Posted: Tue Feb 16, 2016 3:27 pm
Home Team Locker Room, National Stadium, Carinha, Ficiscia
Did you think we were nervous before the first game of the Baptism of Fire? Or before the final against Amazonesta? I did. But now... I was thousands of times more nervous now. Over 80'000 were in the sold out stadium, among them my parents, who couldn't leave their small book publishing company alone for long enough to come to Ceni, Vanessa who couldn't get holidays on such short notice and another bunch of friends who have never seen me wearing the National Team jersey, and I was to lead my team onto the pitch against one of the 100 best teams in the whole Multiverse in a few minutes. Everything was just different. Larger. We had received a roster and some tactical information about Eshan in truly the last minute, and got ready take them on. A man hammered against our locker door, visibly about as stressed and nervous as we were, telling us we needed to be out in the tunnel in two minutes. Netta finished his last sentences and sent us out when I noticed Pavel, Andri and Petrus waving us together, the few who were out with us in Cenial. They huddled us together and Petrus started to speak. "You all know what we swore that one night in that bar. For fucks sake, act on it! Or I'm gonna regret that I left that blonde back there" he chuckled, making us all laugh and be a little less nervous. We reminded each other of our oath, and suddenly, next to that overwhelming wave of nervousness, there was a bit of hope and power.
Over the time, it grew and grew. As we stood for the national anthem, I shivered. As you probably know, our anthem has no lyrics, so we were just standing in awe - until a stadium full of people shouted unisono the Sumus Ficiscia chant that came after the anthem traditionally. This moment left me with goosebumps and incredible power, the power of Ficiscia in my heart. And with this power, we lined up and took the kickoff. It took us some time to get into the game and get used to our opponents, but we quickly noticed where their weaknesses laid and tried to avoid being pressured to death.
As we won possession, they usually closed down onto us, which gave our fast wingers a chance to charge down the lines. One or two times, they could find Rectus or Sergius in the area, but Eshan's keeper was playing at his best and got all our attempts. The fans cheered us on, pushing us forward with every contact, and it was what we needed. About twenty minutes later, I got the ball in midfield and I tried to carry it forward when Markovic, this midfielder who was on my heels through the whole game, left his foot standing for a little too long. I fell over it and rolled over the ground when I heard the referee's whistle. He pulled me up while the referee told him the yellow card would be ready if he did that again, and Andri came to me to take the ball and give me a little "well done". I jogged a few metres forward, ready for Andri if he wanted to pass the ball, when I saw it flying over my head. It lowered in the penalty area, onto the head of Nicos Rectus, off a defender, and... on the foot of Alexandrinos! "GOAAAAAAAAL" the announced shouted, as we huddled together in joy. We were leading against Eshan!
However, about an hour later, things seemed to turn against us. Eshan got more aggressive, having equalized shortly after our goal, and scored another one late in the first half, luckily (for us) disallowed for offside. We were all defending against their frequent and hard attacks, but then a chance opened for us. On the right side, Pavel won the ball back and passed it to Andri, who sent Petrus Rex down the line. I ran along with him, Sergius slightly behind me. We had the whole Eshan defense on our back, but before us were only the two center-backs. One of them went to the outside, to Petrus, while one tried to cover me and Sergius. I saw Petrus dribbling past his defender, crossing sharp and flat as he loved to. It was aimed right into my way, perfect height and speed, but the goalkeeper saw it as well. He ran to me and would be only a meter or two in front of me when I reached the ball, leaving no angle for me. "Retro, Deci!" I heard someone scream behind my right side. A voice I instantly recognized. Seeing the little space the goalie gave me, I pulled my right foot back for a shot - and let the ball just bounce off the outside of it, a few metres to the right, where Sergius Vero stormed forward and shot the ball hard into the net before he jumped onto me and tackled me almost to the ground.
We disappeared under a hill of Ficiscian players. Seven minutes before the end, we shot our team ahead against the number 4 of the group. Things went to our side again. The coach took me off the pitch and brought Harall Sjoedberr in, a defensive player. And the next eight minutes turned to hell. I was sitting on the bench, watching the game, shouting, biting my nails. But then, relief came, one minute into injury time, when Parca scored off a corner. A minute later, the referee blew the whistle and the stadium in Carinha exploded when we, the Ficiscian national team, had beat Eshan and took the number one spot in the group.