Chapter 109: Observe for 1 to 2 seasons

"Joao, wake up!"

Early in the morning, Jiang Yuan pulled Felix's quilt away and forced his roommate to get up.

Felix rubbed his sleepy eyes and stammered, "Well...you went to bed so early last night and you are still so energetic. Were you a slave in your previous life?"

"What black slave? Hurry up and get up, or there will be no food in the cafeteria later!"

Jiang Yuan urged Felix to get up while putting on his clothes.

"What? How could there be no food in the cafeteria? Let me lie down for a while..."

Felix opened his eyes and closed them again. Jiang Yuan usually gets up at 7 o'clock, but the base cafeteria serves breakfast until 9:, so he is not afraid at all.

However, what Jiang Yuan said next made Felix unable to sit still.

"It's already half past eight. Are you sure you don't want to get up and eat? I'm going to train..."

After saying that, Jiang Yuan took his things and left. He came back just to change a pair of sneakers.

Just wake Felix up.

"What!?"

Felix jumped up from the bed and took a closer look. Jiang Yuan was wearing a blue and white striped training jersey with a lot of dust on it.

It turned out that Jiang Yuan didn't just call Felix after getting up, but he had already finished his morning extra training and even had breakfast before returning to the dormitory!
Felix changed his clothes quickly. The U17 coach Alvarenga was not a good person. If he was late, he might not be able to enter the cafeteria in the future.

"Jiang, why didn't you call me earlier!"

Jiang Yuan curled his lips: "Joao, I called you when I just got up, don't play tricks on me"

"..."

Hearing this, Felix fell into deep thought.

It was true that Jiang Yuan called me in the morning, and it was true that I woke up.

The problem is, he wakes up and goes back to sleep!
"Hey!"

Felix sighed and said helplessly: "Then can you wait until I put on my clothes before leaving? You know, I can easily fall asleep."

"Ha ha!"

Jiang Yuan laughed and gave Felix a suggestion: "Why don't you put on all your clothes before going to bed at night, and then when you get up in the daytime, you won't have to spend time getting dressed, so you can sleep a little longer."

After hearing what Jiang Yuan said, Felix's eyes lit up and he gave Jiang Yuan a thumbs up: "Jiang, you are such a genius, I will sleep with my clothes on tonight!"

"By the way, Jiang, do you also wear clothes when you sleep?"

"Hey? Jiang, where are you..."

Felix looked towards the door again, but Jiang Yuan had disappeared without a trace.

"Oh my God... How can someone work so hard? He only sleeps 5 hours a day. Is he still a human being?"

……

On the training ground, assistant coach Hemiel held a notebook and Porto players formed a semicircle in front of him.

"We have a busy schedule these days. We have a Portuguese Super League match the day after tomorrow and a Champions League second leg away game against Bayern on the 21st. So our recent physical training will be cancelled."

"We don't have much to do this morning. We'll start with the simplest two-person ball feel exercise. I'll talk about the rest later. We won't warm up today, let's get started."

"Snapped"

Hemiel closed his notebook and clapped his hands to signal everyone to start taking action. Lopetegui watched the whole process from the side. As the head coach, he has not said a word so far.

"Jiang, are we in the same group?"

Casemiro came over dribbling the ball. He was originally in the same group with Quaresma, but Quaresma has his own aura, and the pressure of practicing with him is a bit too much to bear.

"Well, Carlos, how about you play with Reuben first, and I play with Mr. Ricardo?"

Neves and Casemiro both didn't want to be in the same group with Quaresma, but Jiang Yuan didn't care, so he stood up, fished a ball out of the net, and then waved to Quaresma.

"Mr. Ricardo, I would like to work with you to learn from your experience. Is that okay?"

"Of course, Jiang, come on!"

Quaresma smiled happily and prepared to receive the ball.

"coming!"

Jiang Yuan called out and kicked the ball to Quaresma with a long pass.

The ball spun downward, drawing a smooth arc through the air.

"ta!"

Quaresma stopped the ball with his chest, then touched it with his thigh, and finally kicked it at the bottom of the ball.

"!"

Jiang Yuan was very focused. He took small steps while observing where the ball would land. He also stopped the ball with his chest. After stopping the ball, Jiang Yuan also bounced the ball a few times with the instep of his foot and then kicked the ball back to Quaresma.

In this way, the two players passed the ball continuously in the air, and after more than ten rounds, the ball still did not fall to the ground.

At this moment, Quaresma suddenly shouted: "Be careful!"

Quaresma used his chest to take the ball off, then rubbed the outside of his right foot against the bottom of the ball, causing the ball to fly towards Jiang Yuan in a strange arc.

Quaresma is going to make things difficult for Jiang Yuan!

Facing the ball flying in an arc, Jiang Yuan seemed a little flustered. The ball was neither high nor low, and it was not particularly good to catch it with the chest or the thigh. In addition, the ball had a strong outward spin, so it was indeed difficult to handle the ball.

Jiang Yuan chose to raise his foot to block the ball, but the ball hit his ankle neither too high nor too low and bounced out.

"asshole!"

Jiang Yuan felt very uncomfortable. His ball-stopping technique was still lacking. Anyone in the first-team could catch this kind of arc pass, except Jiang Yuan.

"Jiang, how do you feel?"

Quaresma ran over with the ball, looked down at Jiang Yuan's ankle, and breathed a sigh of relief after confirming that it was not swollen.

Jiang Yuan licked his lips and suddenly said, "Mr. Ricardo, where do you think my problem lies? This kind of curve ball is too difficult for me..."

Jiang Yuan's face turned slightly red as he spoke. Stopping the ball should have been part of the curriculum for youth players, but Jiang Yuan, a regular player in the Portuguese Super League, is still struggling with these things.

In this regard, Quaresma did not laugh at Jiang Yuan, but comforted him: "Don't worry, I'll see if there is any way..."

"By the way, don't call me Mr. Ricardo, just call me Ricardo"

Quaresma really likes Jiang Yuan.

He passes the ball beautifully and has good shooting ability.

He speaks very nicely. It's rare to find such an outstanding winger!

"Okay Mr. Ricardo!"

Jiang Yuan nodded solemnly. Quaresma threw the ball with his outside foot and rubbed it. The ball slowly formed an arc in the air and flew far away. Quaresma pointed at the trajectory of the ball and said slowly: "The biggest difference between an arc long pass and an ordinary long pass is its trajectory."

"Normally speaking, long arc passes are easier to receive..."

Quaresma is right. There is a big characteristic of arc pass. The moment the ball touches the player, there is a force in other directions. At this time, the player only needs to move his feet slightly in the same direction to get the ball off well.

This is why in professional games, when passing the ball to the wingers from the backcourt, the pass is usually an arc pass, because it will greatly reduce the difficulty for the wingers to stop the ball.

But Jiang Yuan's problem is that he can stop an ordinary long pass with the same direction, but he is always unsure of the position when stopping an arc pass.

"Mr. Ricardo, I may be suffering from poor eyesight"

Jiang Yuan looked a little frustrated. Lopetegui had talked to him about this last time. For this reason, Jiang Yuan went to CUF in Porto for a test. He learned from the doctor that vision is actually divided into static vision and dynamic vision.

Static vision is the data of Jiang Yuan's vision test, 4.9 for one eye and 4.8 for the other eye. It is the ability of the eyes to observe stationary objects.

As for dynamic visual acuity, as the name suggests, it is the ability of the eyes to capture the target image when observing a moving target.

The so-called "judgment of the landing point of a long pass" in football is actually determined by dynamic vision.

Unfortunately, Jiang Yuan's eye refractive problem also affected his dynamic vision.

It is equivalent to catching a pass. The normal trajectory in the eyes of others seems to be accelerated in Jiang Yuan's eyes.

Thinking of this, Jiang Yuan suddenly asked:
"Mr. Ricardo, is there any way for me to stop the ball even if I'm not sure where to stop it?"

"hiss--"

After hearing Jiang Yuan's question, Quaresma frowned and said, "It is very uncomfortable to not know the correct position when stopping the ball. Jiang, I understand how you feel."

As a wing master, Quaresma is well aware of the huge role of a winger's ability to receive long passes.

Many times, whether a winger can catch the pass from his teammates in the backcourt directly determines whether an attack can be successfully launched.

Quaresma stroked his beard and suddenly had an idea: "I think you can try to use your chest to stop the ball. You know, the chest has a large contact area and is less likely to make mistakes."

"Too"

Jiang Yuan nodded quickly, thinking that what Quaresma said might be a good idea.

When perfection is impossible, Jiang Yuan can only find ways to be excellent.

Later, Jiang Yuan and Quaresma made a series of long passes, and Quaresma always used various weird angles to "make things difficult" for Jiang Yuan. At the beginning, Jiang Yuan still had great difficulty in stopping the ball, but he got better with practice.

Quaresma is right. Although stopping the ball with the chest is slower than stopping the ball with the feet, it has a higher tolerance rate and is less likely to make mistakes.

"Beep beep beep!"

Soon, Hemiel blew the whistle, and the half-hour long pass and warm-up came to an end.

"Okay guys, next we're going to the gym to do some strength training!"

???

Strength Training?

The players were a little confused. Captain Martinez reminded them, "Sir, I remember we did strength training the day before the game. What happened today is..."

Lopetegui shook his head: "That time it was upper body strength, this time it's lower body strength, this is different. You all run so slowly, how can I not give you some strength training?"

"All right!"

Martinez was helpless, it seemed that today's pain was inevitable.

Casemiro was also a little nervous. He turned to look at Jiang Yuan and found that Jiang Yuan was chewing gum very calmly: "Jiang, aren't you nervous?"

"It's nothing urgent, it's just a calf cramp at best."

Jiang Yuan looked calm and composed, as if the calf cramp was nothing to him.

"Jiang, you are awesome!"

Casemiro gave Jiang Yuan a thumbs up.

50 minutes later……

"Ah, it hurts, damn it, Reuben, give me some pressure, my calf is cramping!"

Jiang Yuan fell to the ground and yelled, and Neves rushed over to help Jiang Yuan bend his legs.

"Asshole, don't you have a competition the day after tomorrow? Why are you lifting so heavy weights today?"

Hearing Jiang Yuan's scream, Casemiro walked over, squatted down, and gave Jiang Yuan a thumbs up again.

Only this time the thumb is upside down.

……

Arsenal training ground, Holloway, London, England.

"Pat, has the transfer been finalized?"

Head coach Arsène Wenger is talking to assistant coach Patrese.

Patres shook his head: "Porto gave him a new contract, and the penalty for breach of contract increased to 1150 million euros..."

"asshole!"

Wenger was so angry that he threw the documents in his hand away: "1150 million euros in liquidated damages. It seems that we have to go through the normal transfer procedures. Have you asked Porto how much his transfer fee is?"

Patrese made a "2" with his fingers: "Porto's asking price is 2000 million"

"All right!"

Wenger sighed.

The offer of 2000 million is definitely inflated. Either Porto wants to rip off Arsenal, or they want to rip off Arsenal.

"Do you want me to send someone to talk to them?"

Patras inquired.

Wenger rubbed his white hair and waved his hand: "No need, the price will not be less than 1000 million euros if we negotiate now. Let's take a look first."

It is not a big problem to get Arsenal to pay 1000 million euros, but whether Jiang Yuan is worth 1000 million euros is still a question. It is still a bit risky to force a purchase.

Spending 1000 million euros to buy a 17-year-old young player whose skills are not yet fully developed is not something Arsenal can do.

"Fine!"

Patiles smiled bitterly. Since Wenger insisted so much, he, as an assistant coach, couldn't say anything. He could only put the matter aside for the time being.

"correct!"

Wenger added: "Let's observe him for one or two seasons. If he can maintain his current form, 1 million euros will not be a problem.

"Arsene, I understand"

……

(End of this chapter)