Glory Of The Football Manager System-Chapter 449: Cracks II

The second half was a war of attrition. Both teams were laboured, the match stretching and sagging like a rubber band losing its elasticity. Crosses floated harmlessly over the bar. Passes went astray. Tackles arrived late, the kind of clumsy, lunging challenges that come when muscles are screaming and decision-making slows.

And then Eze did something extraordinary.

In the sixty-seventh minute, he picked up the ball twenty-five yards from goal. Two Everton midfielders closed on him, their body language aggressive, certain they had him trapped. Eze didn’t panic.

He shifted the ball from his left foot to his right with a touch so delicate it barely disturbed the grass, opened his body, and curled a shot that kissed the inside of the far post and nestled in the net. Pickford got a hand to it fingertips, nothing more. The ball was already past him before his dive had fully committed.

Crystal Palace 2–1 Everton. Eze. 67 minutes.

Selhurst Park rose as one. The roar was different from the Benteke goal not the explosive detonation of a breakthrough, but something more emotional, more grateful, the sound of a crowd watching a twenty-year-old do something that nobody else on the pitch was capable of. On the bench, Sarah shook her head slowly.

"He’s almost nineteen, Danny. Nineteen years old. And he’s doing that with fresh legs against an entire midfield that’s been playing international football for two weeks." Marcus Reid leaned back with the quiet satisfaction of a man whose thesis had just been proved correct.

[GOAL. Eberechi Eze. Curling shot, inside far post. xG: 0.07. Distance: 23 yards. This is a goal that defies statistical probability. It exists because of individual talent operating at peak freshness while the surrounding players operate at diminished capacity. The contrast is the lesson: fresh legs change matches.]

Ten minutes to hold. Home. Winning. Three points that would consolidate third place.

I should have made changes. Should have brought on McArthur for Neves, Pato for Benteke, locked the door and thrown away the key. The System was practically screaming at me Neves’s numbers had deteriorated further in the second half, Milivojević was running on fumes, even Sakho’s positioning was a fraction less sharp than usual.

But I waited. Two minutes too long.

In the seventy-ninth minute, Everton won a corner. Kevin Bray was on his feet immediately, screaming at the defensive positions. "Zonal! Hold your zones! Tarky, back post! Mama, central! Do NOT let anyone get a free run!"

The corner came in a deep, swinging delivery from the right. The ball hung in the floodlit air for what felt like an eternity. And in that eternity, two things happened. Tarkowski, who had been magnificent all match, turned to track a decoy runner at the back post.

And Michael Keane, Everton’s six-foot-two centre-back, attacked the space between Tarkowski and Sakho that the decoy run had created space that shouldn’t have existed, space that wouldn’t have existed at the start of the season when every defender was sharp and every zone was covered. Keane powered a header into the corner. Hennessey got a fingertip to it. Not enough.

Crystal Palace 2–2 Everton. Keane. 79 minutes.

The Holmesdale went quiet. Not silent frustrated. The particular groan of a crowd that had watched their team lead twice and fail to hold on, that could see the fatigue in the heavy legs and the slow recoveries and the missed headers, and felt the helplessness of being unable to do anything about it.

I threw on Pato for Benteke and McArthur for the exhausted Neves changes that should have been made ten minutes earlier, changes that might have prevented the corner, the goal, the collapse.

As Neves walked off, his head bowed, his legs heavy, I put my hand on his shoulder. "Not your fault, Rúben," I said. He looked at me, and I could see that he knew it was partly his fault, and that he knew I knew, and that we would never discuss it again. 𝒻𝓇𝑒𝘦𝘸𝑒𝒷𝓃ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝒸ℴ𝘮

The final ten minutes were a stalemate. Neither team had the energy or the belief to find a winner. The whistle blew. A draw. At home. Against a team we should have beaten.

I shook Ronald Koeman’s hand at the tunnel a firm, businesslike grip, the Dutchman’s face betraying nothing. Then I walked into the dressing room.

The mood wasn’t devastation. It wasn’t the ash of Chelsea. It was something quieter and more insidious a creeping doubt. The awareness that the machine was being pushed to its limits and the limits were beginning to show.

"Nobody panic," I said, standing in the centre of the room.

"We dropped two points. It happens. The schedule is brutal, and we’re managing it. But I need more from the players who aren’t on international duty the ones with fresh legs, the ones who’ve been training while others were travelling. Eberechi, you were the best player on the pitch today. That’s the standard. That’s what fresh legs look like."

Eze, sitting in the corner, his shirt already off, his lean frame glistening with sweat, gave a small, serious nod. He didn’t need praise. He needed opportunity. And I was going to give him more of it.

"Now," I said, and the room stilled.

"Rome. Thursday. The Stadio Olimpico. Seventy thousand people. The biggest crowd any of us will have ever played in front of."

I looked around the room at Tarkowski, wiping his face with a towel; at Sakho, rolling his knee carefully; at Chilwell, who looked fresher than anyone despite his weeks of absence. "I’m going to rotate the entire starting eleven. The players who started today will not start in Rome. The players who didn’t play Dann, Tomkins, Ward, Digne, McArthur, Kirby, Bowen, Bojan, Gnabry, Abraham... you’re getting the biggest match of your lives."

The room stirred. Gnabry looked up, his eyes sharp. Abraham’s jaw tightened with determination. Nya Kirby, sitting quietly beside McArthur, glanced at the older midfielder, who gave him a reassuring nod.

"And for Arsenal on Saturday," I continued, "I bring the rested players back. Three days’ recovery from today, no ninety minutes in Rome. That’s the plan. That’s how we survive the calendar."

Sarah caught my eye from the doorway and gave a barely perceptible nod. The plan was right. The rotation was right. The question was whether the quality would hold across two entirely different squads playing two matches in forty-eight hours.

I turned to Kevin Bray. "Kev. I need the Lazio set-piece analysis by tomorrow morning."

Bray, who had been sitting quietly on the treatment table, his notepad already open, looked up. "Already started. Their centre-backs are vulnerable to near-post runs. I’ve got three routines in mind."

"Good." I looked at Sarah. "Full tactical presentation by ten a.m. Marcus’s opposition analysis, individual profiles, and defensive weaknesses. Everything."

Sarah was already moving. "On it."

I walked out of the dressing room, down the Selhurst Park corridor, and into the October night. The Everton fans were filing out of the away end, their scarves trailing, their voices carrying across the car park. Behind me, the Holmesdale was emptying slowly, the last songs of the afternoon fading into the dusk.

Two points dropped. A match that should have been won. And in four days, the Stadio Olimpico.

[FULL TIME: Crystal Palace 2–2 Everton. Goals: Benteke 23’, Eze 67’. Everton: Calvert-Lewin 34’, Keane 79’.]

[Manager Record: P19 W16 D2 L1. GF: 53. GA: 13.]

[Premier League: P8 W5 D2 L1. Points: 17. Position: 3rd.]

[Post-Match Note: Neves played 79 minutes despite the System’s half-time recommendation to substitute. No injury occurred, but tactical output was compromised. Second instance of the manager overriding a fatigue substitution recommendation (first: Konaté vs Chelsea). Pattern noted. Pattern concerning.]

The machine had cracks. The question was whether the cracks would widen or whether we would find a way to seal them before Rome.

***

Thank you to Sir nameyelus for the support.