"If Simão Sabrosa were here, Simão could do it. If Ricardo Quaresma didn't skip a grade, Quaresma could do it too."
"But for this role, no one in the current Sporting Lisbon U15 can fill it."
"Cristiano Ronaldo is still too immature. He is obsessed with dribbling and breakthroughs. Even his dribbling relies mainly on speed and lacks technique and flair. His passing has long been criticized by the public."
"Perhaps Kai gave Maxa such courage, but Maxa was wrong — very wrong!"
"Kai's statistics in the past few games have been excellent. He has scored many goals and provided assists, and most of them came from counterattacks. But there is an essential difference between him and a counterattack commander."
"His role in counterattacks is even more extreme and direct than Cristiano Ronaldo's. Long shots, long shots, long shots!"
"He simply doesn't have the ability to organize and distribute the ball quickly during counterattacks. His goals even rely on Cristiano Ronaldo, who isn't good at passing either."
"With the occasional counterattack, he may be able to use Cristiano Ronaldo's suppression to create chances and score a few goals. But if the team focuses mainly on counterattack tactics, once he is tightly marked and prevented from shooting, he will become completely useless."
"Sporting Lisbon U15 does not have a truly qualified midfielder. Their U14 João Moutinho has this potential, but he is smaller than Kai and cannot yet adapt to the U15 level."
"This tactical change is doomed to fail and will only bring an abrupt end to Sporting Lisbon's current positive momentum."
"The sinner behind all this is Maxa's wishful thinking — and even more so, Kai's mediocrity without self-awareness!"
…
November 16th.
Amid heated discussions about the tactical changes of Sporting Lisbon U15, a new round of the league began.
Sporting Lisbon traveled away to face Chaves.
The last time they played against this team, Kai was forced off the pitch after only thirty minutes and then began two months of special training.
Therefore, during this match, in the stands of Chaves, some fans raised banners reading "Caesar's Nemesis" and "Knock Him Off the Pitch Again."
This greatly boosted Chaves' morale.
But as soon as the match started, Chaves' players felt those banners were a bit of a curse.
Sporting Lisbon's young players were clearly angered by them and began pressing aggressively from the very start, immediately putting Chaves under pressure and nearly forcing an early mistake.
In the eighth minute, Sporting Lisbon completed a steal in midfield and quickly pushed the ball into the opponent's half.
In the ninth minute, Kai, controlling the ball on the right flank, suddenly delivered a rare long pass, sending the ball into the left side of the penalty area and instantly revealing his killing intent.
Unfortunately, Cristiano Ronaldo reacted a bit too slowly and ultimately failed to catch up. The ball rolled out past the opponent's goal line.
"Oh! What a fantastic pass! It looks like Kai really didn't leave any lingering injuries."
"I'm starting to wonder whether he was really injured over the past half month, or if he went through another round of special training."
"He's never made a pass like that before. He's clearly leveled up!"
Cristiano Ronaldo nodded. He shared the same view as the commentator.
His off-the-ball runs were always based on Kai's passing habits.
Most of the time, he had to wait for Kai's pass.
But just now, for the first time, Ronaldo felt that the pass was too fast — he couldn't catch up.
No wonder Kai wanted everyone to speed up before the match started.
From the first two days of training until now, Ronaldo still hadn't fully adapted to Kai's new passing style.
Because Kai himself couldn't precisely control the power yet — sometimes the ball came fast, sometimes insanely fast.
And the placement of the passes was tricky, with accuracy fluctuating significantly.
In the 13th minute, Kai carried the ball laterally and fired a dangerous driven pass.
It was stunning, but far too sudden. Even though Ronaldo leapt forward and stretched his neck while sprinting, it still didn't connect properly and missed his head.
In the 15th minute, Kai played a diagonal ball into the half-space, creating the best chance of the match.
Cristiano Ronaldo took the shot.
It looked fine at first, but the ball flew over the low stands and nearly knocked pigeons out of the sky.
The Chaves fans burst into laughter.
"Is this the so-called Supernova Chris?"
"Isn't he a bit too ordinary? That shooting is completely unqualified!"
"His shots make me laugh!"
"Too bad! How many chances has he missed already?"
"In comparison, this Kai actually looks like he has something. His passing is very sharp."
Ronaldo's face turned red.
He was a joke?
Do these people know anything about football?
What's funny is Kai's passing being good?
Was that diagonal ball just now even a normal pass?
Was that really a low-driven assist?
Ronaldo's shot flew off because the ball arrived faster than he could adjust to. No matter how he tried, he couldn't match the timing and missed the optimal contact point.
Generally speaking, if your foot is faster than the ball and touches it too lightly, the shot tends to dip and slice.
If your foot is slower than the ball and makes too much contact, the shot will sail high.
In the 18th minute, after receiving a forward pass, Kai released the ball immediately without stopping it.
It was the highest-quality pass of the match so far.
However, the team's center-forward was at least two meters away and completely missed it.
Cristiano Ronaldo, arriving late from behind, rushed desperately into position but had no time to adjust his shooting motion.
The shot was made almost entirely through body coordination as the ball arrived.
There was no power, no control — it was less a shot and more a forced block.
Unsurprisingly, the ball flew miles away from the goal.
With the goal nearly empty, Ronaldo's attempt struck the advertising boards beside the left post.
Ronaldo swore that when he first started playing football, shooting had never been this difficult.
Almost overnight, football had gone from being his best friend to a complete stranger.
"Oh! That shouldn't have happened — that shot shouldn't look like this!"
"It was almost an open goal!"
"It seems Chris has run into some serious trouble and must solve it quickly."
"Looks like he forgot to wear his shooting boots today!"
"Not just Chris — Sporting Lisbon as a whole wasted far too many attacking opportunities today."
"They let down Kai, who just returned from injury. Kai is clearly the best player on the pitch — and also the youngest!"
Seeing Ronaldo looking completely lost, Kai didn't pressure him and instead gave him a thumbs-up.
In the eyes of the spectators, this was a clear sign of leadership.
Even Maxa was confused.
Normally, whenever Ronaldo missed a chance created by Kai, Kai would curse, throw a tantrum, and act like his cock had been cut off.
So why was he so calm today?
In this regard, Kai was extremely confident.
Maybe the entire world thought Ronaldo and the other forwards played terribly today.
But only Kai himself knew the truth.
Tintin's stream-of-consciousness passing was simply too fucking stream-of-consciousness.
Even Kai himself had no idea how hard his next pass would be to control!
In the eyes of experienced journalists, Sporting Lisbon's performance was the growing pain of new tactics.
The aggressive frontcourt press drained the forwards' stamina, making their movements lag behind the passes.
The intensity of pressing and ball-winning disrupted their touch, affecting dribbling and shooting accuracy.
As a result, they struggled to control the ball and finished poorly throughout the match.
In this game, Sporting Lisbon was truly walking a tightrope.
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