The next day came alone very quickly. A lot faster than Tyler expected. He thought he would have trouble falling asleep in the night, but he slept off pretty quickly. Before he knew what was happening, he was wearing his jersey and hearing James's pre match team talk.
Tyler was completely zoned out during the entirety of James's pep talk. His heart kept beating wildly, not because of the scouts watching the match, but because of the notification he saw from the system the night before.
It had given him a mission to drop a masterclass performance, but it wasn't the mission that made him react that way, it was the reward.
There was a potential potential increase (that was on purpose) on the line. The system called itself the Unlimited Potential System, but so far it never said anything to help him improve what he considered a low potential rating if he was to get to the top of football. Now, after nearly a year of it, he finally had a chance.
And he had to take that chance, no matter what.
"So go out there and go win!" James shouted, snapping Tyler away from his thoughts.
Everyone in the locker room seemed motivated, even though they had different reactions to whatever James said. Some were fired up and shouting while others, like Tyler had a look of quiet determination in their eyes.
A few minutes later, a match official came to them and told them to come out to the tunnel.
Tyler, along with the rest of the team, walked out and saw that their opponents were already lined up. Tyler sized them up in his head mentally and noticed that they were a lot more physical than his team were.
They were going to be tough, but he had to be tougher than them.
The two sets of players walked out onto the pitch. Tyler took his place on the left side of the pitch and after the captains and the referees completed the pre match rituals, the referee blew his whistle and the match started.
[A/N: just realized that I didn't drop the name of the opposing team. It's been corrected in the previous chapters but for those that are already here, it's Giannis Academy]
Unlike the other matches that Rising Stars Academy played, this one had a quick start. This wasn't like the other matches where the players didn't want to make a mistake because of the scouts. Many of these players felt that it was their last chance so they threw caution to the wind.
Giannis Academy created the first chance of the game in the fourth minute. After relentlessly pressing forward, they finally managed to get the ball to the final third of the field.
Their team's attacking midfielder passed the ball to their center forward who had dropped deep. The center forward flicked it wide to the team's left back who took a touch on the ball and looked up, before whipping a deadly cross into the box.
The Rising Stars Academy players inside the box jumped up to meet it, but their efforts were futile. The cross went over them, and to Giannis Academy's right winger who connected with the ball first time.
Unfortunately for him, while his shot had pace, power and the element of surprise, it didn't have precision. His shot went over the bar and the Rising Stars Academy players heaved a sigh of relief.
The next few minutes were bouts of open fire between the two clubs. Usually, teams would spend time building up and then executing attacks, but the two teams threw that format away. They were playing direct football, with no other thought than scoring goals.
In the twentieth minute, Tyler finally got his time to shine. After being limited to back passes and crosses, he finally had a chance to dribble.
He got the ball in transition, Moses passing to him after intercepting a pass. With his first touch, he nutmegged the opposition player trying to pressure him and went on a mad dash on the left flank.
When he got to the middle of the park, the opposition defensive midfielder and right back double teamed on him.
Tyler didn't even know what happened for the next three seconds. He somehow managed to dance his way past the double enclosement and had a lot of free space to run into on the left.
The right center back came out to try and cut him off. But Tyler did a couple of step overs before cutting into the box. He took a couple of steps inside and pretended to take a shot before cutting back to his left foot, wrong footing the two center backs inside the box and setting him up for a one on one with the goalkeeper.
Tyler didn't hesitate and sent a powerful shot with his left foot towards the goal. He would have preferred to cut back to his right but he could hear the rapid footsteps belonging to the Giannis Academy players rushing back to their goal. Every second was critical.
The Giannis Academy goalkeeper rushed out of the goal and spread his body to make himself big with the hopes of blocking Tyler's shot.
Unfortunately for him, the shot grazed his hand and smashed the net of the goal post. Tyler scored. Rising Stars Academy had taken the lead. One nil.
As soon as Tyler saw the ball hit the back of the net, he started running down the corner flag and did a knee slide, then stood up and started pumping his fists. He repeatedly tapped on Rising Stars Academy's insignia on his chest before doing a love sign with his hands.
Everything he was now, while it was mainly thanks to the system, was also thanks to them. They took a chance on him when nobody else could. Hell, the tournament he was currently playing in which led to him being scouted he only played in because he was representing them.
He was grateful to them.
A/N: apologies for the lack of updates yesterday. Another chapter will come out later today to make up for it.