Portishead kicked off with no patience whatsoever.

  Straight from the whistle, their six rolled the ball square, their right centre-back took one touch too many, and then they predictably punched it forward early, a hopeful vertical meant to establish territory rather than logic. It skidded across the grass and landed at the feet of the one player I’d already clocked as the weakest link.

  Luka Petrovic.

  Every semi-pro league in the North seemed to have at least one Petrovic: Balkan surname, tidy boots, decent engine, and just enough technical polish to look convincing until you actually pressed him. The overlay confirmed what my eyes already knew.

  That combination was a gift.

  Petrovic received on the half-turn, tried to cushion the ball across his body to shield it, but his touch ran long. I stepped through him, clean as you like, nicked the ball off his toe, and was already looking up before he’d even registered the loss.

  Turnover. Mine.

  No time to dwell. I pinged it forward first time, a flat pass split between their midfield line, right into Henderson’s path.

  For half a second, Henderson looked like a man who’d been handed a live animal and wasn’t sure where to put it.

  “FEED THE CAT!” Mitch bellowed from the touchline. The old code. Play it back inside; feed the triangle.

  Henderson didn’t.

  Maybe it was instinct: he saw space and couldn’t help himself. He carried the ball wide, somehow passing their left-back as he rode it out toward the right corner flag.

  Henderson dropped his shoulder and whipped the cross in.

  Roberts was waiting.

  He’d ghosted off Pinout’s blind side, timed it perfectly, and met the ball with a thunderous header that thudded just wide of the near post. Close enough that their keeper stood still, close enough that the crowd sucked in a breath as one.

  Mitch let out a sound somewhere between a growl and a swear. “HENDERSON! THAT’S NOT THE CALL!”

  Henderson threw a hand up as he jogged back, but I barely heard it. My eyes were on Portishead’s centre-backs.

  They were rattled.

  Pinout was still arguing with his fullback, blaming the cross. His partner hadn’t even checked over his shoulder on the run, just ball-watching like a trainspotter seeing his first steam engine in the wild. The shape they’d held on paper was already fraying under the slightest stress.

  Interesting.

  The restart came, and within a minute the pattern repeated itself.

  Portishead tried to go down my side.

  Their left winger dropped short, dragged our fullback with him, and the eight made the underlapping run into the channel, exactly the sort of pre-scripted movement coaches loved because it looked tidy on a whiteboard. The pass was meant to be slipped inside my shoulder, into the gap they assumed would open.

  It didn’t.

  “Hold. Don’t step,” I called to Reeves, already shuffling across. “Show him the line.”

  Reeves trusted it. He angled his body to shepherd the winger wide instead of diving in. That forced the passer to hesitate for just a fraction, but it was enough.

  “Now,” I said.

  The ball came anyway, telegraphed and hopeful. I stepped across the lane and cut it out clean, one touch to kill it, second to push it out of my feet before their winger could react.

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  I’m going to farm so much EXP from this game.

  I punched the pass out to Henderson. He read it early, stepped in front of their fullback, and suddenly had grass in front of him again. Same lane. Same mismatch.

  “FEED THE CAT!” Mitch roared, right on cue.

  Henderson stopped the ball. The moment passed, the lane narrowed, and he rolled the ball back inside instead. The triangle formed, but it was stiff, and still not rehearsed enough. After a few touches too many, Portishead shuffled across, reset their block, and the moment died without even a whimper.

  Philosophy preserved. Threat neutralized. I groaned.

  Play carried on for another phase before the ball went out for a throw. As Henderson jogged past me to reset, I drifted across his path, close enough that it looked incidental.

  “Do that again,” I muttered.

  He glanced at me, surprised. “Thought Mitch wanted—”

  “I know what Mitch wants,” I said. “They can’t defend the channels. You’ve got them on toast. If you see space, just do that again. If not, feed the triangle. Mitch can’t say anything if it works.”

  Henderson gave a short, nervous laugh. “You’re saying that like you won’t be the one getting bollocked.”

  I shrugged. “I’ll live.”

  The throw came in. Portishead’s left-back glanced over his shoulder this time, wary now, and that alone told me we’d already won something. Their centre-backs stayed deeper, uncertain, no longer sure who was meant to step and who was meant to cover.

  Good.

  I dropped half a yard, opened my body, and made myself available. Henderson took his first touch forward instead of sideways.

  The cross was rubbish.

  Henderson overhit it by a yard, sent it skidding beyond Roberts and into the channel where no one lived. Their right back retrieved the ball for a counter.

  Mitch detonated.

  “What did I say?” he roared from the touchline, arms flailing like he was directing air traffic in a storm. “WHAT DID I SAY, HENDERSON? FEED THE BLOODY CAT! WE DON’T GO HERO BALL IN THE FIRST TEN!”

  Mitch’s voice kept going, spilling over the pitch in sharp, public syllables. Philosophy. Discipline. Trust the process. All the hits.

  But now I was making his job easy.

  The damage was already done.

  Portishead’s left-back didn’t push up as high anymore. Their left winger stopped cheating inside and started checking over his shoulder before every touch. Their centre-backs were five yards deeper than they’d been at kickoff, which meant their midfield had to stretch to compensate.

  They were scared of the channel now.

  Now would be the right time for a triangle.

  Portishead adjusted, if you could call it that. If the right channel was poison and the middle felt less hostile, then the left would have to do.

  They worked it around slowly this time, recycling through their six, dragging Milner across before slipping it out to their left winger. He took his man on early, chopped inside once, then again, just enough to buy half a yard. Their fullback overlapped hard, and suddenly they had a bit of momentum.

  A low cross came in, skidded fast across the six-yard box.

  I stepped across the Petrovic’s run and got there first. The clearance wasn’t pretty, but it was decisive—straight into touch, forty yards up the line.

  “Good,” Kowalski barked behind me.

  They tried again almost immediately. Same side. Same idea. This time the winger didn’t bother with the overlap; he slipped a through ball early, threading it toward the channel between Kowalski and me, betting on hesitation.

  There wasn’t any.

  I read it off the passer’s hips, stepped forward, and cut it out with the inside of my foot before it could even think about bouncing. One touch, clean. Second touch, gone.

  Petrovic came steaming in, late and hopeful, trying to turn it into a duel.

  That was optimistic of him.

  The ball somehow got to Petrovic a minute later, and he tried to shift it past me with a little shoulder drop and a toe poke. It might work when defenders panic or overcommit. I didn’t do either. I just stood there, waited for the touch to drift too far from his body, and took the ball like I was reclaiming lost property.

  He bounced off me and stumbled, arms out, looking for a whistle that never came.

  At this level, I might as well have been a brick wall with studs.

  They kept coming, increasingly desperate now. A hopeful diagonal. I headed it away. A loose second ball. I won it. Another rushed through pass, this one straight down the middle, panic-written all over it.

  Intercepted.

  I could practically feel the numbers ticking upward with every touch. And I still had 64% Stamina left.

  I checked the clock. Thirty minutes gone.

  We just needed one goal before my fuel tank ran out.