Godfather Of Champio Chapter 6: Down By Three Goals

Chapter 6: Down By Three Goals

Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio

Wilford training ground's old security guard, Ian Macdonald had already turned on the radio before the match started. He turned the volume to max and sat inside the guardhouse peacefully listening to the match. At this time, the players who had made it to the team's roster were all at the City Ground, while those who did not make the cut were at home or elsewhere. The training ground was quiet, and the only sound was the mentary ing from the guardhouse.

He still remembered Tony Twain's smile and promise to him, "You will hear us score one goal after another." This filled him with anticipation.

The match started not long before, and he indeed heard news of goals being scored from the radio. However, they were not by Team Nottingham Forest, but by the away team, West Ham. The match was only a half an hour in, and the team he loved had already conceded three goals.

He sat dumbfounded in the chair, unable to believe the voices he had just heard.

"Jermain Defoe! Defoe shoots and scores! What a beautiful assault!"

"Defoe gains possession of the ball outside the penalty area and dribbles past! Will it be 2:0? Yes! Jermain Defoe has scored again! West Ham leads with a score of 2:0!"

"Unbelievable! Unbelievable! A volley shot from outside the penalty area! From Joe Cole! Simply hard to believe that he is only 21 years old! He is the future treasure of English football! This is the third goal from West Ham in this match. They have plete control over the match, leaving Nottingham Forest no chance at all! 3:0, the match ends ahead of schedule!"

Ends ahead of schedule? You worthless mentator, what are you saying? The match is only 30 minutes in, and we still have 60 minutes to make a eback! Macdonald had never trusted the substitute manager, Tony Twain so much before. At that moment, he believed that this man could deliver what he had promised.

He shook his fist at the radio, as if he was standing alongside his fellow supporters on the viewing platform to demonstrate against the opposing team. Ever since he had assumed the role of the training ground's gatekeeper, it had been several years since he last watched a match at City Ground.

City Ground was almost flooded with jeers. Tang En was extremely familiar with such jeering sounds. Three days ago, when he first opened his eyes and saw this world, what surrounded his ears were these sounds, and they were ing from their own fans. The target on whom they were venting their discontent was not the opposite team West Ham, but the home team Nottingham Forest.

In a corner of the field, a group of players wearing the West Ham jersey clustered around their team captain. They were celebrating the goal, celebrating their third goal of the match.

Des Walker hugged his head in aggravation, as he sat beside Tang En. From the pre-match preparations, all the way to the tactics, Walker was the one who had planned for this match in the entirety. Tang En said that he believed in him, and so Walker wanted to use a victory to reciprocate the manager's trust in himself. There was no way he had anticipated a massacre before halftime.

The electronic scoreboard's 0:3 score, was red, as if dyed in fresh blood. The number of middle fingers raised at the manager was as numerous as the trees in Sherwood Forest, to the Northeast of Nottingham City. What made the fans furious was not only the score, but the performance of the players on the field.

Tang En saw it clearly. If he were a hardcore fan of Team Nottingham Forest, faced with such a performance in the first thirty minutes of the first half, he would also use vulgarities and a middle finger to express his feelings. He even suspected the 11 people on the field, like him, did not manage to sleep well the night before. Did they assemble as a team to patronize prostitutes? These b*stards! He thought to himself as he frowned and gritted his teeth.

What Tang En did not know, was that a camera on the opposite side of the field was pointed at him, capturing a close-up on his facial expressions and broadcasted live. The mentator for this match was the same as before. He was famous for his sharp and passionate mentary style. He had just used a series of pliments to praise West Ham's young team captain, Joe Cole's goal. That was also West Ham's third goal in this entire match. He concluded, "This match is already over! Despite Team Nottingham Forest's glorious history, this team is like a group of pitiful souls on their last legs after being stepped on by Joe Cole, worrying about when the next wave of offense will e! Look at Team Nottingham Forest in their red jerseys. This is really heartbreaking!"

"Manager Tony Twain also appears to be unsatisfied with the team's current performance. If that is the case, please e up with some sort of strategy! Don't keep frowning and gritting your teeth at the coach's seat. Aren't your teeth in pain? In fact, we have only seen his assistant manager, Des Walker, direct the match so far. Just who exactly is the manager? But who would have any hope that a former player, a newbie to managing who had just retired would be able to direct a League One team to defeat a Premier League team? The doubts cast upon Team Nottingham Forest's substitute manager's ability are not groundless. Until now, Tony Twain has yet to make any change to the team strategy. He is even worse than his predecessor, Paul Hart—according to rumors, it is said that Twain assumed the role of the manager only because Paul Hart strongly remended him to Chairman Doughty. What I want to say is, Paul, you always had a discerning eye for players, but in terms of managers, there is still much room for improvement!"

Who knew what Tang En would do if he had heard such disparaging ments from the mentator. Perhaps he might quarrel with this mentator on the spot... However, the current him did not have time to think about other people's ments about him. He had to salvage the current situation on the field. He knew that West Ham was very strong. Just from looking at some of the players' names, he could tell how impressive they were. But this was no excuse for Nottingham Forest to be losing.

The reason for their loss was only one, and that was because they were not good enough!

Tang En muttered this sentence softly.

Walker turned his head toward Tang En. He seemed to have heard it, but it wasn't registering. "What?" he asked.

"Nothing," Tang En shook his head.

"Tony, you have to think of a plan. We can't carry on like this," Walker whispered to Tang En as he moved his mouth closer to his ear. "Bowyer must be waiting for us to fail miserably. I feel like he is hoping for us to lose this match!"

"You're right, that old man is indeed thinking like this. But the current version of me has no solution."

Walker was extremely disappointed at Tang En's reply. The manager should not do this kind of thing: When he loses control over a certain thing, it tends to be when he is at an impasse.

"Do you think our defenders could possibly defend against Joe Cole, Lee Bowyer, Di Canio and Jermain Defoe?"

Walker shook his head. Truth to be told, the team indeed did not have any way of going toe-to-toe with such a Premier League team. Hearing these players' names, they were either veteran stars who were already very famous, or they were the best new talent from the whole of England.

"Also, do you think with our strikers and midfielders are able to penetrate the defense of Michael Carrick, Ian Pearce, Tomas Repka, and David James, and score?"

Walker continued to shake his head. This defensive line was national team level. James was England's national team goalkeeper, while Tomas was a member of the Czech Republic national football team. Carrick even transferred over to Manchester United in the summer three years later. In the entire first half of the match, the two strikers of Nottingham Forest had only three chances to score, but the type of balls they shot were not even sufficient for James to warm up.

With the aid of their group of talented football players, West Ham United easily took control of the entire match's tempo and had plete ball possession on the field. Team Nottingham Forest could only run back and forth after the ball, wasting away their stamina and fighting spirit with this sort of meaningless running. West Ham had extremely miserable results in the English Premier League, only obtaining 16 points in the 21 rounds of the first half of the season, and was ranked last in the League. However, their strength was more than sufficient to throw their weight around in front of a League One team, venting their frustrations from being bullied.

After merely 17 minutes into the match, West Ham United managed to take the lead. The swift and agile young striker, James Defoe managed to break past Team Nottingham Forest's clumsy back defensive line with much ease, scoring the first goal for his team. Five minutes later, Defoe once again made use of his speed and broke past the defensive line. Watching this young talent who would be chosen for England's national team give his utmost performance, Tang En had a feeling of time-space disorientation. He knew of this young lad's future achievements. What made Tang En feel pletely powerless was that his team, Nottingham Forest, had to play against such a team which had no lack of talented players.

Looking at West Ham United's players casually passing the ball around, Joe Cole even performed a back heel pass in front of their few fans present. Listening to the sounds of laughter from the West Ham United's fans on the viewing platform as well as the various jeers, Tang En had an ugly thought: Exactly whose home match was this?

This kind of situation made him extremely furious. Although he did not personally experience being passed by Joe Cole and the rest on the field, he still felt himself being humiliated. Because he was the team's manager. When his team was bullied on the field, the responsibility was on him. It was the same as him being pushed around with his players.

Michael Dawson was currently the strongest player on Team Nottingham Forest, even though he alone was unable to defend against West Ham's relentless offense. The responsibility for the three misses did not lie with him. It was just that the team was too weak overall. After watching 30 plus minutes of the match, Tang En decided to pass the captain armband over to this young lad. If the 21-year-old Joe Cole could bee the captain of "The Hammers