Unshaken
Have you ever heard the name Sun-moon Ha?
“What kind of name is that? It’s weird.”
It was a name that felt both familiar and unfamiliar to the English. When Ha Sunmoon arrived at Manchester City, his name alone was enough to bring a small smile to the faces of the City fans. But the British could be coldly pragmatic. The things they said about Sunmoon were far more calculating than one might expect.
The Manchester City journalists wrote their pieces about him. Jack Gohan had focused on Sunmoon’s career trajectory, and since his path—from Fluminense to Espanyol and now to Manchester City—wasn’t bad at all, at least no one criticized him on professional grounds.
But Sunmoon’s nationality was South Korean. Whenever a non-English player joined the club, the rivalry between fans of different nationalities grew fierce. There had been similar situations before. Back when three left-backs competed for a single spot: France’s Benjamin Mendy, Ukraine’s Oleksandr Zinchenko, and Spain’s Angeliño. Now Sunmoon had taken Angeliño’s place.
Strangely enough, the black players were quite friendly with one another, and many felt Mendy’s position was under threat. Yet the comments under internet articles about Sunmoon were far harsher than anything directed at Mendy.
Those kinds of comments kept multiplying, and soon they began attacking Sunmoon directly.
Even under the photo of Sunmoon holding up his new jersey, strange people crawled out of the woodwork. This kind of atmosphere was even more delicious fodder for magazines that hated Manchester City.
All sorts of dirty rumors began flying toward Sunmoon. The one saving grace was that Fernandinho had checked on him early and asked if he used social media. When Sunmoon said he didn’t, the veteran gave him some advice.
“Then… until you get properly settled, don’t pay any attention to that stuff. Focus on training and matches. I’ve seen a lot of young players get sucked into social media and lose their way.”
“I won’t. I already have too much to do anyway.”
“Really? That’s good to hear.”
Beep. Beep. Beeeeeep.
The final whistle blew.
Ah! I thought I was going to die.
Sunmoon trudged along the pitch.
“Well played, Ha!”
“Congratulations!”
The Manchester City players each offered him a word as they passed. Sunmoon wanted to respond properly to their congratulations, but his muscles were screaming in exhaustion, so he could only manage a light wave.
Let’s get inside and rest.
“Yeah, I should.”
Just as he was about to head into the tunnel, Pep Guardiola caught him.
“Ha! You were excellent today.”
But when Sunmoon couldn’t answer properly, Pep remembered the boy’s condition.
“Ah! You’re in rough shape, aren’t you?”
Pep Guardiola slapped his shiny forehead and called for the team doctor. The doctor quickly assessed Sunmoon’s condition and handed him over to a professional sports masseur to work on his tired muscles.
“How is Ha?”
“There’s no ligament damage or anything like that. It’s all just accumulated muscle fatigue. Rest will take care of it.”
“That’s a relief.”
Pep Guardiola watched Sunmoon receiving the massage with a thoughtful gaze.
“Are you going to keep doing that?”
“Sorry? Doing what?”
What is he talking about? Is he telling me not to overtrain?
As Sunmoon’s head began to spin, Pep asked again.
“Are you going to keep running like that?”
“Pardon?”
“I’m asking if you can keep playing the way you did today.”
Pep’s words were short, but the meaning was clear.
I’m thinking of giving you more starts.
“Yes! I’m always ready.”
“Even while creaking like that?”
“Ah!”
“What you’re doing right now is bulking up, right?”
“Uh… yes, that’s correct.”
“When do you think you’ll be satisfied with the results?”
Sunmoon glanced at Harrison, pretending to think hard.
Hmm… Normally it takes half a year to build that kind of fitness, but since you’ve already gone through Stage Two, three months should be enough.
That… that long? It’ll be winter by the time I’m done…
Trusting Harrison’s words, Sunmoon answered honestly.
“I want to build my body properly, so I’m thinking three months.”
He worried Pep might scold him for taking so long, but instead the manager gave a small smile.
“Good. Very good. Most players would shorten the timeline because they think it’ll get them on the pitch sooner, but you stubbornly say three months. That’s an excellent attitude. Doing it properly is far better than doing it half-heartedly. But don’t overtrain right up until match day. You could be called upon as a substitute at any time.”
“Yes! Understood!”
Sunmoon was relieved to see the satisfied look on his manager’s face.
After the match, Sunmoon returned to the hotel where he was staying.
“This is how you do it, right?”
He turned on the TV and began connecting something.
Oh! It worked!
What he had received from the club’s performance analyst was data analyzing today’s game. Harrison looked quite impressed by the advance of modern science.
“Hmm… there’s the full video, but they’ve marked the key moments with timestamps. There are comments on those scenes too.”
Alright, let’s watch it together.
The first timestamp they played showed the moment Sunmoon scored.
Ah! That funny goal?
It was the scene where Sunmoon had scored. However, the analyst hadn’t given it a particularly good comment and had scored it quite low. At least the fact that it was a goal kept the score from being terrible.
— A lucky goal. The result was good, but the process was poor.
As expected… They consider everything.
Watching the play on video, Sunmoon strongly felt that assessment was accurate. The footage showed him being pushed around by the opposing center-back, barely regaining his balance, and the ball bouncing off his face and into the net.
“That’s a little embarrassing to watch…”
After reading all the comments, Sunmoon moved on to the next scene. Most of the following clips were of him making mistakes. Naturally, all the comments were negative. The scores given to Sunmoon kept dropping.
Ugh…
Just as Sunmoon was pouting at the screen, the scene that received the highest score appeared. It was the moment he delivered a heel pass to Phil Foden.
Sunmoon’s eyes widened.
“Whoa! I actually did that? Is this what Brother Listen sees from this angle?”
Right? It’s quite artistic, isn’t it?
“It is!”
That’s why the manager is seriously considering using you.
Sunmoon replayed the scene.
— In a split second, he accomplished too many things at once. It seemed excessive, but he successfully dragged the center-back out of position and delivered a one-touch pass into the space in front of Foden. A well-grounded play based on first confirming Foden’s position beforehand.
A well-grounded play…
Reading the comment helped Sunmoon’s understanding click into place.
“Ugh, it’s hard. But it was fun. Time to look at something else!”
Hm? What now?
“I want to read some football articles. Sterling sometimes gets inspiration from good pieces.”
Really? Hmm… I’m against it.
“Why?”
Sunmoon turned off the TV, switched on his computer, and began searching.
You’re going to read that garbage? It won’t help you at all.
“Come on… When I was at Espanyol, the articles written by Mr. Jimenez were pretty good, weren’t they? There were lots of pieces that gave us an outside perspective on ourselves. Thanks to them, I fixed a lot of things.”
That and this are different.
“Hmm…”
When Sunmoon didn’t seem to understand, Harrison spoke up.
You know Manchester United, right? I don’t know about it, but apparently your number 13 is the same as the Korean player who was there.
“Yes, that’s right.”
Anyway, do you know how much abuse Alex Ferguson got when he came here after writing history over there?
“Huh? I think I’ve heard something about that.”
Similarly, Arsenal’s Arsène Wenger got slaughtered for bringing in a player from Japan.
“And?”
The British press is full of garbage. These crazy bastards write absolute filth about players and managers alike.
“But a lot of time has passed since your era, Brother Listen. Maybe things have changed?”
That’s hard to say… These things tend to stay exactly the same… Or they get even worse.
“Still, today was my debut, I scored a goal and got an assist. There can’t be that many bad things written about me, right?”
Sunmoon took Harrison’s warning lightly and searched his own name on the internet. Then he froze.
What did I tell you? I said not to look. They’re all idiots. You’re not angry, are you?
“It’s okay. I am a little angry, but…”
I knew it.
“If I just play well enough to shut these people up, that’s all, right? Since there’s no proper criticism anyway, if I do well, people will naturally bury this stuff.”
Huh?
Harrison, who had expected Sunmoon to be hurt by the harsh criticism, looked at him with slightly surprised eyes. In that moment, he saw a small lion cub in the boy.
That’s right. That’s exactly what you should do. That’s the correct answer!