God Of football

Chapter 743: He Makes It So Easy.

As the clock ticked by, Arsenal pressed again, a patient black wave rolling forward as passes were exchanged across the middle of the pitch.

Declan Rice swept a ball into the channel, looking for Saka, whose first touch carried him near the touchline.

The Palace defenders tracked back hurriedly, their fans urging them to close ranks as the ball bobbled out of reach, rolling into touch for an Arsenal throw.

Saka retrieved it quickly, wiping his palms against his shorts before lifting his head.

Izan was already there, trotting over with his arm raised, calling for it, and the understanding was almost wordless.

Saka threw it short, chest height, and Izan cushioned the ball down on his chest, prepared to spin into the space he had seen before anyone else.

But just as the ball dropped, a sudden jolt came crashing into his back, the weight of a boulder slamming into him at full stride.

The contact was brutal, unexpected and intentional.

His feet lost their anchor beneath him despite his effort to stay upright.

He staggered, knees buckling, before crashing onto the turf, and the whistle shrieked almost immediately, piercing through the swell of noise inside Wembley.

”Foul, surely! That’s late, and it’s heavy,” Martin Tyler’s voice rose with the whistle. ”The referee is already across, and this does not look good for Palace.”

The crowd’s reaction fractured into competing waves of noise.

Arsenal supporters howled for a card, fists thrown into the air.

But from the corner filled with Palace fans, the chants rained down venomously.

”Flopper! Get up! Wanker!”

It rolled like a chant, harsh and relentless, every syllable biting into the air.

Flat on the turf, Izan twisted onto his side, grimacing as he looked back and just beyond the referee’s shoulder stood Marc Guehi, the perpetrator, hands raised in a protest that rang hollow.

His eyes darted toward the official, pleading innocence while calling the fall of Izan soft, citing that the latter had intentionally dropped to the ground after seeing no way out.

The referee stood firm, arm stretched, pointing directly at the spot where Izan had been upended, and another sharp warning followed, the gesture firm as he beckoned Guehi closer.

”Well, it’s not subtle from Marc Guehi,” Jim Beglin cut in, his voice carrying a mixture of disbelief and inevitability. ”You can’t simply barge through the back of a player like that, especially not when everyone’s watching. Izan had his chest to the ball, clear control. That’s reckless.”

Arteta clapped once from the touchline, though his expression was taut, brows furrowed as he shouted instructions toward his bench.

Meanwhile, Izan pushed himself up slowly, dust clinging to the sleeve of his shirt, his breathing heavy as he regained his footing.

The jeers rumbled on, but his eyes locked briefly with Guehi’s, the faintest spark of defiance flickering there.

”Listen to that noise, Jim. This place has erupted — Palace fans convinced he’s made the most of it, Arsenal fans baying for justice. Whichever way you see it, Izan Miura Hernández is at the centre of it all again.”

While the free-kick had hardly been awarded, Izan darted forward in a swift motion, nudging the ball into place with a burst of intent that made half the Palace players panic.

Two defenders hurled themselves into the line of fire, knees bent, arms braced against the sting of impact, while another looked ready, like he was about to sprint towards the referee and complain anytime soon.

For a heartbeat, Wembley tensed, expecting the ball to fizz through.

But the strike never came.

Instead, Izan stood there with his boot planted squarely on the ball, a wide grin tugging at his face as if he’d just pulled the oldest trick in the book.

He looked at the Palace defenders writhing in awkward stances, one of them practically crouched like a sprinter waiting for the gun.

The tension cracked instantly into laughter.

A ripple of chuckles began in the Arsenal section, rolled into cheers, and even a smattering of neutral voices around the stadium joined in.

In the gantry above, the commentary booth wasn’t spared.

”Oh, he’s played them all, Jim!” Martin Tyler laughed, his voice shaking with amusement. ”Half of Palace threw themselves into that ball... only for it to stay exactly where it was.”

Jim Beglin was chuckling too, hardly able to hold his line. ”You have to admire that cheek, Martin. That’s a kid with the courage to embarrass senior defenders on the big stage. That grin says it all.”

Down on the pitch, even Saka was clutching his stomach, pointing at Izan with an incredulous shake of the head.

The referee, though, was less amused, striding back toward Izan with a pointed finger as if to remind him the game wasn’t a stand-up routine, to which the fans didn’t take lightly.

”What, you get warned for that now?” a fan in the stands said.

”Game’s gone,, another replied.

Still, the moment had broken the tension.

For a few seconds, the boos and jeers that had followed the foul were drowned out by an atmosphere that was lighter, brighter.

”Well, if there was ever a way to shake off the pressure, this is it,” Tyler added, his tone softening back toward analysis. ”Arsenal have been trying to funnel everything toward Izan tonight, and he’s finding ways not only to influence play but to command the stage.”

Enough laughter. Enough smiles.

As Izan jogged back into his own half, brushing shoulders with Adam Wharton, he muttered something low under his breath, half to himself, half to the Palace midfielder shadowing him.

Whatever the words were, they weren’t meant to entertain.

The grin was gone.

Palace had been nibbling at his ankles, clipping at his shins, leaning their weight on his shoulders whenever he dared to spin.

Rough, deliberate fouls that skirted the referee’s tolerance.

But rather than complain, Izan lowered himself deeper, tugging his marker with him into unfamiliar territory.

Jim Beglin spotted it first from above. ”He’s dragging his man away here, Martin. Look at the space it leaves in Palace’s midfield... It’s a clever shift.”

And then came the flick.

A sudden, feather-light touch of his heel that turned the ball behind Wharton, bypassing the nearest line of pressure as if it were nothing more than a formality.

Martin Ødegaard pounced.

The captain didn’t hesitate, shaping his body so the ball skipped off his instep toward the right channel, where Bukayo Saka was already on the move.

The roar inside Wembley lifted as the number seven took it in stride.

One touch, two, and suddenly he was going stride for stride with Tyrick Mitchell.

”Saka at full flight—Mitchell can’t stop him!” Martin Tyler cried, his voice quickening as Saka shifted gears.

Mitchell tried to lean across, desperate to shepherd him into traffic, but Saka’s shoulders dropped, his legs churned, and in one sharp twist, he was free, tearing down the flank with grass and noise at his feet.

Declan Rice read the moment perfectly, bursting forward to overlap, timing his arrival as the pass cut back toward him.

He didn’t break stride, whipping a cross into the mixer with venom.

The gantry braced, and so did the fans.

”That’s a dangerous one! It only needs a touch! Sakaaa!”

But there was none.

Maxence Lacroix stretched, sliding across the box with an outstretched boot that met the ball cleanly.

The danger seemed cleared, only it wasn’t.

His clearance skidded across the turf, skipping away from the melee but not far enough, rolling into the most dangerous patch of grass in Wembley: just beyond the edge of the Palace box.

And there stood Izan.

Back to Daichi Kamada, body pressed against him, the seventeen-year-old arched his frame, feeling the weight of the Japanese midfielder on his back.

The ball fell, silent, obedient, cushioning at his feet as though it had been placed there by design.

Tyler’s voice dropped to a simmer, tension bleeding through every syllable.

”And it’s landed for him...”

All eyes tilted forward as Izan shifted his weight, the stadium holding its breath.

Then, with a sudden jerk of his hips, he rolled it forward, shaping as though to strike with his right as he held off Kamada with his arms.

”He’s going to hit it!” Tyler’s voice spiked, the crowd bracing for the explosion.

But it never came.

The teenager merely dragged the ball onto his other side as his right foot cocked back in a convincing motion.

The Palace back line lunged, bracing for the shot.

Even Henderson, crouched low in his goal, shifted weight to his near post, palms itching.

But with a deft cut, Izan snapped the ball back onto his left as Kamada staggered past him, helpless and there, the gap opened like a trapdoor in the grass.

Beglin’s words cracked through the gantry: ”Oh, that’s filthy deception! He’s sold the lot of them!”

Izan didn’t hesitate.

His left boot struck through cleanly with a sniper’s touch, a carpet strike, dragging blades of turf in its wake as it skimmed low, arrowing toward the far corner.

Henderson, already committing to the other side, quickly changed directions as he sprawled full length, a desperate stretch of fingertips chasing shadows.

But the ball was already gone, slicing past him, nestling into the back of the net with a thump that felt louder than thunder.

And then the stadium erupted!

Arsenal’s end roared, red and white flags thrashing, voices cracking in unison as the players surged toward their talisman, fists raised, faces alive with belief.

”IZAN MIURA HERNÁNDEZ! He has the first goal of this tie, and he makes it look so simple, but dear viewer, it is anything but that!”

On the touchline, Arteta was already punching the air, his shouts drowned out by the avalanche of sound inside Wembley as the scoreboard flickered.

Arsenal 1–0 Crystal Palace.

a/n: First of the day. Okay now I gotta sleep and prepare for Calculus.