Scouts from Chelsea

The team's starting goalkeeper, Sebastian Mielitz, was practicing penalty tactics with his teammates, since Telekom Cup matches often dragged on to a penalty shootout.

So they needed to rehearse taking and defending penalties in advance, to avoid scrambling when the time came.

Taking free kicks into an empty net felt like something was missing, so Lin Quan went to fetch the team's backup goalkeeper, Wolf, to guard the goal.

Although Wolf was the second-choice keeper, being a substitute for a Bundesliga team meant he was no slouch.

Facing shots from De Bruyne and Lin Quan, he dove high and low, saving almost all of their attempts.

"Kevin, your ball speed isn't fast enough, and your trajectory is too easy to read. If the goalkeeper stays focused, it's hard to threaten the goal!"

Wolf noticed De Bruyne was trying to practice the knuckleball, so he spoke up to remind him:

"You need to add some variation to the ball!"

De Bruyne put his hands on his hips and stared at the ball on the ground, thinking.

Add some variation to the ball?

How was he supposed to do that?

A knuckleball required controlling spin while keeping the ball speed high—it was already tough to pull off.

Adding more variation on top of that felt beyond his reach.

"Let me give it a try?"

Lin Quan had been practicing the outside-of-the-foot shot for a while, but he never felt it had the same flair as Quaresma's version, so he grew curious about the knuckleball De Bruyne was working on.

He didn't know if Messi's arsenal included that kind of technique—Messi always seemed to prefer curved free kicks, and Lin Quan had never seen him use a knuckleball.

De Bruyne nodded and stepped aside.

Lin Quan stood at the spot, took a deep breath, and thought about the movements of several knuckleball masters.

Cristiano Ronaldo, Pirlo, Juninho...

He stepped back, took a quick run-up, aimed carefully, and swung his foot.

Wolf stood motionless in goal, and of course, there was no ball inside.

So where did the ball go?

At that moment, a young man on the sidelines who nearly got knocked out by the ball was thoroughly pissed off.

"Sorry, sorry! Are you okay?"

Lin Quan quickly ran over to apologize to him.

He hadn't controlled the angle well, and the ball had gone straight up like a cannon shot, flying over fifty meters before landing.

The guy rubbed his dizzy head and looked up at the culprit, as if trying to remember which bastard had hit him.

When he saw the green jersey with the number 10 on it, he seemed to realize something.

"Are you that winger from Werder Bremen?"

Lin Quan was a bit surprised. He'd only played one official match, and a random passerby already recognized him?

Wait, could this guy be a spy sent by Dortmund to scope out intel?

Only rivals would pay close attention to opposing players, Lin Quan thought.

"Let me introduce myself. I'm George Evans, a scout from Chelsea. I watched your match footage from yesterday—you played great!"

"Thanks. A Chelsea scout—are you here to track Kevin's performance?"

Lin Quan suddenly understood when the other party introduced himself.

His teammate De Bruyne was a Chelsea player. Chelsea had spent eight million pounds on him, so they'd naturally want to check on his loan performance.

Sending a scout to observe was normal, but this scout looked way too young—barely over twenty.

At that age, he was clearly a rookie scout with little say at the club.

Chelsea sending someone like this to watch De Bruyne showed they didn't value him much.

"Sort of. But the team's forwards have been collectively underperforming, so I've also taken on the task of scouting forwards from other clubs."

"Who are you scouting now?"

Lin Quan asked casually after hearing that.

Chelsea's lack of firepower up front was no secret in football.

When they spent fifty million pounds to take Torres, Liverpool's star striker, they dreamed he'd tear it up at Stamford Bridge and score goals like crazy.

Instead, that fifty million turned out to be a huge flop. Due to injuries and tactical mismatches, Torres struggled badly at Chelsea.

Over two seasons, he played sixty games for the club but only scored ten goals—an abysmal efficiency rate!

Even though Chelsea won the Champions League last season, their victory relied on defense, not offense.

If they didn't fix their attacking problems soon, their results this season would plummet.

So this summer, Chelsea waved their checkbook around, searching for forwards everywhere.

First, they spent thirty-five million euros to bring Hazard from Lille, then eight million euros to buy Marko Marin from Werder Bremen.

Then they spent another €32 million to buy Internacional's attacking midfielder Oscar...

This summer, Chelsea has already burned through over €100 million, and they don't seem to be stopping anytime soon.

Deep-pocketed Abramovich says he's not short on cash—he wants to find a big name for Chelsea, preferably a top-tier striker in the football world.

So rumors surfaced that Chelsea made an offer to Barca to buy Messi.

Of course, that's mostly hearsay. After all, last year Manchester City was willing to pay £250 million for Messi, and Barca still didn't let him go. Given the bad blood between Chelsea and Barca, the latter is even less likely to release him.

George glanced at Lin Quan: "Why are you asking about this?"

Team transfer matters definitely couldn't be casually discussed. If such things leaked early, it could easily trigger a bidding war or price gouging from other clubs.

"I'm just worried you guys might come poach our team's striker again!"

Lin Quan, seeing the other party wasn't willing to say more, brushed it off casually.

"That won't happen. There aren't enough stars on your team. We've already bought Marko Marin—who's left that's worth Chelsea poaching?"

Uh...

That was the truth, even if it didn't sound great.

The players at Werder Bremen didn't have much potential or future achievements—not a single star among them, just a bunch of cheap, reliable workhorses.

So, the only ones he could be scouting were players from Dortmund.

Considering Dortmund's performance last season and the impact of Manchester United buying Shinji Kagawa from them, it was only natural for Chelsea to poach from Dortmund.

But who were they eyeing?

Was it the future top striker Lewandowski, or Dortmund's midfield core Götze?

Given Chelsea's striker and midfield reserves, they were more likely to go for Lewandowski.

None of this had anything to do with him. Chelsea definitely wouldn't pay to buy him, and even if they did, he didn't want to play for Chelsea.

The intense physical contact in the Premier League was way too harsh on young players.

Before he got his Injury Immunity talent, it was better to stay put in the Bundesliga, a good place for young talents to level up.

Hugging the ball, Lin Quan returned to the pitch and continued discussing the secrets of the knuckleball with De Bruyne.

Lin Quan had plenty of theoretical knowledge but lacked strength.

De Bruyne, on the other hand, had enough strength but was short on theory.

Theory was easy to learn, but building strength wasn't so simple.

So Lin Quan shared his understanding of the knuckleball theory with De Bruyne, guiding him in practicing it.

If De Bruyne could master this technique, the team would have another option for free kicks in the future.

The morning training only lasted an hour and a half. After lunch, the team began tactical drills.

At 5:30 PM, the players boarded the bus to Dortmund's home ground, Westfalenstadion, to get familiar with the pitch early and do pre-match warm-ups.

At the same time, Dortmund's players also set off on their bus, and the two teams ran into each other at the stadium entrance.

The Telekom Cup final was about to kick off!