Idol Sports Competition (2)
Once the match began, the first half settled into a rapid exchange of attacks near the center line.
And the crisis arrived sooner than expected.
The ball slipped free between colliding legs and found its way to an opposing striker. As the attacker drove it toward the goalmouth, Do-jun—the team leader playing the futsal goalkeeper role of goleiro—stepped up more calmly than anyone had hoped and planted himself in the way.
Do-jun dropped low, arms spread, closing the shooting angle as he advanced. The striker panicked and struck the ball; it caromed off Do-jun's thigh and spun out of bounds.
"Nice one, hyung!"
Dong-ha bellowed the praise and flashed a thumbs-up to lift the team's spirits, then everyone crowded in front of the goal to prepare for the corner.
Still, our defenders are tall. Aerial control shouldn't be too bad.
Yeon-woo waited a little off the goal, ready to surge into the opposing half the moment his teammates cleared the ball.
Thock—
The corner kick sliced through the air and met the head of Axis member Kang Jae-won—then rattled the back of their own net.
"Ah?"
For a heartbeat every body on the pitch froze.
The heading form had been perfect. The direction was the problem.
"Ah! The first goal of the match, unfortunately, comes as an own goal!"
"Yes. Moments like this are when the Axis members' mental management becomes critical."
The MCs' commentary rolled across the arena.
Jae-won had jumped to clear it and instead put it in his own net. They were amateurs, not professionals—it was the kind of thing that could happen. Still, Kang Jae-won's head dropped.
At the same time, the live chat exploded with messages racing up the screen.
On the pitch, the Axis members closed in around the bowed head of Kang Jae-won, clapping his back.
"Jae-won, it's fine! We've still got plenty of time."
"Ah, seriously, sorry. I was just trying to clear it wide."
"It happens. Don't let it get to you."
The Axis players collected the ball and walked it back to the center line for the kickoff. Jae-won's shoulders sagged as he came.
He's shrinking after that own goal. Bad momentum has to be cut off fast.
Yeon-woo stepped toward the approaching Axis members and issued orders.
"Dong-ha, you said you were pretty confident in your shooting, right?"
"Yes, hyung. My dribbling and tricks aren't flashy, but my vision and finishing aren't bad!"
Since the match started he had held back, watching how these kids moved. It was time to intervene properly.
On every battlefield, the presence or absence of a commander made a stark difference in what the troops could do. A small futsal court was no exception. And as a field commander, there was no one in all of Korea who had been deployed into live operations more often than Yeon-woo.
"Dong-ha, which foot's your strong one?"
"Left."
"Then we do this. On the kickoff, push the ball to me. Jae-won, you sprint hard left—as deep toward the corner as you can."
Jae-won nodded at the instruction.
"Woo-bin, you stay in front of Do-jun in case of a counter. And Dong-ha—you're the key."
"Yes, sir. What do I do?"
"Wait one beat. Watch Jae-won run. When the defenders chase him, you cut in on the right on a delay."
Dong-ha looked toward the opposing goal.
"How far do I go in?"
"To the spot where you're most confident taking a shot."
"If Jae-won and I both push up, won't the connection get hard?"
"Trust me. Just run the play."
Under Yeon-woo's commanding presence, heads nodded on their own.
Dong-ha set the ball on the center line. The referee's whistle blew, and he kicked off—nudging it lightly to Yeon-woo, who collected it cleanly and kept possession. One defender charged in to mark him while, at the same time, Kang Jae-won tore down the left flank exactly as planned.
The tall Jae-won drawing two markers with him opened the gap; Dong-ha slipped into the blind spot of the last remaining defender.
Yeon-woo held the ball with pure physical presence, bodying off the closing opponent—then spun in a tight circle and created space.
Dong-ha. There you are.
He clipped the underside of the ball with the tip of his foot. It lofted with heavy backspin, arcing just over the defender's head and dropping onto Dong-ha's feet.
The backspin kept it from sailing long; the moment it kissed the ground it settled, speed bleeding off, perfectly teed up for a strike.
...Huh? This—I just have to hit it.
Dong-ha calmly rolled the ball into the far corner of the net. The mesh shuddered.
From the restart to the goal, barely five seconds had passed.
"Goal! It's a goal! Dong-ha of Axis, trailing after the own goal, answers immediately to level it!"
"Wow—was that a set play? Textbook off-the-ball movement. And among all of it, Ryu Yeon-woo's pass was absolutely brilliant."
Watching what looked like it might turn into a free-scoring slugfest, a few live viewers clipped the sequence and dropped it into soccer communities.
Drawn by the bait, community users followed the links into the live broadcast. Idol Sports Competition streams were normally overwhelmingly female-viewed—but with the clip hitting soccer boards in real time, an unexpected wave of male viewers began flooding in.
"Hyung!"
Dong-ha came sprinting toward Yeon-woo, fired up for a goal celebration.
Ah...? You're not Han So-hyun—why are you running at me.
It was a different energy from when Han So-hyun had charged him on Gaeya-do for Summer's Table, but Yeon-woo still caught Dong-ha as he jumped. Behind them, Kang Jae-won was jogging up with a bright grin—clearly relieved that the score his mistake had opened was at least level again.
Yeon-woo set Dong-ha down and ran to Jae-won.
"Well done. Because you dragged two defenders with you, the space opened up completely—that's how we scored."
"Th-thank you, hyung."
In the end, momentum and flow decided everything. Judging this was the moment to press, Yeon-woo looked back as the opponents carried the ball toward midfield and issued new orders.
"Seven minutes left in the half. They'll push hard to take the lead before the break. Drop the line and defend. Han-bin on the left, Jae-won on the right—force them into the corners as much as you can."
"Yes!"
"Okay!"
"And Dong-ha—keep it in mind that the return ball is coming back to you."
Tweet—
On the heels of Yeon-woo's last words the referee blew the whistle, and the other side kicked off.
The moment the ball crossed the center circle, opposing wingers surged down both flanks at once, and in Axis's half the Q-Nine players swapped positions in a blur. They had clearly trained together; the passing moved with real cohesion. Kang Jae-won and Ju Han-bin, tracking the defense, lost their marks for a split second.
Yeon-woo dropped back to help, but the striker who had already beaten Han-bin was already striking.
"Hah!"
With a sharp shout Do-jun stretched a leg and blocked the ball headed for the far corner. The rebound spun out toward Yeon-woo.
"Ah! Q-Nine's Kim Tae-jun takes a shot—but it's denied by the keeper's incredible reflexes!"
Three of theirs have come forward. In their half, excluding the keeper, there's only one defender.
Watching Dong-ha already running on the far side, Yeon-woo drove the ball forward at speed toward the goal. When the lone defender lunged toward him, he slipped a light pass to Dong-ha. The instant the defender's eyes locked on the receiver, Yeon-woo cut into the blind spot.
"Pass!"
He raised a hand and called for it. Dong-ha struck the ball straight to him. Yeon-woo cushioned the hard-driven pass with a raised instep, looked up at the goal—and the opposing keeper, the defender, and even a late-arriving striker all collapsed toward him.
Yeon-woo swung his leg through.
Tok—
For all the big wind-up, at the moment of contact he took the power clean off and laid the ball back to Dong-ha. The shooting motion had been a fake.
Keep it in mind that the return ball is coming back to you.
Dong-ha, who had never doubted the return would come, gently rolled the ball into the empty right corner of the net while every opponent was still marking Yeon-woo.
"Goal! It goes in! Ryu Yeon-woo and Dong-ha of Axis combine for another!"
"Just now Ryu Yeon-woo drew every eye on the opposing team, then casually slipped the ball to Dong-ha. That looks like chemistry built through practice. They really are in perfect sync."
Listening to the MCs over the arena speakers, Dong-ha shook his head inwardly.
No. Yeon-woo hyung is just spoon-feeding me everything and I'm only finishing it. We didn't practice—this is the first time we've ever linked up.
And with that, the first half ended.
In the second half that followed, the other side refused to sit idle. Through polished passing patterns they kept peeling Axis markers off, and Q-Nine's shots produced equalizers and lead changes in a seesawing scoreline. The PD watching the entertaining match wore a broad grin.
Meanwhile the YouTube live viewership climbed until the comment feed started lagging.
"Goal! Q-Nine scores again. The score is 5–5 once more. Only one minute remaining—will we go to extra time?"
"Q-Nine has already used one substitution this half, while Axis has no remaining substitutes. If it goes to extra time, Axis is the side at a disadvantage."
The members sitting on the bench, as Dong-ha had said before, were the type who kicked the ball forward and watched it sail sideways. With no substitutions available, they had to stop extra time from happening—exactly as the MCs said.
Because the other side had just scored, it was Axis's kickoff.
"Guys. Gather up. You remember the play from the first goal. We run it one more time. Jae-won sprints, Dong-ha moves into the blind spot."
"Yes! We'll move exactly like the first play."
The members nodded and headed for the center circle.
Tweet—
At the whistle Dong-ha passed to Yeon-woo, and Jae-won tore down the left. The Q-Nine members exchanged looks.
They had already held a meeting about this strategy in the first half. If Axis ran it again after a kickoff, designated players would lock down man-to-man marking.
Unlike the first goal, only a single defender went with the surging Jae-won, and Dong-ha—timing his run into the gap—found the passing lanes sealed in front and behind. The remaining man closed on Yeon-woo, who still held the ball.
Other than a back pass, there was nowhere left to play it.
But Yeon-woo looked across the pitch and smiled.
Moving exactly as expected.
This reaction was precisely the one Yeon-woo had wanted from them.