[Football] Bad Boy Batty

On May 5, Guardiola led the team to Germany to play against Bayern in the second leg of the Champions League semi-final.

In the first leg, Manchester City had a 2-goal advantage. As long as they can score a goal today, Bayern's road to the final will be blocked.

Compared to most people in the team, Batistuta's attitude was very optimistic. From the very beginning he believed that Bayern would not pose much threat to them.

In fact, in Batistuta's opinion, Bayern's performance this season was very bad, and he couldn't even understand how these Germans made it to the semi-finals.

Flick is a good coach and he did come at a good time.

The 19-20 season was the last season for many of Bayern's original championship players, and it happened to coincide with the epidemic. Other teams (like Manchester City) were caught off guard, thus achieving Bayern's six-crown feat.

But they are not so lucky this season. After Thiago and Coutinho both left the team, their midfield creativity is not as good as before. Goretzka is focused on rushing forward and cannot help Kimmich well, nor can he play a practical role such as sweeping and picking up the ball.

Therefore, as long as Kimmich is blocked, it is equivalent to strangling Bayern's throat.

This has been put into practice in the first leg with quite good results, but in the second leg Bayern were missing Thomas Muller and Lewandowski (one was injured and the other was injured). Even at their home ground, Allianz Arena, Batistuta believed that Bayern's chances of a comeback were almost zero.

"Time flies. The last time we met, you were still a kid, following Thomas around with your eyes glued to him. Now you are the captain of Manchester City."

When the captains of both teams shook hands and chose sides, Neuer took advantage of the referee's mistake in the coin toss to tease Batistuta.

"I agree." Batty nodded lazily, agreeing with Neuer that "time flies so fast". "Speaking of Muller - did he really get tested positive again because of chatting with fans? I heard that he was like a megaphone and chatted away three groups of fans in front of the club."

When mentioning this, the Bayern captain became a little helpless, which also indirectly confirmed the authenticity of the rumor. He shrugged his shoulders and raised his eyebrows at Batistuta.

"That's Thomas," he said. "What else can you do?"

Yes, this is Thomas Muller, the iconic figure of Bayern and the German team, always optimistic and loving life. That is why Batistuta likes and always pays attention to him.

But then again, at this stage, Bayern may be unable to maneuver in the midfield and frontcourt without Muller, and their ability to press will be reduced, but the lack of Lewandowski will directly lead to a decline in their finishing ability in the frontcourt, and they will be pinned to the ground by Manchester City.

In the end, thanks to Foden's goal and assist in the first half and a penalty in the second half, the Blue Moon defeated the Bundesliga giants 3-1 (Sane found an opportunity to steal a penalty in the second half) and entered the final with a total score of 5-1.

At the same time, the two goals in this game also brought Batistuta's Champions League goal tally to 16 this season. If he can score another goal in the final, he will tie/break Ronaldo's single-season Champions League goal record of 13 goals set in the 14-17 season.

Having reached the final four times in five years, Manchester City players returned to the hotel with joy.

A few hours later, the next match ended. Thanks to Courtois' god-level performance, Real Madrid tied Chelsea 3-3 in regular time. In the stoppage time, Ramos stepped up again and scored a header to help Real Madrid reverse and enter the final.

So yes, just like the season that started with the dream (16-17).

Manchester City's opponent is Real Madrid.

……

"Are you nervous?" Batty asked Stones who was soaking in the water.

He was sitting by the hotel swimming pool preparing to go into the water in a few minutes, but rather than preparing, his behavior was more like dawdling, because after finishing the swimming pool training, the players had to get a bottle of vegetable and fruit milkshake made from loaches after getting ashore, and Batistuta hated that stuff.

Today is the second day after the game. All players who participated in the game have to undergo recovery training. In view of the tiring journey back to Manchester, Manchester City’s medical team decided to do the recovery in the hotel in Munich and fly back to the UK in the evening.

"No, not at all." Stones wiped his face and said, then he raised his head above the water and slowly swam towards Batty on the shore.

He performed very well yesterday. Although he was a substitute, he made two world-class defensive plays in the 20 minutes he was on the pitch, preventing Bayern's substitute striker Choupo-Moting from finding any chances.

Batty is sure this has given Stones more confidence.

"Finals, Real Madrid, have you thought of anything interesting?" He deliberately teased, "Maybe we should add a few more elements, such as locker rooms, showers, uh, wait, John, who was the one I found crying?"

"God, how long are you going to tease me with this?" Stones swam up to Batistuta and poked him in the knee.

"Let me think about it..." Batty narrowed his eyes and pretended to be in a dilemma. Then he lowered his head and looked at the England defender, with a nasty smirk on his lips. "Probably - forever."

"I knew it." Stones complained quietly, "You are a heartless bastard."

Batty raised his foot and kicked his arm underwater, "You just knew that?"

"--Hmm." Stones grabbed Batistuta's calf. "I'm giving you a chance to reorganize your words. Are you still making fun of me?"

His tone was full of threats, meaning: If you say something I don't like again, I will drag you down and make you choke on the water.

what!
Batty smiled.

"You can try," he said. "By the way, Johnny, how come you can't even threaten people?"

"Ok?"

"Look, you've already told me everything you're going to do. I'm prepared, so what should I be afraid of?" Batistuta patiently taught his defensive general.

"I don't really want to--" Stones glanced around quietly.

Great, no cameras, no coaches, no teammates, no staff.

So he took action generously, spread Barty's knees apart, placed his hands on the swimming pool platform on both sides to close the distance between him, then he looked up, and under the reflection of the swimming pool water and the light above his head, Barty's eyes became brighter, as if there were flowing and twinkling stars in them.

"I shouldn't have let you in that day," Stones said.

"Oh..." Batty gently stroked Stones' wet hair, "Who asked you to admit it? From the moment you admitted that you couldn't help yourself from me, the initiative was no longer in your hands."

"You bastard"

"Yes, I am." Batty twisted a lock of Stones' hair with two fingers, his smile getting wider. "But dear, do you know how bastards are made?"

"how?"

"Come closer and I'll tell you."

Just when Stones was about to possess those shining eyes——

‘Wow’

Batty exerted force on his hands and pushed him back into the swimming pool.

Water splashed everywhere.

"The posture is too ugly, 0 points."

"Gurgle, gurgle...cough, Batty!" Stones finally managed to steady himself. He wiped his face and angrily raised his middle finger towards the shore, "You almost blew my lungs!"

"You're not that fragile." Barty blew him a kiss and then stood up by the pool.

"You know, John." The king looked down at Stones in the water, "Here, I am always at the top of the food chain." After that, he dived into the swimming pool like a dolphin.

"Let's have a race, two rounds, and see who finishes first."

Stones felt like there was a ball of air stuck in his chest. It was really unreasonable. He hadn't even prepared at all and Barty had already swum 5 or 6 meters away.

Looking at the figure stretching underwater, the England defender shook his head helplessly and hurriedly followed.

They recognized themselves as the king, they recognized themselves as the captain, even if he was cheating, what could they do?

Pamper me.

……

Of course, the final competition had no result, because in the last few meters, Walker rushed in with a group of people, like a group of monkeys or baboons, they picked up B席 and threw him into the swimming pool.

"Depth charge! Hahahaha!" Walker laughed out loud.

Batistuta, who was disrupted, emerged from the water and responded to those guys with a roll of his eyes and a middle finger. Then he swam towards B Silva to continue Manchester City's fine tradition.

As for Seat B, he had already gotten used to it.

so--

There is some debate about who is at the top of the food chain at Manchester City, but at the bottom is undoubtedly Bernardo Silva.

……

At dinner time, Buddy arrived at the restaurant on time for the first time. Against the backdrop of the poor British menu, the taste of the German sausages was simply perfect.

Just as he got his meal and was about to find a place to sit down, suddenly, beautiful piano sounds came from the hall.

I remember seeing when I checked in that there was indeed an expensive piano in this hotel, but the question was, who was playing it?
Batty walked over with the plate.

He wasn't the only one who was curious. There were already a lot of people gathered around the piano.

Batty looked through the gap and saw, oh, it was Ake.

The Dutch defender with dreadlocks looks like an artist under the overhead light.

"I didn't know he could play the piano," Batty exclaimed. "He plays really well."

"Yeah, it does sound good." Seat B in the back echoed, also holding a plate, "I heard he has only been learning for a short time."

"Really?" Batty was a little surprised.

B shrugged and said that he also heard it. "Sam (the translator) told me that he didn't know how to play the piano before. He was stuck at home during the epidemic and had nothing to do, so he learned it."

"Wow." Batty cheered for Ake, "Very good."

wait--

Suddenly he remembered that there seemed to be someone in the team who had also learned piano.

But that person is not here now. Judging from the time, he should be on the club's training ground, doing training from without the ball to with the ball.

Batistuta took his plate and sat down at the table reserved by De Bruyne.

Although there is no hierarchy within the Manchester City team, at certain times (such as eating), they will sit according to seniority and the like.

Players like Batistuta, De Bruyne and Fernandinho, who are known as the team committee, often sit together, sometimes talking about the current situation of the team and assigning some conversation tasks.

"Hey." De Bruyne greeted and thoughtfully helped Batistuta to organize his napkin. "Where were you this afternoon? An was waiting for you to do knee physiotherapy but never saw you."

"In the pool, I'm swimming." Batty answered while taking out his phone. He held the phone high and took a photo of Ake playing the piano from a distance. "I told him to do it when I get back. Let's do it first and start again when we get back to the club."

De Bruyne nodded, noticing Batistuta was messaging.

"Are you chatting with Qiaolin?" he asked tentatively.

"No, it's Neymar," Batistuta replied. "I just saw Ake playing the piano, and it sounded very good. Neymar is also learning it, and he learned it from a famous pianist, but I have never seen him actively play it once."

De Bruyne's eyebrows twitched almost imperceptibly.

"Do you like piano?" he asked.

"No," Barty typed quickly. "I prefer fun."

He did not send the photo directly to Neymar.

Batty: Having dinner
Batty: We will return tomorrow on the night flight
Batty: What are you doing?
Neymar replied immediately.

Neymar Jr: Just finished training
Neymar Jr: (selfie from top to bottom)
Neymar Jr: It feels great! Wait for me, I will be back on the court soon!

Batty: That's good.
BARTY: But--

Neymar Jr: What?
Neymar Jr: (golden hair doubt.jpg)

Batty: Look what I saw
Batty: (Photo of Ake playing the piano)
Batty: I remember you were also learning, and your teacher was a famous pianist, what was his name?
BARTI: Oh yeah, Lang Lang.

Neymar Jr: …

Batty: So dear
Batty: How's practice going?

Neymar stopped talking.

Looking at the screen of his mobile phone and imagining the frustrated expression of the guy opposite him, Batty felt that he was in a good mood for the next week.

"Stop looking and eat." De Bruyne was determined to get back at the opponent. "Remember to practice with jam when we get back. You've fed him so much that he's almost as heavy as the Big Ear Cup."

Batty gave him his trademark smile.

"Of course," he said. "I'll remember to practice my toast ahead of time."

This year is destined to belong to blue.

(End of this chapter)