Milanello Training Center – July 2003
The hallway smelled of disinfectant and old sweat. On the wall: framed photos of club legends, frozen in time mid-tackle or mid-roar. Luca Bellini walked past them all, holding his medical forms in one hand and a folded newspaper in the other.
He'd been here before. But this time, he wasn't a hopeful kid with clean boots. This time, he had numbers. Minutes. A title under his belt.
A club official waved him toward the exam room.
"Bellini? You're up."
Inside, it was business as usual.
"Height?"
"190 cm," Luca said.
The doctor noted it. "Weight?"
"Eighty-three kilos."
"Resting heart rate... 48 bpm. You've been working."
Luca just nodded. No need to explain. He always worked. Even in the off-season. Especially in the off-season.
The rest of the tests were smooth: knee flexibility, ankle strength, vision, balance. The physio team murmured among themselves. He heard one say "strong frame," another say "clean movement." All boxes ticked.
But Luca wasn't thinking about medical charts.
He was thinking about what he'd written the night before.
---
Notebook Entry — July 11, 2003
> "Still tense in right knee when closing space on the left side.
Need to stay lower when pressing inside channel.
Still hesitate when the forward drops deep. Anticipation over aggression."
This wasn't superstition. It wasn't superstardom. It was just his system.
Everyone kept calling it that: "Bellini's system."
Like it was some secret formula. Some cheat code. It wasn't.
It was three things — simple, unglamorous, and unforgiving.
---
1. Honest Review
After every match, every training, he wrote down everything.
Not what went right — but what went wrong.
He didn't wait for the coach. Didn't care about the media ratings.
He wrote about positioning errors, mental slips, poor choices, missed reads, emotions that flared too high or froze too long.
> "Lost focus after teammate's error. Can't do that."
"Too upright when defending back post."
"Feet flat for half a second — nearly cost us the equalizer."
Every single mistake had to be written. Or it would happen again.
---
2. Pattern Tracking
Every two weeks, he reviewed his notes. He wasn't looking for drama. He was looking for patterns.
He trained differently depending on what he saw.
> "Two slow reactions late in matches? Time to adjust recovery."
"Always drawn to ball when anxious? Time to trust the shape."
He wasn't just improving his game.
He was refining his mind.
---
3. Emotional Reset
When the page was full, the mistake was dead.
No dwelling. No shame. No ego.
Whether the press loved him or buried him, the routine stayed the same:
Reflect. Write. Close the book.
He called it his mental laundry. Wash it clean. Hang it up. Move on.
---
Luca stepped out of the medical room and sat down in the waiting area. In his lap, the folded copy of La Gazzetta dello Sport.
He hesitated, then opened it.
---
La Gazzetta dello Sport – July 12, 2003
> 🔴 Bellini Returns: Milan's Cold-Blooded Prodigy
By Marco Romano
After a title-winning season with Siena, 18-year-old Luca Bellini returns to AC Milan not just with promise — but performance.
With 31 Serie B appearances, Bellini recorded:
2 goals
3 assists
78 interceptions
124 clearances
19 blocks
6 yellow cards, 0 reds
87% passing accuracy
5.3 successful long balls per match
Siena coach Papadopulo calls him "unshakable."
Milan hopes he'll be more than that.
Bellini himself declined to comment.
He folded the paper and placed it on the chair beside him.
The numbers didn't lie. But they weren't the full truth, either.
The truth was in the notebook. And the notebook didn't care about stats. It only cared about growth.
---
That night, back in his small apartment, he opened a new journal. Fresh. Clean.
Page One: Milan 2003–04 — Objectives.
Adapt to new system.
Speak more on the pitch.
Win duels, not just survive them.
Don't get distracted by attention.
Stay in control.
At the bottom, he wrote:
> Be the version of myself I haven't reached yet.
He closed the book and looked out his window toward the city skyline.
Somewhere in that city, Sofia was probably finishing a long day of lectures or stuck in the library, buried in anatomy textbooks. He thought about calling her. He didn't.
Not tonight.