Carl sat with his coffee for a while after the call ended.
The cup had gone cold. He hadn't noticed. He was doing the specific ntal work of a professional who has just been told no by soone who was supposed to say yes, running back through the conversation to find the mont where it went wrong and coming up empty.
It hadn't gone wrong. The kid had listened properly, understood what was being offered, and turned it down. Seventeen years old, two professional matches, and he'd declined Manchester United with the tone of soone rescheduling a eting.
Carl had been doing this for nineteen years. He had been turned down before - agents playing for better terms, players with existing loyalty to a club, families who didn't want the relocation. He had never been turned down by the player himself, on the spot, without consulting anyone, because he had decided staying where he was served him better.
He left a generous tip and walked back to his hotel. He had a report to file. Ferguson would want to know what had happened and why, and the honest answer - the kid thought about it and said no, was not going to be the simplest conversation he'd ever had.
He filed it anyway. Accurately.
Sowhere in central London, Tom Warrick let himself into the production office at half past ten.
Duncan was already there, headphones around his neck, a half-eaten sandwich beside his keyboard. He looked up. "Thought you were still in Germany."
"Got back this afternoon." Tom dropped into his chair and pulled out a USB drive. "Before we finalise the top ten, I need you to look at sothing."
Duncan rolled his chair over. Tom plugged in the drive, found the file, and played it.
The 14-pass sequence. The one-twos through the Magdeburg midfield. The inside-of-foot arc curling into Hant's run. The goal. Then, separately - the free kick bending away from the front post and arriving at an empty back post.
Duncan watched both clips without speaking. When the second one finished he stayed leaning forward with his elbows on the desk, staring at the still fra.
"That's the Third Division?" he said finally.
"Schalke U18."
Duncan turned to look at him. "How old is he?"
"Seventeen."
A short silence. Duncan turned back to the screen. "Okay," he said, in the tone of soone revising sothing they'd already decided. "That's top three."
"I know. Why I'm here at half ten."
"The sequence or the free kick?"
"The sequence. Free kick's close to second."
Duncan exhaled and pulled up the current list, scrolling through it with the grim focus of soone doing arithtic they don't enjoy. "We're going to have to redo the bottom half."
"Sorry about that."
"No you're not." But he was already rewinding the clip, watching the 14-pass build-up fra by fra this ti, pausing on the delivery. "What's his na?"
"Mateo Silva."
Duncan grabbed a pen from behind his ear and wrote it on the pad beside his keyboard. He underlined it once, for no particular reason, then went back to watching.
That sa evening, across the city from Tom's production office, a football fan called Alex was watching the weekly highlights show on his laptop when the number three clip began.
The presenter's voice: "From the German Third Division - Schalke 04 Under-18, second round of the season. Watch what happens from the mont this midfielder receives the ball..."
Alex watched it once. Then again. He went to his keyboard and typed the na into a search engine.
The forum thread ca up imdiately - Farfán's original post, now with nearly forty thousand views and replies still coming in. He read through the top comnts. He watched the debut highlights. He found the match footage from the second ga.
He closed his laptop two hours later and went to bed still thinking about the outside-of-foot pass that had bent around two retreating centre-backs at ground level and curved right on the bounce.
That sa evening, in Gelsenkirchen, Schalke 04's first team were playing Cottbus at ho in the second round of the Bundesliga.
The result was 0–1.
Cottbus, newly promoted, set up in a low block and stayed there for ninety minutes. They conceded possession, invited Schalke to play through them, and waited for the mistake. The mistake ca from Schalke's midfield - specifically from the gap between the defensive midfielders and the attacking line, a gap that had been a problem in the first match and was still a problem in the second. Raúl made intelligent runs that nobody fed. Huntelaar chased long balls that weren't properly weighted. The Cottbus central midfielder, doing nothing spectacular, simply intercepted a wayward pass in the 63rd minute and played it wide for the goal.
The ho fans had started booing by the 70th minute.
After the final whistle, the crowd around the player tunnel made the exit complicated. Magath, surrounded by his staff, kept his expression neutral and his pace steady. The chants from behind the press barrier were not subtle. Several reporters had their caras pointed at his face, looking for a reaction.
He gave them nothing.
He went inside and went back to work.
Monday morning. Eight o'clock.
The training ground was already full - first-team players arriving in ones and twos, the particular looseness of a group that had lost badly two days ago and hadn't fully processed it. Conversations were quieter than usual. Nobody was laughing at anything.
Word had gone around the squad the previous evening. Hughes Yves had sent a brief ssage to the group: a player from the U18 academy would be joining first-team training from Monday. No na in the ssage, but in a squad this size, nas travelled faster than official communications. Most of them had heard "Mateo Silva" by Sunday night. So had looked up the highlights.
Farfán was already on the pitch when Mateo arrived, going through his individual warm-up. He straightened up when he saw him, looked him over once - taking in the first-team training kit rather than the U18 one and ca across.
"So it's true," Farfán said.
"Apparently." Mateo set his bag down. "Did you know before last night?"
"I had a feeling after your second match. Didn't know it would be this fast." Farfán fell into step beside him as they moved onto the pitch. "How are you feeling?"
Mateo considered it. "Like I've been in the building next door for six weeks and soone moved a wall."
Farfán laughed - short, genuine. "That's about right. Just train. Don't try to make an impression in the first session. There'll be people watching you looking for reasons to have an opinion either way. Don't give them material."
"I wasn't planning to."
"I know you weren't." Farfán glanced across the pitch. "Bujerab's going to be difficult."
"He's not a bad player. He's having a rough start and you've arrived at exactly the wrong ti for him."
Mateo looked at where Bujerab was stretching alone near the far goal, his back to most of the group. "I'm not going to do anything about it. That's his thing to work through."
Farfán nodded once, satisfied with this. He peeled off to continue his warm-up.
Raúl arrived a few minutes later, nodded at Farfán, glanced briefly at Mateo - he rembered, the Garden Stadium, three weeks ago, watching from the fence and went to his own routine without making anything of it. He'd said what he needed to say through Farfán. The rest would play out on the pitch.
Bujerab saw Mateo from across the training ground and found sowhere else to look.
Magath and Hughes Yves ca through the gate and the training ground shifted - conversations stopping mid-sentence, everyone finding their position.
Magath looked at the group without preamble.
"Mateo Silva. U18. So of you have seen him play. He's joining the first team from today."
He turned to Mateo.
Mateo stepped forward. He looked at the group - professional footballers, most of them older than him, several of them internationals, at least two Champions League finalists.
"Mateo Silva. From Brazil. Attacking midfielder."
Short. Factual. A few players nodded. Most applauded briefly. Huntelaar caught his eye and gave a small nod.
Bujerab, standing near the back, looked at sothing in the middle distance.
Mateo moved to stand beside Farfán at the end of the line.
Magath was already talking about the session.
Plz Drop So Power Stones.
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