The God of Football Starts With Passive Skills

Wang Shuo ran straight to Reus’s side, slung an arm around his shoulder, and patted it firmly.

The gesture instantly warmed Reus’s ice-cold heart.

"It’s okay. I’m here," Wang Shuo said calmly.

Hearing this, Reus took a sharp, deep breath and looked at Wang Shuo intently, saying nothing.

But from his eyes, Wang Shuo read the message he wanted to see.

He was starting to snap out of it.

The Dortmund fans in the stadium didn’t boo.

Reus was a child of Dortmund, young and exceptionally talented since joining the team, even earning a spot on the national team.

A player like that deserved forgiveness, even for a mistake.

And when they saw Wang Shuo consoling Reus, they applauded even harder, cheering on their players.

Klopp shouted from the sidelines, "It’s fine, it’s fine! Get your spirits up! Show them what we’re made of!"

"Come on!"

Klopp clapped forcefully, waving his hands nonstop, urging the team to push forward boldly.

...

Reus’s "assist" threw Dortmund’s pre-game plan into disarray, and the match’s tempo was disrupted.

Originally, Dortmund’s plan was not to fixate on possession, but to desperately ramp up the pace.

Although the Premier League was known for its fast pace, Chelsea was an aging team.

In a high-paced, high-stamina match like this, they couldn’t outlast Dortmund.

But now, Reus’s sudden mistake, which led to the goal, had given Chelsea a perfect reason to fall back and play on the counter-attack.

The defense of a Premier League team was indeed more ferocious than a Bundesliga team’s.

In the 7th minute, just as Wang Shuo finally got the ball and tried to make a breakthrough, he was taken down by a sliding tackle from Ivanovic.

The referee didn’t even blow the whistle, simply waving for play to continue.

Moreover, they were extremely adept at physical challenges.

In the 13th minute, Wang Shuo, with his back to the goal, received a long pass from the backfield. Just as he settled the ball with his chest, Terry charged in from behind like a runaway dump truck, slamming into his back and making him stumble, nearly sending him sprawling forward.

Although he didn’t fall, he couldn’t control the ball in time and naturally lost possession.

"Wang Shuo really is too honest."

"In a situation like that, he should have just gone down. The referee might have even called a foul."

"But he doesn’t have a habit of diving, so after regaining his balance, he didn’t fall, and the referee didn’t even call a foul."

Dortmund focused their attacks on the flanks, targeting Bosingwa and Ashley Cole.

In the 18th minute, Piszczek made a quick run up the right wing and sent a cross from near the byline into the box.

Wang Shuo was being tightly marked by Terry. With no angle to shoot and no clear passing lane, he tried to control the ball in the box, get past Terry, and then look for a pass.

But Terry, without a second thought, went straight in with a slide tackle, knocking the ball out for a corner.

He took Wang Shuo down in the process.

Afterward, the corner kick taken by Shahin failed to pose a threat.

Hummels couldn’t even win the header against Ivanovic in the box.

Wang Shuo found it hard to describe, but he could feel the mood of his teammates around him.

A little fear, a little panic, a little chaos.

No one was on the same page.

As they played on, the rhythm was always off.

As they passed the ball around, mistakes were made easily.

In the stands, the Dortmund fans were singing in unison.

They sang their club anthem, they sang "You’ll Never Walk Alone," trying to inspire the players on the field.

But everyone was playing poorly.

Nothing was going right!

Even toward the end of the first half, Wang Shuo tried to rally the team and launch an attack, but it came to nothing.

He couldn’t do it all by himself.

In the end, Dortmund was trailing 0-1 at halftime.

...

"Hiss."

Back in the locker room, Wang Shuo winced in pain as he took off his jersey, revealing a lean, muscular torso.

His eight-pack abs were especially eye-catching, each one sharply defined.

"Marcus, come take a look," Wang Shuo called out.

The team doctor, Marcus Braun, immediately ran over and knelt in front of Wang Shuo. Following his gesture, he saw a large bruise on his left ribs.

Hearing Wang Shuo’s shout, the others all turned to look.

"What happened?" Marcus Braun asked.

"Who did this?" Subotic demanded, growing anxious. "That looks like an elbow strike."

Wang Shuo glanced at his best friend and nodded.

As expected, an expert could tell at a glance.

It was indeed an elbow strike.

"Ivanovic. During a challenge, he drove his elbow into me."

Wang Shuo had been trying to receive the ball with his back to the goal when Ivanovic came up and simply knocked him down.

But the elbowing motion was too subtle.

Wang Shuo protested to the referee, but it was no use. He hadn’t seen it.

"Hiss!"

Wang Shuo could clearly hear his teammates sharply sucking in their breath.

Those were his ribs, after all.

"Does it hurt?" Götze asked, his face a mask of pained concern.

"Duh. How about you let me elbow you and see how it feels?" Subotic snorted.

In fact, when it came to doing this sort of thing, Subotic was quite the professional.

How professional, you ask?

He could inflict a lot of pain without causing a fracture or any other serious injury.

In short, they had enough experience to precisely control their force.

The doctor quickly treated it with a cold spray. After a chilly sensation spread over the area, it felt much better.