his bag, Rin removed his bag from the table and placed the newspaper atop his table.
He then began to rigorously turn the pages of the newspaper. After turning three pages, he stopped at one of the page dedicated for things related to sports.
“Look here” Sounding all excited, Rin mumbled while pointing at one of the article in the newspaper.
“What do you want to show me?” Murmuring such, Hiro leaned his upper body to see what Rin was trying to show him. 𝒍𝙞𝒓𝒆𝙖𝓭.𝙘𝒐𝒎
Looking at the article pointed by Rin’s finger, Hiro started to read, “The birth of a world class player”
“In one of the match of Prince Takamado Premier League which took place on April 4, Takahashi Hiro, the youngest player to ever play in the league scored 4 goals and registered 1 assist in his debut, shocking everybody present in the field.”
While he was reading the first few lines of the article, his eyes widened just as he witnessed his name on the article.
Finding his name on the newspaper, Hiro stopped reading and turned his gaze towards Rin. Staring at Rin in awe, Hiro questioned in disbelief, “Is this article about me?”
Lifting the corner of his lips, Rin smiled and nodded his head.
“I… I… I can’t believe that my name is published in newspaper.” Hiro shuddered, feeling all excited.
“Why don’t you read the full article?” Rin asked him to read the full news.
Hiro nodded his head and started to read the article. The content of the article read as such;
“Only thirteen year old, Hiro has achieved what many players in the league could only dream about achieving. Scoring 4 goals and delivering 1 assist, he has proved that he is not afraid of facing players that are 4 or 5 years older than him. With excellent ball control, dribbling, passing and shooting skills, he’s proved that he’s no inferior to top tier talents of Europe and South America. Yet once again Japan has given birth to a world class player. But let us not put pressure on the kid and let him develop at his own pace. May be in the near future we’ll have someone of Messi and Ronaldo’s calibre from our own country.”
The first few paragraphs of the article was all filled with Hiro’s name. Exaggerating Hiro’s talents, the person who wrote the article was full of Hiro’s praises.
After detailing about Hiro’s performance in yesterday’s match, the article then detailed the performance of the team. And finally at the bottom of the page was a table showcasing the standing of the teams in the league.
East league
1) Kawasaki Frontale U-18 (Kanagawa prefecture) 3pts
2) Aomori Yamada High School (Aomori prefecture) 3pts
3) FC Tokyo (Tokyo) 3pts
…..