From Arsenal to the Ball God

May 27th, Departure Day.

After some morning exercises focusing on physical strength and speed, Ma’el took a shower and changed clothes, preparing his belongings for the final preparations before departure.

During the process, he also glanced at the skill levels of various skills to see the improvement effects of recent intensive training.

[Skills: Decision Level 4]

[Skill Level: (2032/5000)]

[Skills: Rapid Charge Level 4]

[Skill Level: (1454/5000)]

[Skills: Divine Power Level 4]

[Skill Level: (1021/5000)]

[Skills: Fancy Breakthrough Level 3]

[Skill Level: (1439/2000)]

[Additional Skills: Fancy Techniques Level 2]

[Skill Level: (391/1500)]

”The increases are decent.”

He exited the skill level panel with satisfaction, knowing that Fancy Breakthrough was about to reach Level 4, marking a qualitative leap.

Once the additional skill Fancy Techniques reaches Level 3 or 4, he will officially light up the Four Stars Reverse Foot!

Just thinking about it, you can imagine how much this will enhance his overall breakthrough ability.

After experiencing a season in the top league, Ma’el could clearly feel that with the constant advancement of modern football’s tactical and technical systems, the intensity of defenders’ defenses was rising.

This doesn’t mean their personal abilities are increasing, but rather within an ever more precise defensive system, each defender can better utilize their strengths and avoid their weaknesses as much as possible.

There are fewer instances of being out of position or facing forwards in one-on-one situations unprepared, and defensive lines are less likely to become disorganized and scattered.

More often, they have ample time to position themselves properly, lower their center of gravity, and face the forwards’ impact with full readiness, maintaining a tight chain link structure among themselves.

Even Messi cannot easily get past them in such situations.

His few frontal evenly matched breakthroughs are some of the classic moments of his career... like shaking off Scholes with a feint, or the unbelievable stumble of Boateng.

Ma’el chose to train in Fancy for this very reason, finding that most of his dribbling breakthroughs occurred in counter-attacks, one-on-one or one-on-two situations.

As long as the opponent slowed down his attack and positioned themselves well, having an evenly matched encounter, his success rate for breakthroughs might not be as high.

Not to mention the dense defense in positional battles, facing a chain-link defensive group of 3-4 opponents.

Even with his incredible power and speed, he could still achieve 4-8 breakthroughs per match, creating 2-3 scoring opportunities, and even managing to score once in a while.

But it’s still not enough!

With such powerful passing and shooting techniques, he should be creating more scoring opportunities, achieving more goals and assists when the team struggles to break the deadlock!

Therefore, he must pursue more flamboyant variations and improve his breakthrough abilities in small spaces and directly confronting opponents!

After half a season, his improvement was satisfactory, finally nearing the day of great success.

Once he lights up the Four Stars Reverse Foot, he could proceed to upgrade his dribbling and additional skill Rhythm from Level 4 to Level 5, truly bringing his ’carrying’ standard close to the ultimate level.

By then, even if the opponent’s defense was tight and their positions were solid, his solo breakthrough performances would become routine, yielding more incredible highlights than Messi and Neymar.

No longer dwelling on breakthroughs, Ma’el focused on the three skills currently upgrading to Level 5.

”It shouldn’t be difficult to increase each by about 1000 points by the end of the offseason.”

He had a rough estimate of his improvement speed in mind; the European Cup ended on July 2nd, and the new season started in mid-August.

During this period, his improvement speed would be very fast... adding the small improvements during the European Cup, raising by 1000 points wasn’t really difficult.

”But if we pursue an immediate combat boost, should we add 1-2 skills of 2000 points to upgrade from Level 4?”

Ma’el came up with a new plan; starting to train skills with 2000 skill levels now would ensure his capability enhances significantly by the first half of the next season.

Otherwise, constantly waiting for these three skills to reach 5000 skill levels would be endlessly long.

Let’s do it!

Since entering the Level 5 era, we can’t let just Long Shot stay lonely at Level 5; let’s train 2 more skills to accompany and complement it!

Ma’el didn’t hesitate long in skill selection, first adding ’Dipping Shot’ to his training plan, then adding ’Crossing.’

Obviously, these two skills are currently the ones that can most effectively improve his scoring and assisting efficiency with a 2000 skill level.

From his early career practice of these two skills, it’s evident they offered the highest return on investment.

”Jose!”

After packing, Ma’el called Jose to help formulate the training plan.

Only physiotherapist Harry, Safina, and personal doctor Lewis would accompany him to the France team training camp this time.

Jose and Davis had little to contribute now, reportedly returning home and only returning after the matches started to watch from the stands.

So let him prepare the plan in advance and practice during his free time.

”Give me three days, then I’ll send it to you via mobile phone.” Jose agreed, not rushing into the research as they still needed to see Ma’el off together today.

”Alright.” Without hurrying, Ma’el went to his room to put on the suit he wore for the previous Golden Ball Award ceremony, and then, with Isabella’s help, started to style himself.