From Arsenal to the Ball God

On June 1st, Ma’el woke up in the morning, went downstairs, and ate a nutritional meal prepared by Safina, then got ready to head to the training ground for practice.

He had already talked to Mendes about finding him a top technical training private coach and a physical training private coach. Presumably, there would be news soon.

For the next few days, he can temporarily set aside the ball-stopping practice that requires two people to work together and focus entirely on improving his ball control ability, aiming to enhance this crucial ability as soon as possible!

”Boom boom boom.... boom boom boom....!”

Arriving at the field, Ma’el’s feet quickly touched the ball, sometimes switching left to right and then right to left, sometimes switching the ball back and forth between his feet, and sometimes trying various dribbling skills with one foot.

His ball-touching frequency wasn’t particularly fast, but after a period of training, noticeable improvements could be seen, and his stability had greatly improved.

He believed that this ability could definitely be trained, and although it hadn’t appeared on the skills panel yet, there must be some mystery to it.

”Boom boom boom.....!”

During training, he often got lost in his thoughts. Whenever this happened, Ma’el would exert all his strength to accelerate the frequency of his footwork, striving to control the ball with his maximum speed, allowing him to maintain full concentration.

He was well aware that only by being this focused and constantly challenging his limits could he quickly improve his ball control ability.

Of course, sometimes when he trained until the world seemed to spin, he couldn’t help but doubt whether this ability existed and if training it was useful at all.

The first reason was that it was indeed different from other skill-based abilities, making it hard to define as a characteristic ability, as it seemed more like an overall comprehensive enhancement ability.

The second reason was from a realistic point of view, is someone with good foot control skills on the field necessarily able to beat their opponent?

Definitely not.

Good ball control could be considered a hard skill, but it also requires the support of soft skills, such as rhythm, reaction, speed, and so on.

These brain-related ones could not possibly be included in the ’ball control’ panel, could they?

Could it require specialized training?

Ma’el felt it was not right either; he could figure out the ball control training, but training for something as elusive as rhythm and reaction was something he had no clue about.

”Perhaps the private coach I find at that time can solve this?”

He could only place his hopes on this, or perhaps not think too much about it for now and just focus on enhancing his ball control ability first!

At 4 o’clock in the afternoon, Ma’el finished the skill training and headed to the gym to train Power and Coordination, two physical abilities.

As expected, his ball control panel had not appeared.

He couldn’t help but feel a bit frustrated and annoyed.... It’s been many days, and he always felt like he was grinding something that didn’t exist.

”Just hang in there a bit longer!”

Ma’el cheered himself up. He recalled that whenever he had this kind of emotion in the past and forced himself to persist through it, he always got good results.

[Skills: Strong Level 3]

[Skill Level: (789/2000)]

[Skills: Flexibility Level 3]

[Skill Level: (568/2000)]

[Skills: Power Side Foot Level 3]

[Skill Level: (366/2000)]

Looking at the skill levels he was currently training, Ma’el found the growth was quite good. Before the season started, at least one ability should see an upgrade.

Perhaps taking advantage of the off-season to train hard, the speed of improvement could exceed his expectations!

......

At noon, when Ma’el just turned on his phone, he saw many messages from Gilbert.

He was just about to change clothes to go see him off in the afternoon when he was slightly taken aback by the messages.

——”Fooled you, actually my ticket was at nine in the morning, bye-bye..... Just didn’t want to say goodbye, wanted to leave in style, play it cool, hahaha..... See you next year!”

——”Of course, I can’t say definitively, if I play well on the new team, I might come back early to show off and see your match.”

——”Keep it up, I was the captain of that Arsenal U17 team, and you are the hope of that Arsenal U17, we both must not lose face, you conquer London, I’ll go explore elsewhere, let’s make our mark!”

Gilbert left?

Ma’el stared at the phone screen, feeling a sense of indescribable emptiness in his heart.

Leaving was indeed a bit sudden, quite cool.... but it’s fine this way, saving the farewell.

As he was about to close his phone, he saw some missed calls in the call log from Isabella; they had exchanged numbers before.

Calling back, a gentle, vibrant voice came from the other side: ”Ma’el, you’ve really become a star now, you’ve really made it, the phone can’t even get through.”

”No,” Ma’el replied with a smile, unsure of what she wanted to talk about: ”I’ve just been training constantly, very busy.”

”I’m coming to London tomorrow.”

Isabella’s voice was filled with anticipation, more vibrant, ”Do you have any thoughts on having a meal with me? Just so you know.... There’s some good news.”

Ma’el thought back to when he left Sheffield and saw how popular her sports brand store was, combined with her previous promise, he had a guess.

”Good news? Is it that the joint apparel sold well, and you’re giving me a bonus?”

”Correct! Come pick me up at the airport tomorrow.”

”Alright.... see you tomorrow then.” Ma’el perked up; things related to getting more money naturally interested him.

Hanging up the phone, he lay on the sofa of the mansion, looking at the comfortable surroundings and recalling the last lifestyle wish he had before coming to London.

A sports car!

Without further ado, Ma’el grabbed Harry to go out together and headed to a large Ferrari dealership in Central London.