God Of football

Chapter 737: The Star He Is.

Fweeee

The referee’s whistle cut through the euphoria before it could swell any further.

PSG’s celebration had become a little too theatrical. Dembélé sprinting toward the corner, Kvaratskhelia and Vitinha following, arms aloft, and the official strode into the middle of them with a no-nonsense whistle and a raised palm.

”Bring it back,” the ref barked, voice carrying across the pitch.

His signal was final; the players reluctantly peeled away and trudged back to their positions, heads still high but their jubilation tempered.

Hakimi and Vitinha, still grinning, slowed their jog back to the halfway line, passing the Arsenal players, many of whom wore the heavy look of men suddenly reminded of the mountain they now had to climb.

Martin Ødegaard had his hands on his hips as his midfield mate, Rice, dragged his forearm across his brow.

The PSG players filed past them with a mix of swagger and nonchalance, muttering to each other in a mix of French and Spanish, boots clapping against the grass as they finally took their positions in their own half.

And then, before the restart, a different whistle cut through.

The referee gestured firmly toward the touchline, eyes narrowing at the fourth official, who had already raised the substitution board above his head.

In bright green: 10. Izan Miura Hernández. Beneath it, glowing red: 9. Gabriel Jesus.

The Emirates stirred, a ripple at first, then rolling into applause for the Brazilian forward.

Gabriel Jesus jogged toward the sideline, his shirt clinging to him, frustration mingling with fatigue in his expression.

It hadn’t been his sharpest outing with snatched chances and heavy touches at times, but the fans knew he had worked relentlessly, still carrying that unpredictable spark.

The applause was generous, respectful, and the North Bank rose to its feet.

Jesus lifted his hands and clapped above his head as he reached the touchline, offering gratitude where Izan stood waiting for him, sleeves tugged down over his wrists, already bouncing lightly on the balls of his feet.

They exchanged a quick handshake, a brief moment of understanding: one departing soldier passing the torch to the youngest and, inarguably, the best among them.

”And here he is,” Alan Smith murmured as the sound swelled, Arsenal supporters breaking into full voice.

”The Emirates knows what this moment could mean. This is the boy they’ve come to believe in. The teenager they’ve come to sing chants about all season despite the skepticism of forking out 140 million euros to buy him at the start of the season, but now, it looks like a bargain.”

Izan stepped over the white line, the floodlights bathing his frame as the pitch seemed to open up beneath him.

He pulled once more at his sleeves, exhaling, shoulders settling, then jogged briskly toward the centre, finding his place just off Ødegaard’s shoulder.

The camera caught a close-up of his face: eyes sharp, expression calm, but beneath it all, the slightest flicker of anticipation.

”He’s been out for a while now,” Alan Smith continued, voice raised to rise above the roar, ”but he is back again, and front pages of newspapers will most likely be craving for whatever this boy does next in the remaining minutes. Izan Miura Hernández enters the Champions League night at the Emirates once again. Arsenal need a lifeline, but can their Talisman provide?”

PSG looked settled, composed, but for the Arsenal supporters, the match had just been given new breath.

Havertz rolled the ball back toward Izan, a simple touch to let the teenager respond and get used to the rhythm, and Izan’s response was instinctive.

With a swooping first touch that sprayed wide toward Saka on the left, he moved into space, the crowd humming at the crispness of it.

As he jogged forward, he flicked his eyes toward the scoreboard — 83 minutes, ticking into 84.

Time slipping away.

Before he could linger on it, a sharp call rang out.

”Izan!” Odegaard’s voice cut through the din.

The captain had drifted inside, ball at his feet, urging him on.

Izan snapped back to focus, driving into the gap between the lines as Odegaard’s pass came fizzing low, straight and driven.

Izan stepped forward to meet it, only to let the ball run through his legs.

A ghosting feint, and suddenly Fabian Ruiz was behind him, scrambling.

Izan shifted, trying to wheel round and surge into space, but Ruiz leaned in hard, chest to back, knocking him off balance.

Izan toppled onto the grass, palms outstretched, and the whistle pierced the night as the referee strode over, already fishing for the yellow card as Ruiz protested half-heartedly.

”Seventeen seconds!” Alan Smith exclaimed, almost laughing. ”That’s all it’s taken Izan to cause chaos out here.”

Alan McInally chuckled. ”The boy’s barely touched the ball, and PSG are panicking. Brilliant.”

Declan Rice was already there, strong arm pulling Izan back up.

The teenager stamped his boots against the turf, thudding them like they were tethered down before bending to tuck one loose end of the lace inside his boot.

”Worth keeping an eye on that,” Smith noted. ”Remember, Izan’s just come back from that ankle injury. Anything excessive, any awkward twist, and you run the risk of reopening the problem.”

But Izan shook it off in the moments that followed, and strode further into PSG’s half, ready for what was next.

The seconds after the foul bled away with a nervous buzz running through the Emirates, every Arsenal pass greeted by a roar, every PSG touch smothered in whistles.

Rice, calm yet commanding in the middle, took a touch out of his feet before swinging a measured pass out wide.

It was aimed for Trossard, the Belgian who had come on with fresh legs and fresh intent, and he let the ball run across his stride with one fluid motion.

Just ahead of him, Izan angled across the flank, showing for the ball, a feinting option if needed, his presence alone drawing one defender an extra yard inside.

”Here’s Trossard now... Izan making the angle...” Alan Smith called.

But Trossard didn’t need the lay-off, or so Hakimi thought, as he tensed to go one-on-one with Trossard, but the winger slid the ball behind where Izan had settled before receiving the return pass, now free of his marker.

He let the ball roll a step further, touched it forward once, and then with his second touch, clipped in a curling cross on the one.

The ball streaked towards the penalty area like a silver arrow, the crowd rising as one in anticipation.

Inside the box, Havertz braced himself, eyes locked on the descending ball.

He rose, contorting his body to meet it, but so did Willian Pacho, the Ecuadorian leaping with full commitment.

Shoulder to shoulder, body to body, the contest was brutal and brief as Pacho’s forehead met the ball cleanest, sending it clear of immediate danger.

Or so it seemed.

The clearance didn’t carry far.

It spun, looping awkwardly, and fell teasingly towards the edge of the area.

And there, waiting like he always did, was Izan.

Alan McInally’s voice tightened. ”Oh, look who it’s fallen to...”

Izan’s body was coiled, posture low, his right foot hovering like a trigger, and in that fraction of a second, the crowd seemed to hold its breath.

Everything about him was poised, predator stillness before the strike as he adjusted with a single sharp step, timing immaculate, the muscles in his frame tightening like a spring about to snap and then,

”IZAN—!!” Alan Smith’s voice climbed in pitch as Izan’s foot met the ball, and then,

BOOM!!

The sound of Izan’s strike echoed like a cannon shot inside the Emirates.

His right leg had cut through the ball with such venom that even the PSG defenders nearest to him froze for a split second.

Marquinhos, closest of all, instinctively ducked as if his body knew there was no stopping what was coming.

The ball thundered toward goal, a white blur streaking past the desperate pink shirts.

It smacked violently against the underside of the crossbar, the metallic clang ringing out across the ground.

The rebound was cruel and perfect all at once, dropping down behind the line, spinning against the net as Gianluigi Donnarumma stood rooted to the spot, unable to even lift a hand.

”IZAAAAAN!!!” The commentator’s voice cracked with sheer disbelief.

”That is out of this world! A strike of pure violence and beauty! The seventeen-year-old has turned the Emirates into a volcano!”

The stadium erupted.

Fifty-plus thousand Arsenal fans leapt as one, a red-and-white sea convulsing in pandemonium.

The noise was deafening, screams, chants, the rumble of stamping feet shaking through the stands, but the truth was no camera could do justice to the electricity flooding the stadium.

Izan didn’t even pause to check.

The moment the ball cannoned in, he was already off, sprinting toward the ball, which would have mostly been met by some opposition from the PSG players, but they were too stunned to argue.

The Emirates shook as the chant rang loud and unified.

”I-ZAN! I-ZAN! I-ZAN!”

Donnarumma stood still, staring at the net, shaking his head in disbelief, while Marquinhos raked his fingers through his hair, knowing there was nothing he could have done.

PSG’s players slumped back, the wind knocked out of them by the sheer audacity of the strike.

”Listen to this place! You will not hear a louder roar in North London all season! Izan Miura Hernández has just lit up the Champions League like the superstar he is! What a moment, what a goal, what a player!”

On the touchline, Mikel Arteta clenched both fists, screaming into the night sky, veins bulging as he turned to whip up the crowd even more.

The scoreboard flickered.

Arsenal 1 – 2PSG

And still, the Emirates would not quiet down.

It was pure bedlam, a wall of noise crashing back onto the pitch.

Izan rose from setting the ball down at the Center, chest heaving while pointing to the badge on his shirt before lifting both hands high, as if to say:This is my house.

The game had flipped.