After the team doctor left, Taylor gazed at Li Yufei and spoke slowly:
"Darling, make your own decision. Don't change your mind because of me."
"Playing for the National Team will affect your future achievements. I don't know much about football, but I do know one thing: the World Cup at the national-team level is incredibly important to every footballer."
"I know what you want to achieve in football, darling. You want to become the Best Player in football history, and I think winning the World Cup has to be part of that."
"I know what football is like in the United States. If you play for America, you might never get the chance to play in a World Cup."
"I don't want you to reach the end of your career with regrets. I couldn't bear to see that, really..."
Hearing the heartfelt sincerity in Taylor's words, Li Yufei fell silent.
He had to admit, his girlfriend was right.
If Li Yufei really played for the American National Team, he might never get the chance to play in a World Cup.
Football was a team sport with eleven players. No matter how good one person was, he couldn't carry his team to the title alone.
Honestly, given the state of football in America and the ability of its national-team players,
leading them to a World Cup victory would be nearly as difficult as leading the Chinese National Team to one.
On the surface, America was a regular at the World Cup and often made it to the knockout stage.
But anyone who knew anything about football knew that America had been drawn into the same group as England in both the 2010 and 2022 World Cups.
And both matches had ended in dull draws. Who could believe that?
Put plainly, America had reached the round of sixteen in those two World Cups purely because their group included "yesterday's daddy, today's son."
When the British Empire faced the beacon of world civilization, the United States, they were always quick to back down.
They constantly looked down on and belittled the North American upstarts, at least in words.
But in practice, they backed down at every turn.
Even in a football tournament like the World Cup, England had gone out of their way to take it easy on America.
If England hadn't gone easy on America in the 2010 and 2022 World Cups,
America wouldn't have made it to the knockout stage at all.
And even when England let them through, America had been a reliable one-and-done team in the knockouts.
They couldn't beat anyone!
How could a national team like that possibly win the World Cup?
Unless they kept running into England, Japan, and South Korea throughout the knockout stage.
Otherwise, they had no chance!
But obviously, with Japan and South Korea's level of play, they wouldn't make it past the quarterfinals.
So that theoretical path to victory wasn't realistic either!
Still, Li Yufei had to consider the consequences. His mother's surname was Adams, and Adams was his English surname too.
That meant he couldn't choose which national team to play for as freely as an ordinary footballer could.
"But darling, you know my surname. I'm an Adams, after all. I'm afraid I won't be able to get past my mother..."
Li Yufei finally voiced his concern to the woman he loved.
Unexpectedly, when Taylor heard what was worrying him, she burst out laughing:
"Hahaha, darling, you're worrying over nothing."
"You're afraid Mom won't agree, right?"
Li Yufei couldn't see what was so funny about that. Puzzled, he nodded.
"Darling, all I can say is that you're overthinking this. For starters, you were born in the United Kingdom and got British citizenship at birth. There's nothing anyone could fault about you playing for the England team."
"Even if we set that aside, do you really think Mom will care whether you play for the American team?"
"Come on, it's only football. Why would the Adams Family care about that?"
"Besides, English Football is already a niche sport in the United States. You won't become an American national icon like Michael Jordan or Tiger Woods."
"Even if football's popularity makes you more influential worldwide than they are, it'll still be hard to achieve that in America."
"So, does it really matter which country you play for?"
"Americans care about men's basketball at the Olympics. They care about track and field and swimming. The one thing they don't care about is football."
"Look at the American men's team. No matter what they achieve at the World Cup, people back home barely care."
"To put it bluntly, darling, almost all your fame is in England and the rest of Europe. Hardly anyone in America knows who you are..."
At that, Taylor paused and gave Li Yufei a peculiar look before murmuring:
"Actually, that's not quite true. Quite a few people in America know you. They just know you for something else."
Li Yufei couldn't help rolling his eyes. He finished her thought for her, self-deprecatingly:
"They know me as the boyfriend of the superstar, Country Pop Princess, and Grammy winner Taylor Swift, right?"
Taylor smiled and nodded, striking an imperious pose. "That's right. In America, the public sees you as my boyfriend."
"Well? Aren't I a good big sister? I've never stopped showing off our relationship in public. Your name comes up in American entertainment news all the time because of me."
Seeing Taylor's expression that practically begged him to praise her, Li Yufei was utterly speechless.
Still, he had to admit that her analysis had hit the mark.
He had been judging the situation through the lens of his past life as a Chinese person, completely overlooking how Americans thought and how little they cared about football.
If the same thing happened in China, it could easily cause an uproar.
But in America, people might treat it as a joke—or simply ignore it.
After all, Chinese football might be terrible, but the country still had a passionate football culture.
In America, on the other hand, hardly anyone talked about football.
Most Americans didn't even know that Li Yufei was a football prodigy.
To put it bluntly, even people in the distant Eastern Great Nation knew more about Li Yufei as a footballer than Americans did!
In that case, why would Americans care whether Li Yufei played for England or America?
Of course, when it came to a decision that would shape his whole life, Li Yufei had to be cautious—very cautious.
"You make a good point, but I need to call Mom and ask her. You only get to choose a national team once in your life, so I should be careful."
Taylor nodded without objecting.
Her boyfriend was right. He should tell their mother about it. Her analysis was only her own guess, after all; the final decision was up to the elders.
"Darling, what will you do if Mom doesn't agree?" Taylor asked, voicing the concern that weighed most heavily on Li Yufei's mind.
Without the slightest hesitation, Li Yufei answered, "Then I'll play for the American team. I want the World Cup badly, but if winning it means giving up my mother, I'd rather go without."
"Mom is one of the people who loves me most in this world. I don't want to disappoint her."
Faced with that choice, Li Yufei didn't need even a second to think.
No matter how wonderful the World Cup was, it was nothing compared to his own mother!
Li Yufei knew how much his mother had quietly sacrificed for him in this life.
His father had managed to build on the fortune his grandfather left behind thanks in no small part to his mother's efforts.
For one thing, his father's business in America had never run into any political obstacles.
That was because his mother had used her family's political influence to protect it.
Li Yufei understood all of this, so no matter what, he would never put his mother in a position where she had to choose between him and what she believed in.
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