Chapter 50: Can Building Chemistry Be Called Sparring?

Chapter 50: Can Building Chemistry Be Called Acting as a Training Goalkeeper?

"I heard you volunteered to be Li's practice goalkeeper?"

After finishing training and returning to the hotel, Olivier Giroud was greeted by Laurent Koscielny's eyes, which were burning with thick, juicy gossip.

If they were back at the Colney Training Ground, Li Mo could easily find a youth academy goalkeeper to practice with—although Li Mo was young, he was a first-team "big shot" and still had the authority to boss around the youngsters in the youth academy.

Relationships among club players nowadays were relatively equal. But if you went back twenty or thirty years, those young prospects coming up to the first team were basically at the mercy of the senior players. After training and matches, the old-timers would hand their muddy boots and jerseys straight to the youngsters to wash. Back then, which of the young lads in the first team hadn't been "bullied"? Rumor had it that when David Beckham first entered the first team, he was even forced to bust a nut while staring at a photo of Sir Bobby Charlton—allegedly, just a rumor.

"What practice goalkeeper? Can building team chemistry be called acting as a practice goalkeeper? There's no such thing, stop talking nonsense, I didn't do it."

Giroud offered a triple denial.

"Come on, stop pretending! You have no idea, everyone was hanging out on the hotel balconies today watching you two train!"

"Huh?"

Giroud's complexion flickered slightly.

What should he do? Where was the pride of the center forward with the highest market value in the entire squad supposed to go?

Right at that moment, Koscielny patted Giroud on the shoulder. "Actually, everyone thinks it looks really cool—watching you fight for your position."

"Really?"

"That's what I think," Koscielny comforted him.

Meanwhile, Li Mo had returned to his hotel room. His roommate, Jack Wilshere, eagerly hurried over.

"I heard Olivier took the initiative to be your practice goalkeeper?"

"Uh, well, it just happened that I needed to do some shooting practice that day," Li Mo said, scratching his head.

Actually, he had been quite surprised that Giroud took the initiative to come over and train with him. However, on second thought, if he could build better chemistry with Giroud and the other Arsenal forwards, it would undoubtedly benefit their performance on the pitch.

Besides, Giroud coming forward on his own had practically handed him a [Heading Module]. Thanks to the fact that his [Basic Shooting Training Module] was already completed, his heading ability was already up to standard. Therefore, fusing the [Heading Module] brought by Giroud was relatively effortless.

By now, Li Mo had basically figured out the integration difficulty setting of the [Bonds System] modules—it was related to the abilities he already possessed. If he already had a certain foundation, the integration would be much smoother.

Having acquired the [Giroud Heading Ability Module] and the [Bale Left-Footed Cut-Inside Shooting Module], Li Mo now possessed seven player modules.

As for system upgrades, only one more player module was needed, along with the completion of the [Basic Dribbling Training Module].

With his height no longer increasing, Li Mo's control over his body's center of gravity and sense of balance was becoming increasingly effortless. This allowed the training abilities he had accumulated over the past decade to gradually return.

The progress of the [Basic Dribbling Training Module] was also accelerating, and its completion was not far off. By then, once the three major basic training modules were finished, Li Mo's fundamentals would be elevated to S-tier.

His strength was progressing rapidly, which was his capital to continuously score goals—because right now, all of Arsenal's opponents were studying Li Mo. But what if... what if Li Mo could constantly pull new weapons out of his arsenal?

The prerequisite for restricting a player was knowing everything about them. Furthermore, Li Mo didn't feel any aversion to Giroud taking the initiative to cozy up and build a relationship with him, because he also needed teammates with good chemistry.

Football, after all, was ultimately a team sport of eleven players.

During training, Giroud had also been teased a bit by the first-team players, but everyone was just making good-natured jokes. It was obvious that Giroud was about to lose his starting spot. As professional players, they all understood that feeling too well, and Giroud working hard for his place was entirely blameless.

Over the next two days, Giroud chose to stay behind and train with Li Mo. He felt that this kind of training was quite effective—at least, he had become more familiar with Li Mo, getting a better grasp of Li Mo's running habits, receiving habits, trapping habits, and shooting habits.

Chemistry was built slowly, step by step, just like this.

"Gooooooooooooal!!!"

At the Veltins-Arena, the commentary box and the stands erupted into a frenzy.

Clearly, Schalke 04 had scored.

On the big screen at the stadium:
Score: 1-0
Match Time: 48:21:12

Only three minutes into the second half, Arsenal had conceded a goal.

The man who opened the scoring account for Schalke 04 was Dutch international Klaas-Jan Huntelaar. His header inside the penalty area pierced through Wojciech Szczęsny's ten-fingered defense.

This goal completely rendered Arsène Wenger's fifteen-minute half-time tactical adjustments null and void.

If viewed from the starting point of the half-time break, the match prior to this could be described in one word: lackluster.

In the first half, Arsenal had set up in a counter-attacking posture, waiting for the hosts Schalke 04 to attack. But Schalke's manager, Huub Stevens, wasn't an idiot; he naturally knew that if Schalke committed too many men forward in attack, they would likely be caught out by Arsenal's counter-attacks.

Theo Walcott's pace was right there, and Li Mo wasn't slow either. Santi Cazorla, Jack Wilshere, and even Mikel Arteta all possessed the ability to play a penetrating killer pass.

Therefore, in the first half, Schalke 04 did attack, but they didn't commit heavily, opting instead for probing, harassing attacks. Even if they lost possession, Arsenal couldn't find much space to counter. Thus, the first half played out at a dull, sluggish tempo, ending in a goalless draw.

As for the second half, Schalke 04 took advantage of kicking off the half to launch an aggressive early blitz!

Unexpectedly, right from this fierce onslaught, Schalke 04 reaped the reward of a goal.

Huntelaar's goal was worth its weight in gold. It almost completely flipped the dynamic of attack and defense—wasn't Arsenal planning to play on the counter? Now that Schalke was ahead, how were they going to counter? Arsenal had no choice but to push forward and attack.

Otherwise, they would simply have to accept a 1-0 defeat.

And once Arsenal pushed up, Schalke 04 would naturally have plenty of counter-attacking opportunities of their own!

Huub Stevens clapped and smiled on the sidelines. If they won this match, Schalke 04 would basically lock down the top spot in the group!

Wenger's headache stemmed precisely from this. He knew that if Arsenal qualified as the runners-up of their group, they would almost certainly draw either Barcelona or Bayern Munich in the Round of 16.

Those two giants were not teams a current Arsenal side could afford to mess with—even Wenger himself lacked the confidence to eliminate either of those squads.

What's more, the knockout matches wouldn't take place until the second half of the season. Usually, by that time, Arsenal's squad would be riddled with injuries, sometimes even forcing them to call up a few youngsters from the youth academy just to make up the numbers.

There was no help for it; squad depth was simply lacking. When the depth of the squad was tested in the latter half of the season, Arsenal certainly couldn't compete with Bayern Munich or Barcelona.

Besides, even if Arsenal were fully fit and had a complete squad, their financial power and paper strength still fell far short of those opponents.

If they wanted to go further in the UEFA Champions League, the best approach was to seize the top spot in the group stage and avoid the group winners from other groups.

Therefore, only one path lay before Wenger now.

Attack!

With that thought, Wenger looked towards the bench, his gaze landing squarely on Olivier Giroud.

"Olivier, go warm up!"