Wave Pressing Under Pressure – Brazil's Shadow in the Analysis Room
Manager Cheon raised his voice with fierce passion as he pointed at the tactical board.
"Wave pressing, the formation I've been training you on, will stay in the pre-match warm-ups only."
Huh... so we won't be using the one we've drilled so hard for every match.
"Why?" he continued, eyes blazing. "Because this tactic is brutally demanding on the body. All of you who have already tested and trained it know better than anyone."
Exactly. If we stuck to Wave pressing no matter how tired we got in these quick, non-stop Olympic matches, the players would be wrecked in no time.
"But if we practiced it this much and then throw it out, won't you all feel betrayed?"
'...Manager-nim, I can't see a single person looking upset no matter how you look around.'
Manager Cheon calmly rearranged the words on the board and gave his answer without hesitation.
"Wave pressing will still be our base, but we'll build an aggressive 4-3-3 system centered around the midfield."
He jabbed a finger at the midfield line.
"Kang Dong-hyun, as the CDM you will be the glue holding defense and attack together. Join the build-up, but never lose control of the backline."
He moved to the two holding midfielders.
"Park Seo-joon and Choi Woo-jin, you two are box-to-box destroyers. When attacking, sprint forward to create numerical superiority. When defending, sprint back and seize control of the middle. You two are the heart of this tactic. Got it?"
"Haha! Manager-nim, if I can't earn my monthly allowance this time I'll have to join the military! I'll run with everything I've got!"
"Good spirit. There are no easy games for us. If you don't pour everything into it... what kind of words do you think the fans will throw at us?"
'...Just thinking about it gives me the creeps. If we get eliminated in the qualifiers and fly home, the airport staff are probably going to throw eggs at us?'
From the news reports, it was obvious that whenever the Korean national team came back from qualifiers with a bad result, some crazy person would always show up throwing eggs. So if we dropped to 99.9999999% chance of getting eggs thrown at us after a qualifier loss...
Manager Cheon turned to the forwards.
"Yoo Hee-sung and Yoon Jae-hoon, you two will use your wing positions to flood the sides with crosses and cut-backs. Sometimes you'll cut inside to create space for Lee Tae-yang and the second strikers. You guys should be more than capable."
"And Lee Tae-yang, as the target man up top you'll shake the entire defense and sometimes drop deep to give the midfielders room to arrive. I'm going to give Brazil hell."
A ripple of laughter broke out across the analysis room at Tae-yang's bold reply.
"Hahaha haha haha!"
Cheon Mu-seok pointed at the backline next.
"The backline will stay high, but we must prepare for lightning counters. Full-back Lee Jun-ho and Kim Hyun-sung will push forward aggressively, but keep your positioning sharp. Jang Hyun-sung, Kim Eun-woo, you two will stay back and provide stability."
"And finally, Jung Tae-woo."
Manager Cheon locked eyes with him.
"Play steady today. Keep the ball out of the net and show the world how well you coordinate and save. Well... you always do, don't you."
'...You trust me that much, Manager-nim...'
Of course he wasn't overconfident. His reflexes had evolved far beyond human limits thanks to the Soccer Goddess. Even he couldn't call it anything but insane.
"I will."
"Good. As for Brazil, my assistant coach will explain everything."
The moment Cheon finished speaking, a man stepped forward from behind him.
It was Joo Eun-gyeom, the head assistant coach whom the players called the "Dory Coach."
"Listen up, kids. Everyone here knows the names Brazil needs to watch. Seo-joon here has even marked him before."
Don't get fooled. He sounds so gentle and harmless... yet his face looks like it could strike fear into a dragon.
Thinking back to training...
Shiver... even now my body was still trembling.
The moment that gentle voice turned sharp in training...
"HEY! Think before you move! What are you trying to do by messing up the drills I already showed you? Are you messing with me?!"
Who could have ever imagined he would flip like that. And the worst part was he would switch back to the gentle tone the moment training ended.
"Kids, you worked hard. Let's keep going tomorrow with the same energy."
Of all the coaches I had ever met, whether in my previous life or this one, he was the strangest and scariest by far.
Look at how eagerly the players were listening to every word.
"First up is Brazil's star striker, Gabriel Mendes. Last year at just nineteen he debuted for Paris Saint-Germain in Ligue 1 and scored twelve goals. He became an overnight sensation. This season he's already sitting at twenty goals."
He was killing it. Even if Ligue 1 was the weakest of the Big Five, those numbers were impossible to ignore. Nineteen years old and twelve goals, then twenty this season...
Still, nothing compared to the actual monster sitting right in front of me.
I focused on listening to Yoo Hee-sung as he took in every word from the coach.
After the Olympics, he transferred to Manchester United at seventeen and immediately smashed eighteen goals in his debut season.
'If Gabriel Mendes is a genius, then Yoo Hee-sung must be a monster?'
"Did you understand everything I just said, Tae-woo?"
When I was daydreaming, he had dropped an important line...
"Huh? Looking at that face of yours, I see you were thinking about something else the whole time."
The assistant coach's face grew even colder as he continued.
'Oh no...'
"Since I only have one more chance, listen closely, Tae-woo. Got it?"
"Yes, Coach!"
He let out a long sigh and started again.
"Gabriel's biggest strengths are his monstrous physicality and the fact that he shoots with both feet at terrifying speeds. Because of that, defenders have a hard time reading his movements."
The coach took a breath, then kept going.
"So, Tae-woo, what you need to do is this. In one-on-one situations stopping Mendes is important, but the real job is watching the offside line and organizing the defenders. You have to keep the entire backline solid so they don't get disrupted by his movements. Especially make sure you use the offside trap at the right moment. Understood?"
"Yes, Coach. I understand."
"Good. I hope you listened properly this time."
I was curious. Just how monstrously physical was he that he was scoring goals in Ligue 1?
* * *
"In our first match, our opponent is South Korea."
At the exact same time, Brazil's tactical analysis room was deep in discussion about Korea and its players.
"South Korea? I've never heard of them."
"Hey, you idiot. It's the land of the father."
"Shut up."
The noisy players all fell silent the moment Brazil's Olympic coach Marcos Vito spoke.
Marcos Vito was no airhead who relaxed just because his team was supposedly weaker. In sports, there were no better underdog stories than football.
"Don't ever relax. South Korea has Chelsea's starting midfielder, Park Seo-joon. He's more than capable of single-handedly changing a match."
"True. He's the starter for Chelsea in the Premier League, after all."
The young squad had only a few big-club level players, so Park's name still carried weight.
"But don't get cocky. Don't let them scare you. We're not the ones who should be afraid. Brazil is the team that should be scared."
"Exactly. Park won't stop me anyway. Don't worry about it."
"True. Who on earth is going to stop Gabriel Mendes? He's Ligue 1's top scorer."
"From now on, watch the key South Korean players. No chatting. Focus."
The video started. The players stopped talking instantly and watched intently.
"When you watch Park's play, you can tell he scans the entire field before he touches the ball, then connects with one-touch passes. Because his passing is that good, the big thing is to press as hard and fast as possible."
At that moment, Raphael Silva Santos, the defensive midfielder known as Rafa, raised his hand.
"Coach, if Park is so good at passing, can't he still find an open player even when you're pressing hard? Don't you have a counter for that?"
Marcos Vito's eyes sparkled.
"Nice question, Rafa. That's exactly the point I wanted you to understand. Our press isn't about stopping one player. It's the entire team moving together. We predict where he's going to pass and cut off that space ahead of time. This isn't individual skill. It's pure team organization."
'Looks like the atmosphere is shifting exactly how I wanted.'
Marcos Vito was secretly thrilled. When he first joined, no player had ever questioned or argued against his training plans. Of course. In football, a coach's word carried enormous power.
But he never thought that way.
'Football isn't just about following orders. You ask questions, you doubt, you seek better ways. Only then does real football happen.'
"Next, watch the other players' videos and I'll explain the tactics."
The South Korean national team players passed on screen. Then the final player appeared: Jung Tae-woo, the goalkeeper.
"Wait... is that guy a soccer player or a model?"
"Coach, if that handsome face gets hit by the ball, are you saying we won't get an Instagram terror attack?"
"~ He's so good-looking. Should I ask for his number?"
"Stop thinking about his looks and focus on his play. This player is also seventeen, like the forwards Yoo and Lee we just saw. Even if it's South Korea's U-17 tournament, eleven clean sheets in one game is crazy."
Flashbacks of Tae-woo's high-school performances flashed across the screen.
"Wow, he saved it!"
"Wow..."
"Well, he's not bad."
"But I don't care. I can't stop Gabriel Mendes' shots anyway. Right, Gabriel?"
"Haha, that's just U-17 level. My shots probably won't even get a reaction."
"I agree."
Marcos Vito switched off the TV and smiled with teeth showing.
"Let's go to South Korea and give them the nightmare that is Brazil."
The players' eyes sharpened at those words. They already knew victory was certain on the field.