Olympic Final (Part 2)
Yoo Jung-hwan was commentating with one eye on the live chat.
He probably figured the striker would get greedy.
France was not like the other teams.
They had never dismissed Korea, and they certainly hadn't looked down on them for being young. If anything, they had treated the sight of those kids tearing through the Olympics as a threat — and they had studied every player down to the last detail.
Yoo Hee-sung. I am not losing you this time.
Luca, who had been burned by Hee-sung once already, had — at the manager's suggestion, which had sounded a lot like a threat — watched Hee-sung's footage dozens of times over.
This run is the same as before.
The movement Hee-sung was making now was another attempt to rupture the back line and receive the ball in the gap.
"You're not going anywhere— ghhk!!"
Lee Jun-ho.
Ask anyone which name, outside the famous trio of seventeen-year-olds, had generated the most buzz and produced the most outrageous football at these Games, and his would be the first out of their mouths. A central defender of imposing build and a thoroughly uncompromising style, he had already been making noise in the K-League before the Olympics even began. Under Cheon Mu-seok's coaching, though, he had evolved into something else entirely — explosive pace and attacking surges that called to mind the Korean legend Cha Du-ri.
Anyway.
Thud!
Lee Jun-ho drove his body into Luca as the Frenchman tried to step across Hee-sung, shoving him just short of a foul. And Park Seo-joon was never going to miss a ruptured line.
"Waaaaaaaaah!!!"
A roar erupted from the stands.
"Nice one, Seo-joon hyung!"
Ask most people what Yoo Hee-sung's signature is, and they'll point to that Brazil-evoking, silk-smooth individual skill. Buried underneath it, though, is another weapon entirely: raw speed.
The fastest player in the Premier League at present is Liverpool's Adam Tracy, clocked at a top speed of 37.31 km/h. Yoo Hee-sung sits right on his shoulder at 36.8 km/h — a number that puts him inside the Premier League's top five.
Hee-sung ran.
He hadn't been running long before the French goalkeeper filled his vision.
France's keeper is a Ligue 1 first-choice, sure, but...
In that instant, Tae-woo's image flashed through Hee-sung's mind. The overwhelming presence he'd faced on the training ground — those sharp eyes, the glittering reflexes, the unbreakable will — all of it fused into something like a mountain. And Hee-sung, who had climbed that mountain every single day, now saw the game with a clarity he hadn't possessed before the Olympics.
Compared to Tae-woo, this is...
In Hee-sung's eyes, the French keeper's movement stretched into slow motion. The tiniest shift of weight, the direction of his gaze, the tremor at his fingertips — Hee-sung took it all in and decided in a heartbeat. He set himself for a shot in a direction the keeper wouldn't read, the same finish Tae-woo had denied him countless times.
Hee-sung's foot met the ball.
BANG!!
The strike was a laser — true and viciously fast. The French keeper flung himself at it on instinct, but he was already too late. The ball was already ripping into the far corner, making the net snap taut.
"Yes! This is how a final's supposed to feel!"
A colossal cheer exploded from the Korean section.
"Waaaaaaaaah!!!"
"Ahhhhhh, Hee-sung!!"
"That's my boy! Get over here — hyung's gonna kiss you!"
The stands were a cauldron. Fans whipping taegeukgi through the air, strangers grabbing one another in delight, Hee-sung's name rolling around the stadium in wave after wave of noise. On the Korean bench, players and coaching staff were on their feet as one, roaring with the crowd.
And in the middle of all that noise, Hee-sung skipped his trademark Manchester United celebration and looked instead toward the man standing in Korea's goal.
I've grown because of you, you know. A keeper this good is too precious to waste at Man City. After the match, I should try to poach him again.
Ugh — why did I just get the chills?
Thinking about it, he really was on a different level from the kid I'd faced in high school tournaments.
During training I'd occasionally watched Hee-sung's tricks and tossed him a pointer or two.
"When you score with that left-foot inside finish, drop your body a little more. It'll go in cleaner. And if you want to sell a defender, looking the other way with your eyes works too."
"In a one-on-one with the keeper, shoot while watching his knees. You'll read his movement better."
Of course, if every footballer grew from words alone, the sport would just be a war of monsters. The people who can actually grow from talk like that are a handful of genuine talents — and Hee-sung's talent was monstrous. Every time he took something I'd told him in training and used it against me, it had given me the creeps.
"Guess I ought to show him something too."
Show him how, exactly?
By stopping the man currently on the ball — Hee-sung's rival for the Golden Boot?
I dropped my stance and dragged my focus up to its absolute limit. Fortunately — if you could call it that — this time it was a true one-on-one, Lucas Dubois bursting through on his own.
The moment Dubois set himself to shoot, I locked onto every piece of him. His eyes, the angle of his body, the placement of his feet — I read them all at once and started predicting.
His weight's fallen slightly back onto the right foot. He's set for the top-left corner.
The instant the judgment landed, the instant Dubois struck the ball, I threw myself.
Thud!
The impact slammed through me, but I had it — clean, certain, in my hands.
"Come on, move! Now!"
I barked at my teammates at once.
Keepers love a spectacular save followed by a roar or some flashy celebration. I believe the opposite: staying deadpan after a stop puts more pressure on a striker.
From a forward's point of view, when the keeper acts like of course he was going to save that, it pisses you off. Feels like you're being ignored.
While I organized the line, I snuck a look at Lucas Dubois's face. Contrary to what I'd expected, he was just smiling.
From that save on, the match turned into something closer to a brawl with sparks flying. Both sides' attackers hurled themselves at the opposing goal like animals. France's front line kept crashing into our half in heavy waves, and we met them head-on.
I added five more decisive saves. When I got a hand to Mathieu's overhead kick in particular, the instant my fingertips met the ball stretched out like eternity, and the crowd's gasp rang in my ears.
France's keeper, Lucas Hernandez, was no less. His four super saves were like running into a wall. The moment he denied Hee-sung's curling effort, I caught myself clicking my tongue.
The stadium felt like a battlefield. The roar of the crowd, the players' ragged breathing, the crack of the ball off the woodwork — all of it tangled together and wound the tension tighter.
Right before the end of the first half, Lucas Dubois's free kick came in. Twenty-five meters. His moment, on his terms. The ball flew like a bullet toward the top-left corner.
I threw everything I had into the dive —
and in the instant the ball kissed my fingertips,
phweeeet
the first-half whistle blew.
Ah, this is actually, ridiculously hard.