[Football] Bad Boy Batty

A cold wave hit and the temperature dropped sharply. At the end of December, Manchester welcomed the first snowfall of the year. Manchester City employees worked overtime to clear the snow before the players arrived.

Christmas is coming soon, and the club is decorated everywhere, but the color is not the traditional red, but consistent with the main color of Blue Moon.

In the main building of Manchester City's headquarters, the club is arranging a Christmas fan welfare event. In 40 minutes, captain Batistuta and new signing Messi will dress up as Santa Claus to give gifts to young fans.

"You know, usually we're not at the club at this time, the winter break starts 5-7 days before the holidays, but I always put it off until the last day to decorate the tree."

Messi said to Batistuta next to him while standing under the huge Christmas tree. On the floor in front of them were two blue Santa Claus costumes.

"Who asked you to come to England? When you chose Manchester City, you crossed the winter break off your calendar." Batistuta joked in a light tone, "This must be new to you, Leo, not only is it an event before Christmas, there will be something even better in a few days!"

"You mean-"

"League on the day after Christmas!" Batistuta raised his voice and said exaggeratedly, "Do you understand what that means? It means that even if it's Christmas Day and it's freezing cold, we have to come to the club to do damn training, and it's open to the public."

Messi couldn't help laughing when listening to Batistuta's complaints. No matter how many years they have lived here, South Americans really have strong resentment towards the weather in the UK.

"I think that's why the Premier League is so popular," he said.

"Of course, all the leagues in other countries are on break and only you are playing. If people want to watch, they don't have much choice, right?" Batty rolled his eyes. "Oh, there are no friendly matches with lower-level league teams this year, which is not bad, and the policy has been relaxed. When it's almost February, we can go to the warm Abu Dhabi. The hotel rooms there are really nice."

"I'm looking forward to it." Messi put on the Santa Claus suit and carefully put on the fake beard. "How is it?" He opened his hand to show Batistuta, "Does it look okay to me?"

"Very good." Batistuta put on a bright blue Santa hat and gave Messi a thumbs up. "You look more like Santa Claus than the real one. Especially your eyes, which are very sincere."

"I'll take that as a compliment," Messi said.

When he laughed, his fake mustache began to quiver, reminding Batty of some animated characters called the Smurfs that he had seen on an old television when he was a child.

"Uh, Barty?"

Messi's voice woke him up, and Batistuta came back to his senses, "What's wrong?"

The Argentine pointed to his left earlobe and said, "You have something here."

"Huh?" Batty reached out his hand subconsciously, but found nothing except the Santa hat. "Are you saying there's something here? What is it, a thread?"

"I don't know either." Messi frowned slightly. He stared at Batistuta's ear and beckoned him to come closer. "Come here, let me take a look."

Batty bent over obediently.

It was mainly because of Messi's appearance that made him believe that there was really something there, and considering that he was going to meet the children later, he hoped that he could look good.

"Did you get it?" Batty asked.

“—yes, I got it.” Macy’s fingers reached into the hair behind his ear. “Look! That’s it!”

Batistuta felt a little itchy and didn't think about anything else. He just turned his head stupidly to look at the thing stuck behind his ear in Messi's hand.

That's a coin.

50 pence, to be exact.

"Look!" Messi smiled happily and waved it to show off. "I learned this magic trick from Kun not long ago. Many people saw through it when I said the first sentence. Thank you Batistuta, you are my first successful target."

Batty: ...

"Is it fun to tease the captain, you bad Argentine flea?" He used his height to pat Messi on the back of the head, "I knew that anyone who could play with A Kun must not be a good person!"

Messi burst into laughter, and his voice was quite obvious in the not-so-empty room. Soon many people looked over here. Messi noticed their gazes and immediately restrained himself.

After a while, he realized that Batty was ignoring him.

"Are you angry?" Santa Messi touched Santa Batistuta's arm.

Batty waved his hand away without saying a word.

Haha, the captain is angry.

Messi pursed his lips hard to prevent himself from laughing out loud. He opened his Santa Claus clothes and fumbled in his pockets for a while, and finally found the treasure that could make him happy.

"Bati." He touched the captain's arm again. "Here's this."

The king scorned such a simple bribe and was even unwilling to open his eyes to take a look, so Messi could only force Batistuta's hands open and stuff the treasure in.

"This is--"

Batti felt the object in his hand and couldn't help but take a look out of curiosity.

"Strawberry hard candy?"

"Hmm." Messi motioned for him to eat quickly. "I brought this from Catalonia. It's not from a big factory, but it's delicious. I've been buying it since I first arrived in Barcelona."

Batty gave him a suspicious look.

"Really." Messi assured him, "You can ask Pep. He was stricter back then than he is now. Sugar was banned. He took a lot of it from me. He must still remember it."

Batty believed him.

After thinking about it, the little king broke the candy and put it into his mouth.

The strawberry flavor explodes in your mouth.

Indeed, purer than ordinary fruit candy.

"Not bad." Batty commented with narrowed eyes, "Let's go, take the gifts, it's time to meet the children."

Messi nodded, then volunteered to take on the task of pushing the gift cart.

What an easy thing to coax, he thought.

……

In the afternoon, before the training started, Manu gave Batistuta two new players to coach, which is also one of the captain's responsibilities.

One is Cole Palmer, who plays as a front midfielder, and the other is Rico Lewis, who plays as a defender, or more precisely, a right back. The youth training director believes he has the potential to be Kyle Walker's successor. Speaking of this, Batistuta thought of Mario.

The sports director had told him before that since they failed to reach an agreement in the summer, the kid could only be successfully loaned out in the winter window, and at this time a new player who played the same position as him came from the youth training.

Never mind, competition has its benefits.

Batty stepped on the ball, picked it up and held it in his arms, then explained the rules of the training ground to the newcomers, which was nothing more than being responsible for picking up the ball and so on. Then he said some inspiring words and handed them over to the coach. This was all he could do to guide the newcomers.

At nearly 4pm, Guardiola notified everyone in the group to go back to the meeting. Batistuta packed up his things and ran into the building quickly. He had to go to the restaurant to find some snacks before the meeting started, otherwise most of Pep's meetings would easily make him distracted and sleepy. This had almost become his "routine".

On the way to the screening room with the pudding, Batistuta ran into De Bruyne. The Belgian was watching a video on his phone and didn't notice his approach.

"Hey Kevin!" He rushed over and tried to scare De Bruyne, "What are you looking at?"

De Bruyne was indeed scared, but his reaction was not violent. He even put his arm around Batistuta's waist to prevent him from falling. Batistuta was annoyed and jumped down with a pout.

Looking at the phone interface here, a familiar feeling arises spontaneously.

"...Twitch?" Batty called out the name of the app. "When did you start watching this, Kevin?"

"Today." De Bruyne shrugged. "Didn't you see? Kun sent a link in the group chat, saying that today was his first live broadcast and asked us to help increase popularity."

"What a joke." Batty sneered in disbelief. "He was live streaming on it in 19. During the epidemic and when he was injured this year, I often saw him there."

"Yeah, but today is his first day as a contracted anchor after retirement," De Bruyne said, "and he posted an IG story on IG saying that we can talk about our time at Manchester City, starting with you, who took over his No. 10 jersey."

Batty: ???
"What's going on? Is he planning to become a gossip blogger?" The king waved his hand dismissively. "Let him talk. We are very good here. There is nothing shady. Let him talk if he wants."

De Bruyne looked at him for a few seconds with a teasing look in his eyes.

"what happened?"

"Nothing, it's just—" the Belgian drawled, "Aren't you curious about what he said about you?"

“I thought the livestream hadn’t started yet.”

"No, it's over." De Bruyne flipped through his photo album. "There are some good clips. I recorded them and saved them on my phone."

"Why did you save this?" Batty looked over suspiciously, "Give me the phone, Kevin, let me see what he said."

De Bruyne did not resist and handed over the phone directly.

“By the way,” he said, “I have backups, both in the cloud and in another account.”

The implication is: It’s useless even if you delete the files on your phone.

Batistuta narrowed his eyes and clicked on the videos in the album in order. As soon as he clicked on the sound, he heard the Argentine striker indignantly calling him a little bastard to his audience.

[You don't know that the little bastard never tells the truth. I swear to God, when he first came to Manchester City, he was like an angel. He told me that we would be the best partners in the world like Superman and Batman. I was so moved that I almost cried. But then Neymar came and we talked and found out that the little bastard said that to everyone!]

Well, that's true.

Facing De Bruyne's teasing gaze, Batistuta licked the corner of his mouth uncomfortably.

[… and not just me and Neymar, he also told Kevin, Kyle, and Bernardo! ]

Oh wait.

Batty wondered, when had he said this to so many people?

[Sometimes we were roommates. He usually slept later and more soundly. I was the type who would get up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night. Every time, yes, every time I woke up, I could hear Batty talking in his sleep. Unlike most people, his sleep talk was always very clear.]

Batty: ???
"What is this guy talking about!" The King of Manchester City looked at De Bruyne with his eyes wide open in disbelief, "Fake, he is lying, don't tell me you believe him, Kevin!"

De Bruyne: "Well, this--"

[Don't accuse me of spreading rumors, friends, I have evidence, look! This is the video I recorded of him sleeping. (Aguero took out his phone and turned on the screen to play a video, then he put the phone close to the microphone) Listen to it! ]

The recording screen was dark and the pixels were not high, and it was obviously recorded at night. After a short period of shaking, it slowly focused on Batty, who was lying on his side on the bed and sleeping like an angel.

The little king in the picture still looks young and immature, with an unconcealable arrogance between his brows, which perfectly confirms the timeline Aguero mentioned a few years ago.

"this--"

Batty was stunned.

"Akun took a photo of me!" He grabbed De Bruyne's arm and shook it hard. "He took a photo of me and I had no idea!"

The smile on the Belgian midfielder's face deepened.

"Of course, dear," he said. "If you knew, it wouldn't be called Sleeping Face."

Batty: ...

Yes, that makes sense.

He thought, what the hell, I'm so angry.

At this moment, the ringing of the cell phone slightly saved the Manchester City captain from losing his mind. Batistuta took a deep breath, took out his cell phone from his pocket and checked it. When he saw the caller ID, his eyes instantly became serious.

"Who's calling?" De Bruyne asked.

Batistuta didn't answer. He just raised his eyebrows at the Belgian and told him with his mouth: WATCH ME. Then, the Manchester City captain cleared his throat and answered the phone.

"Good afternoon, Mr. Platini, what can I do for you?"

Platini?

That UEFA president Platini?
Oh, De Bruyne quickly understood why this call diverted Batistuta's attention. Think about it, at the end of December, a private call from UEFA could only be about the Ballon d'Or.

(End of this chapter)