Infinite Potential

"Complete your first official match and receive 10,000 King of Football Points."

"Score the first official goal of your professional career and receive 10,000 King of Football Points."

"Score your first professional brace in an official match and receive 30,000 King of Football Points."

"Score in your debut and complete a brace. Reward: one Star Ability Card. Please exchange it at the Shop."

The instant the head referee's whistle sounded to signal the end of the match, a series of system notifications rang out in Su Dong's mind.

Su Dong was dazed by the barrage of rewards.

He had been rewarded with so many King of Football Points at once?

There was even a Star Ability Card!

Good heavens, this was definitely a bumper harvest.

But when he thought about it, it was hardly surprising. This was his debut in an official match, and he had scored twice. It was an unbelievable achievement—even he himself found it incredible.

Even now, he was still completely dazed.

"Beautifully done, Su."

"Great job!"

"You completely dominated the match in the second half. Both goals were incredible."

"You're practically our god of war!"

On a football pitch, strength spoke for itself. Su Dong's performance had helped Sporting Portugal defeat a formidable opponent, so he naturally earned the respect of his teammates—especially since both of his goals had been spectacular.

Matello came over, threw an arm around Su Dong's shoulders, and walked beside him with a grin.

During this period, he had trained Su Dong every day. Although it was his job, he was still delighted to see Su Dong improve bit by bit.

But before today, Matello would never have imagined that Su Dong would perform so brilliantly in his debut.

He had scored a brace!

How many players managed a brace in the Portuguese Second Division in an entire season?

"As long as you keep up this momentum, it won't be long before we can't hold on to you anymore."

Matello sounded both gratified and proud, but there was also a hint of disappointment in his voice.

This was the sorrow of a weak team in the world of professional football.

The players they discovered were people they simply couldn't keep. Even if they managed to hold on to them for a while, what could they do?

This was simply how they survived.

"Don't think too much about it. Keep working hard, push yourself a little more, and charge forward while you have the momentum!" Matello composed himself and encouraged him.

In the stands, more than a thousand Sporting Portugal fans all stood up in unison when they saw the players leave the pitch, giving them a thunderous ovation—especially Su Dong, who was walking beside Matello.

He was only sixteen and had scored twice in his debut. Could there have been a better performance?

Most of the fans didn't know him at all. None of them could even call out his name, but that didn't stop them.

They chanted for Su Dong's number 36 shirt. When Su Dong and Matello drew close to the stands, the entire stadium erupted into its loudest applause. It was the best possible affirmation of the two players.

Matello had been the best player on the pitch. That came as no surprise.

Su Dong had been the team's secret weapon in the second half, defeating Loretano with two goals.

What made it even more exciting was that both of his goals had been beautiful. He looked just like Serie A's god of war, Batistuta.

As they passed the stands, Matello pulled Su Dong along and clapped vigorously with both hands, thanking the fans for their support and recognition. Only then did the two of them enter the players' tunnel together.

The Sporting Portugal fans responded with an even louder ovation.

Head coach Gorba and the club executives were seated among the fans.

When the team had been on the back foot in the first half, Gorba's expression had been grim.

But once the tide turned in the second half, especially after Su Dong scored twice in succession, Gorba's face had practically blossomed into a sunflower.

The team had defeated its opponent, and Su Dong—whom he had discovered and painstakingly nurtured—had scored a brace. This was absolutely a credit to Gorba.

When he heard the fans chanting for number 36, Gorba became even more excited.

"This boy is improving incredibly quickly." Gorba introduced him to the executive beside him.

"If I remember correctly, he was brought in through someone else's recommendation, right?"

"Yes. An unprofessional Chinese agent. He gave us some money and asked us to train Su Dong for two months. At first, we didn't pay much attention to him. Su Dong's performance was poor, too, and he even failed to report to the team for more than a month."

At this point, Gorba deliberately paused and smiled at his superior. "But during the assessment not long ago, I discovered that this boy had improved tremendously. It might have been because the training he received before was unprofessional. After joining the team, he improved by leaps and bounds. Now, he already has the ability to play as a starter."

"After discovering this, I immediately approached him about renewing his contract. But since he's only sixteen, we could only sign him to a Youth Team contract. Still, I believe that, especially after today's match, he'll definitely get better and better."

"Hmm." His superior understood what Gorba meant and guessed at his intentions. "You want to recommend him to the higher-ups?"

As a Lisbon club, Sporting Portugal had a poor relationship with Benfica and Sporting Lisbon. Instead, it had maintained long-term friendly cooperation with Belenenses and was Belenenses' satellite club.

Discovering players and recommending them to Belenenses was one of the cooperative projects between the two clubs.

If Belenenses was interested, it would immediately arrange for scouts to track the player and actively coordinate with Sporting Portugal to learn about his situation. If the player performed well, Belenenses might even buy him outright.

"Of course I want to recommend him. We'll first make sure Belenenses knows his name, while we step up our efforts to develop him. Ideally, we'll promote him directly into the starting lineup. As long as he continues performing well, I'm sure we can sell him for a good price."

"Can we get thirty thousand euros?" his superior asked with concern.

Among young players in the Portuguese Second Division, that was already a very good price.

"That depends on his performance. If he plays a few more matches and performs well enough, thirty thousand—or even fifty thousand—I think it's entirely possible."

Fifty thousand?

A clear glimmer of desire appeared in his superior's eyes. For Sporting Portugal, that was practically a fortune.

"Then do as you suggested."

Su Dong had no idea that Gorba and the management were sitting in the stands, plotting how to sell him for a good price.

In the locker room, he accepted his teammates' congratulations.

Defeating Loretano had given Sporting Portugal its first three points of the season. It was crucial.

Although the team had no hope of promotion, nobody wanted to see it relegated. After all, dropping another division meant facing mostly amateur teams. It would be equivalent to playing amateur football, with no challenge at all.

Even head coach Antonio Pereira did not hold back his praise, encouraging Su Dong to maintain this level of performance.

"From now on, I'll give you more opportunities and playing time. Keep working hard."

Naturally, Su Dong was delighted and grateful.

Only after everyone had dispersed did he sit down in front of his locker and let out a long, heavy breath.

The match was over.

Although he had only played one half, the exertion had been tremendous.

This was the reality of playing for an adult team. He had never experienced anything like it before.

The pressure of the match, the physical battles, carrying out tactical instructions...

There had been too many tasks weighing on his shoulders, constantly draining his stamina.

This feeling was impossible to replicate through private practice or team training. Only by truly stepping onto the pitch and battling an opponent head-on could he experience that kind of pressure.

I might not yet have the stamina to play a full match for the senior team.

Su Dong thought to himself.

Matches for the Youth Team at his age were usually sixty minutes long, with thirty minutes in each half. Whether in tactical execution, physical battles, or intensity, they were nothing like senior-team matches.

More importantly, although Su Dong's stamina had risen to 57 points, his physical strength was only 41 points.

In other words, his stamina had barely reached the average level for a semiprofessional team, while his physical strength was still far below the passing mark.

Under these circumstances, if he spent ninety minutes battling physically against tall, powerful center-backs, Su Dong would definitely be unable to cope.

This made him realize that senior-team matches really were far more intense.

At the same time, he needed to improve his physical attributes as quickly as possible.

At that thought, Su Dong stopped dwelling on it.

He entered the Path to the King of Football and opened the Personal Attribute Panel.

The match had just earned him more than two thousand King of Football Points, but that was not the important part.

The important part was that, when the match ended, the system had rewarded him with 50,000 King of Football Points in one go.

Su Dong immediately exchanged those 50,000 King of Football Points for 100 Potential Points, dividing them into four portions and investing them in his four physical attributes.

First, he raised the potential of his Speed and Explosive Power to 99 points. Then he raised his Stamina potential to 99 points as well, and invested the remaining 15 Potential Points into Strength, raising it to 65 points.

But he still felt that it was far from enough, so he converted more King of Football Points into 34 Potential Points and directly raised his Strength potential to 99 points as well.

With that, all four of his physical attributes had reached their maximum potential.

Moreover, over the past period, Su Dong had spent nearly all his Potential Points on his technical attributes and had long since maxed out the potential of all four technical attributes. As a result, two major categories of his attribute potential were now completely full.

What he needed to do next was improve his actual ability as quickly as possible.

But that was only a matter of time.

After spending so long with the Path to the King of Football system, Su Dong had gradually figured out some of its rules.

Potential was like a player's talent.

In the past, Su Dong had possessed only a small amount of talent, so he had easily reached his limit. No matter how he trained or how hard he worked, it was useless. He simply could not make any progress.

But the Path to the King of Football had brought him a world-shaking change. It allowed him to continuously increase his potential, which was equivalent to improving his talent. Once his potential increased, as long as he was willing to train hard, his actual ability would slowly rise along with it.

The rate of improvement for Ball Trunk-level ability was slower than that of Ball One-level ability. He believed it would become slower and slower as he continued upward with each increase in level, but to Su Dong, it was merely a matter of how much time he needed to spend.

Compared with being stuck at the ceiling and wasting his efforts like before, this was already an immense improvement.

During the new-book period, I humbly ask for rewards, collections, and recommendation votes! Many thanks!