My Goalkeeping System

Chapter 431 Attempt A Shot

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The day for the last group-stage matches of the Europa Conference League was finally here.

The day Villarreal had really been looking forward to, to them it was like that last exam you knew you prepared for but were afraid you were going to fail mainly because of how difficult it could be.

On the other hand, the match didn't really mean anything to Unique FC because whatever the outcome may be, nothing would change for them.

However, they still wanted to win and that was mostly because of Norman.

The Bilbeth Premier League side had to travel to Spain the first time they faced Villarreal which meant that the yellow submarines were the ones who traveled over to Bilbeth this time to try their shot in qualifying for the next round of the competition.

They arrived at Unique City yesterday evening, and even some of them got to meet some of the Unique FC players.

The match was set to kick off in the next forty minutes, and in the meantime, the players from both teams were all on the pitch warming up.

"I know this is weird, but right now, this really feels like one of those pre-season matches to me," Dave said before passing the ball to Mateo who was just opposite him.

Mateo didn't trap the ball and just sent it rolling toward Ferran who was on his right with his first touch.

"Yeah, I'm getting that feeling too, and I guess it sort of makes sense." The midfielder commented before he sent the ball rolling to Minino on the other side just before Roland could get to him.

"Well, there's absolutely nothing on the line," Merino remarked before he sent the ball rolling to Mateo. "For us at least."

"Yeah, you guys are right," Mateo said before lobbing the ball over to Dave. "But you all heard coach, we have to win, and if he says we have to win, we have to win."

"Who said we're not going to try our best to win?" Dave replied as soon as he trapped the ball under his foot.

Roland quickly rushed toward him at that time, and before he could try to evade him with the ball, the defender got the ball off his feet and sent it rolling to Ferran.

"I mean it's not like we didn't take the pre-season matches seriously." The goalkeeper said as he got in the middle. "I can't really speak for the others but I know I took it seriously."

They continued their conversation that way for a while and only broke up just a few minutes before they had to go down the tunnel to get ready for the match.

Unique FC players quickly made their way to the locker and slid into their custom orange kit before making their way to the tunnel's exit where they met up with Villarreal players.

They were putting on black kits with yellow outlines and single yellow stripes on both sides of the shorts while their goalkeeper was putting on a green kit.

There was this myth that Villarreal didn't play with any other than their yellow home kit but finally today, the Unique FC fans who believed that could finally see that it was just a myth.

The players waited there for a while before they were finally given the signal to start making their way to the pitch.

The fans were all cheering as the players matched their way to the pitch alongside each other.

"Welcome everyone! It's your regular commentator Jim Waterson, and as always, I have your favorite co-commentator Mr. Steve Jefferson with me here in the studio."

"Hey, everyone, and welcome to another Europa Conference League match, this time, one team has everything on the line while the other team has absolutely nothing to lose."

"That's the best way to put it, Unique FC could walk away with a seven-goal loss here and not feel anything the only person that would affect would be Lazio who are also about to start their match against West Ham United. However, I don't think Villarreal can score seven against Unique FC at least not now, I know the Bilbeth Premier League side are planning to not make things easy for them."

The captains from both teams made their way to the officials now for the coin toss, and in the end, Villarreal ended up winning.

"Just before the match kicks off, let's take a quick look at the lineups," Jim commented.

Unlike last time, Villarreal were sticking with the four-four-two formation with this match and they had Conrad up front alongside Fraser.I think you should take a look at

It also looked like they were going to be more attack-focused for this match because they had three attacking midfielders up front and just one defensive midfielder, this could backfire against them if not well executed.

Unique FC on the other hand were playing with their standard four-three-three formation, maybe Norman discovered that his team wasn't given maximum output with the formation he used against Lazio.

He had Mateo, Fredinho, and Carlos up front, in midfield he had Harry and Merino as the attacking midfielders and Martinez in the defensive midfield position.

The back line from the right was Norman, Aima, Pirlo, and Roland, yes the captain was on the bench for this one which meant that Carlos was the one with the captain's badge.

[ Conjoined quest received ]

[ Keep a clean sheet ]

[ Make at least four crucial saves ]

[ Attempt a shot ]

'That's a new one.' The goalkeeper said subconsciously as he made his way to the goalpost.

Conrad was standing over the ball in the kick-off spot waiting for the referee's whistle, and after making sure that everyone was ready and in position, the referee blew his whistle.

"There's the whistle and we are rolling."

Conrad quickly pushed the ball to Antonio who quickly sent it rolling to Fraser.

"They have everything on the line, they have to beat Unique FC and hope that Lazio loses or draws against West Ham United, that or they beat the Uniques with a high scoreline which is highly unlikely." Jim articulated.

So far, Lazio had not made any attacking attempts and were still passing the ball around mainly in their own half as they were trying to draw out Unique FC's defense.

That was until the ninth minute when Antonio got his foot on the ball and quickly sent it flying to Fraser down the right.

The ball flew straight to the winger who brought it down with his chest.

He quickly cut past Harry with neat ball control but before he could go any further, Roland took the ball off his feet and quickly sent it rolling way back to Dave.

"Dispossess Fraser and sends it rolling back to Dave."

As soon as the ball got to the goalkeeper, he trapped it under his foot before pushing it forward a little with Conrad quickly.

'Hmm, how about we do that last part of the quest now?'

Just before Conrad could get to him, he pulled his right foot back and fired the ball toward the goalpost.

"Dave's going for the kill!"

Jeremy quickly returned to his goal line as soon as he saw the ball coming, and he was fast enough to dive toward the right and get his hand on the ball, as the ball ended up hitting his hand before hitting the crossbar and flying over the bar for a corner kick.

"Oh, my goodness! That was so close!"

"What the heck was that?" Jeremy muttered under his breath with his face still on the floor.