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It was an awkward angle, and Otto Berger was in the goal, even if he wasn’t expecting me to be the one taking the shot. As a goaltender, his entire role on the team is to be prepared for anything when the ball is in play.
I’m positive reminding Wagner of that won’t go over well.
“I’m trained to shoot.”
Wagner’s expression doesn’t change, remaining the same hard, unflinching one I’ve only ever seen him wear. “Americans have benches, no?”
“I wouldn’t know. I wasn’t the one riding ’em.”
I only catch the barest glimmer of amusement on Wagner’s face, but it’s there. And it inflates my chest with hope that maybe Kluvberg isn’t the jail sentence I imagined. I’m used to coaches showing me total deference. If I’d pulled that move in Seattle, Garcia would have nodded and told me to save some for the game. My former coach couldn’t have cared less about me disobeying his instructions as long as the soccer ball ended up in the back of the net.
I thought I loved that autonomy. I’m realizing now it’s also a little…boring. Wagner holding me accountable isn’t terrible, but I don’t want to be closeted by close confines either. No game goes according to plan, so training like it will seems pointless. My first instinct is to shoot, not pass.
“Go practice.” Wagner jerks his chin toward the bench, his expression reverting to stoicism so quickly that I might have imagined any warmth.
I nod before taking a seat on the bench and accepting a water bottle from one of the trainers. I swallow several sips, then lean forward to watch the activity on the field.
Beck is dribbling toward the goal. He sends a clean pass over to Stefan Herrmann, another veteran on the team. Herrmann shoots…and it lands directly in the waiting arms of Otto Berger.
I scoff, then lean back against the hot metal bench.
Rather than continue to watch my teammates follow instructions, I let my gaze drift.
I’m trying a new thing—focusing on the positives of playing here, and one of them is the stadium we’re inside. Since tomorrow is a match day, today’s practice is taking place in Sieg Stadium to prepare.
I’ve been inside before, during the friendly match I witnessed. But this is my first time on the field itself, and I’m appreciating the opposite view. Looking around instead of down.
For all the upsides of playing in the States—the main one being it’s where I chose to play—I never would have experienced this there.
The stadium in Seattle had a maximum capacity of twenty thousand and was rarely half full. This place seats seventy thousand, and tomorrow’s game is sold out.
There have been a lot of humbling moments recently.
This is another big one, looking at the thousands and thousands of empty seats. Imagining what this place sounds like when full.
In Seattle, I was the main attraction. People came to see me. There was an importance and a responsibility intrinsic in that, one I lived up to the only way I knew how. By being entertainment. By putting on a show that included risks and hamming it up when I was on the field. I’m excellent at getting the ball in the back of the net, and I’m just as good at putting on a show as I score.
Here, I’m part of an institution. Of history, it feels like. Everyone who shows up tomorrow will be here to see FC Kluvberg play, to pledge allegiance to a club that’s one of the oldest and most respected in Europe. Most of them probably won’t even know my name.
Two defensive midfielders, Böhm and Winter, take seats at the opposite end of the bench.
I glance toward them.
Neither meets my gaze. The heat isn’t keeping them from giving me the same cool shoulder.
I pick up the water bottle and take another sip, feeling beads of sweat dribble down my back.
Aside from Fritz’s drinks invitation, indifference is the warmest reception I’ve received.
It’s a jarring contrast from every other team I’ve played on. Starting in elementary school, I’ve always been the player who gets noticed. Who draws attention. Who other guys gather around.
Being banished to the outskirts is fucking uncomfortable. It’s like I’m on the other side of a window, watching the rest of the team through a glass wall.
I get the uncertainty. I came in right before the start of the season as a foreigner with a colorful past, to put it mildly. I haven’t looked up any of the press coverage surrounding me signing with Kluvberg because I know it’ll just piss me the fuck off. But it’s not hard to imagine what’s being said about me.
I keep my gaze on the trampled blades of grass right in front of the bench, watching them slowly straighten.
Tomorrow, I’ll have the chance to prove myself.
