Chapter 356 The Title Race Is Close
Four minutes of added time wasn\'t enough for either side to come up with a winning, although it looked like Unique FC were the only ones that desperately searched for a winning goal during those few minutes until the referee finally blew his whistle to bring the match to an end.
"That\'s the whistle, the match comes to an end with a result that both sides would be equally happy with," Jim said.
"You say equally happy, but I don\'t think anyone would be happy to lose hold of a two-goal lead like that, but then again, this is better than losing. Supreme United got quite lucky but they could have gotten luckier and grabbed the win instead." Steve expressed.
Just like Steve said, Unique FC players weren\'t happy with the final outcome, unlike Supreme United players who were glad that they were able to drag out a draw from their neighbors who were surprisingly fearsome today.
Unique FC players weren\'t happy with that result but the fans who would have loved it more if they had actually won the match were still happy that they dominated Supreme United and came out with a draw instead of losing to them like they had been doing for a couple of seasons now.
They were chanting the name of team happily, they knew the players would be sad after letting a possible win go like that so they were just trying to cheer them up.
"They did not succeed in winning the match and ending Supreme United\'s unbeaten run and winning streak, but at least they succeed in doing the latter, handing the Supremes their first draw of the season." Jim expressed.
"Yeah, and that shows just how far they\'ve come as a team, they\'re clearly title contenders this season, Supreme United and Dynamo FC should watch out because they may swipe it by surprise." Steve expressed.
After greeting the fans, the players began to make their way toward the tunnel.
Mateo was obviously announced as the man of the match and today there was no one to bug them about the official post-match interview as Emma had already chosen those she needed for it, but they still had to deal with the normal ones.
After taking care of those things, they made their way to the locker room.
Minino couldn\'t help but take out his anger on a trash can that did absolutely nothing to him as he sent it flying across the room with a kick.
"We almost had them and then everything just fell apart." He huffed before he made his way to the bench and sat down there.
Despite having an aggressive nature, Minino was never one to call out his teammates for making a mistake during the match.
He would still tell them, but never in a mean way like Jonas always did.
"You should have just sent that ball flying, Roland." The midfielder said before turning his gaze to Roland.
"I\'m sorry," Roland muttered.
"Hmph, it\'s all in the past now," Minino said with a calm voice before letting out a deep sigh.
"Yeah, it\'s all in the past now, we just have to focus on winning our next match," Adolf said.
"Yeah," Ferran responded with a nod. "You know, Adolf, I\'m quite surprised by how you were able to hold Roland down to the extent that he didn\'t look like a threat again, if it weren\'t for you seriously man-marking him, I doubt things would have ended this way."
"You can say that again," Dave said as he pulled off his boots. "Their first goal was a mistake from our side and that second goal also came as a result of a mistake from us too, we should have won but things ended the way it did, at least we made them drop points." The goalkeeper expressed.
"Our next match is against Junami United, right?" Mateo asked.
"Yeah," Dave replied with a nod.
"Well, we\'ve drawn our last two matches now, we can\'t draw or lose that one we have to win it or we\'ll move further away from the title race." The winger said.
He was right about that because now that they ended up drawing against Supreme United, they now had twenty points from nine matches, Dynamo FC were ahead of them with three points and now that Supreme United dropped points to Unique FC, they were only ahead of Dynamo FC with two points.
It was pretty close between these three times but any slip-off from Unique FC from this moment onward and they were going to fall deeper.
Lesica United won their match that day, unlike Unique FC which meant that Unique side were just ahead of them with two points now.
"Yeah, we have to win that match," Adolf said.
"And after that, we\'ll go on to face Lazio in the group stage of the Europa conference league," Martinez said.
The players had already talked about their group and they all agreed that their group wasn\'t fair and looked like something that was done on purpose to make sure that they were eliminated in the group stage even if that may not be the case.
There was nothing they could do besides buckling up and making sure they go into every single one of those matches well-prepared and confident, and that was just what they were planning to do.
"Being at the top of Series A this season is not a small feat even if it is just the start of the season, they have a good point gap against second-placed Juventus, and that speaks volumes about their strength this season. However, we just dominated the team that is at the top of our table and currently in the UEFA champions league this season, if we managed to get this close to beating them, then beating Lazio cannot be described as impossible." Adolf articulated.
"Sure, if we avoid making big mistakes, we\'ll win," Frankie said.
While his teammates continued to talk about other things, Dave decided to take a look at his post-match rewards.
[ Post-match rewards ]
[ Four crucial saves: +70 exp ]
[ Match rating: 7.0 ]
\'Another match, another day to gaze upon a single reward.\'
<Well, you only have yourself to blame for that, an assist or goal would have been nice>
\'Yeah, because I saw the opportunity and didn\'t take it, right?\'
<I don\'t think there was an opportunity>
\'Exactly, you said it yourself, but shouldn\'t I get extra rewards for saving penalties?\'
<Um…. that\'s accumulative>
\'Accumulative how?\'
<Don\'t worry, you\'ll find out soon>
\'And trying to get it out of you anyway is going to be futile.\'
<Exactly, you\'re catching on pretty fast>
[ Penalties faced: 28 ]
[ Penalties saved: 06 ]
<You know your penalty save ratio has gone up quite well after saving three penalty kicks in two matches, the fact that you did it without focus is quite impressive, I just hope you can keep it up>
\'Thank, I\'ll try my best, I just need enough attribute points to unlock sweeper keeper for that speed boost, shot-stopper is really not that useful to me, to be honest.\' He said subconsciously.
<Well, it depends on how you use it, you can already shoot rockets without any boosts, just imagine what will happen if you activate shot-stopper before taking those shots>
As soon as she said that, Dave\'s face suddenly lit up.
\'Why didn\'t I think about that before?\'
<Because you can be dumb sometimes>
\'Hey, don\'t say that.\'
<That\'s the harsh truth, but don\'t worry, you have your smart moments just like everyone else>
\'That\'s it, I\'m turning you off.\'
<Okay, okay, I\'m sorry>
_______ _______
Matchday ten came by pretty fast, it was just four days from their match against Supreme United and that meant that this was the day they were meant to face off against Junami United.
The match was set to kick off by 2:00 PM and that meant that it had already kicked off.
It was a home match for Unique FC and they weren\'t taking things lightly with their opponents.
Twenty minutes had just passed since the match began but the home side were already two goals up and were dominating the match.
"Unique FC came into this match red hot, it\'s like they\'re taking out their anger from their last match on Junami United," Jim said.
Adolf received the ball from Roland and had to send it back to Dave after he was pressed by Junami United\'s center forward.
Dave quickly dashed past the player after receiving the ball and just as he got outside the box, he sent the ball flying over to Mateo.
"They feel comfortable to the extent that Dave is now taking risks of this level," Steve commented.
Mateo brought the ball down with his left foot before he put it past the player right in front of him and zoomed past him to take the ball.
He fearlessly raced toward the box taking on the defenders until he was able to find enough space to take a shot just before he was tackled down.
The ball flew toward the right side with a little bit of elevation as the goalkeeper dived toward it, but he wasn\'t able to get to it on time as the ball flew past him and into the goalpost.
"This is crazy, three goals up with just twenty-two minutes on the clock!" Jim exclaimed.