[Football] Bad Boy Batty

"Why are you here? I thought this was the Brazilian team's hotel."

Batty put the cat down and pushed his butt to let him get out of here, then closed the door and asked the two people on the sofa.

Someone opened the window, and the cool neon lights of Qatar at night shone in, dividing the entire reception room into several areas of different tones.

The sofa in the middle was against the window. Guardiola and De Bruyne were leaning on it, not too close to each other. One of them had his legs crossed on the coffee table, while the other did not. Most of their faces were hidden in the shadow of the backlight.

There is a retro table lamp next to the sofa, emitting orange light to Guardiola's right hand, adding a not-so-strong warm color to the overall picture of the room.

There was also a suitcase at the door with a small Belgian flag on it.

Overall, this is a very Martin Scorsese picture.

If someone who didn't know them walked in at this time and saw the composition and colors, they would think they were filming a pornographic movie.

Batty suddenly wanted to laugh.

What was this, some mysterious meeting with some hidden agenda, or was it a Godfather-style plan to interrogate him and make him an offer he couldn't refuse?

It has to be said that after receiving the reassuring news from Alves, Batistuta became brighter again, the gears started turning, and he even had the energy to think of some strange ideas to entertain himself.

"Tell me, what are you doing here?" he asked.

"That's not the point." Guardiola was quite tough. "The point is - let's talk about your views on the World Cup and football."

"I see, you are here to hold a meeting with me." Batistuta smiled, then walked briskly to the sofa and threw himself between the two of them, curled up his legs and put his chin on it. "We'll talk about that later." He said to Guardiola, "Now I want to know how you got here. I thought you should be on the plane home." He turned to De Bruyne and asked.

Uh.

It doesn't feel right.

De Bruyne secretly looked at Guardiola and signaled to him with his eyes: Why does it seem that Batistuta's condition is better than Neymar described?

Guardiola shrugged and didn't answer.

"I was originally on the plane." De Bruyne moved his eyes to look at Batistuta and said slowly, "But I watched a game before I flew, Brazil and Cameroon, and I saw a robot that looked very much like you sitting on the bench. I didn't believe they replaced you with that thing, so I came to see."

"Oh." Batty nodded obediently. "What's the matter with the box?" he asked.

"I don't want to sleep on the street," De Bruyne replied. "Not all of this hotel is reserved for the Brazilian team. Half of it is reserved for tourists."

Batty let out a knowing breath: "So you are a tourist now."

"Yes, the tourist who lives in the building opposite your room. Don't worry, I don't have the habit of peeking through a telescope. If I miss you, I will video call you." De Bruyne said with his unique dry humor.

"No you won't," Batistuta joked. "Remember the day you lost to Morocco? I called you countless times, but you just didn't answer. You didn't get back to me until I was about to play. Don't you remember that?"

It was a sensitive period and De Bruyne didn't say anything.

"Okay, just think of it as you teasing me." Batty stopped asking, "When are you going to leave?"

"I won't leave," the Belgian midfielder said, and he really looked over. "I won't leave until I see you hold the gold trophy."

"Jesus, you guys, let me take a breath, please?" Batty's reaction was unexpected. He moved his numb jaw. "I have made too many promises to too many people in recent days. Everyone wants to give me a boost, but it's not a good thing to do too much too early. I'm not sure I can keep this mood until the final."

He then made a tongue-out face at De Bruyne, then turned to Guardiola: "What was it you wanted to talk to me about football, Pep?"

Guardiola: …

He silently tore up the "speech" that he had carefully prepared for several nights in his heart, because every word on it was full of chicken blood.

"I have nothing to say," Guardiola said dryly.

"Oh, don't." Batistuta blinked and reached out to touch his smooth head. "Come on, just say something, for example - there are 16 teams left in the World Cup. Who do you think will be crowned in the end? France, who broke the curse, my Brazil, or Argentina, where you love Messi."

“…I don’t make predictions.”

"Tell me about it, just as if it were a casual chat between friends." Batistuta squeezed him with his knee. "In Manchester City you were my coach, but here we are just people from two different countries. Tell me, I want to hear you talk."

Guardiola took a deep breath and finally compromised.

After preparing for a few seconds, he said: "I dare not say which team will be the champion. As a Catalan, I certainly hope that Spain can win the championship. But as we always emphasize, there are too many variables in the World Cup. The team that can make it to the end may not be the most aggressive, but it must be the one with the highest comprehensive ability and the strongest belief. When your persistence is enough to impress God... is he asleep?"

Just as Guardiola was racking his brains to think of some words that sounded sensible and nutritious but were actually just chicken soup for the soul, he was surprised to find that the little bastard who had been staring at him innocently with a pure face just now had leaned on his knees and closed his eyes at some point.

De Bruyne carefully walked over to check, waved his hand in front of Batistuta's eyes, but there was no response. He listened quietly for more than ten seconds and his breathing was steady. "He's asleep," he said.

Guardiola showed a smile that was not quite like a smile, and then shook his head helplessly. No matter what state he was in, the little bastard always made him feel distressed and headache at the same time.

"I guess this means he's feeling better," De Bruyne whispered. He just saw a faint dark color under Batistuta's eyes. You know, he's a guy who dances until the early hours of the night and can still train as usual the next day. He must not have slept well in the past two days. He tentatively touched Batistuta, and after making sure he wouldn't wake him up, he gently placed him on the sofa and found a coat to put on.

"Go to sleep and have a sweet dream." De Bruyne kissed Batistuta on the forehead, then stepped away and quietly walked out of the room with Guardiola to chat outside the door.

With the door closed, they could talk at a normal volume.

"So, Neymar called you too," De Bruyne said, changing the subject. "I didn't expect to see you here, Pep."

"Neymar?" Unlike De Bruyne, Guardiola seemed very surprised. "Neymar didn't call me." He said, "Did he call you?"

"Yes, he called me when I was booking a room with the front desk here. The Brazilian team's hotel is popular and they didn't have a suitable room for me. Then he called me and told me that he had reserved a room." De Bruyne explained how he appeared.

Even if Neymar didn't ask him for help, he planned to stay, but the process might not be so smooth.

"So, back to the original question, how did you get here?" De Bruyne asked.

"If I have to say who invited me, it was probably their head coach," Guardiola shrugged. "I saw the news that day and knew that Batistuta was going to have problems, so I called Zidane, who happened to be at Batistuta's door. I heard that Batistuta was about to collapse, and Zidane couldn't handle this. There were still club games to play after the World Cup, and I couldn't let this ruin my captain."

De Bruyne nodded.

Having said so much, the fundamental reason is still worrying about the little bastard.

"Are you done, Kevin? This is taking longer than I thought... Pep?" Neymar came downstairs and when he saw Guardiola, he was as surprised as Batistuta. "Why are you here?"

Guardiola waved his hand: "It's a long story."

Neymar was in no mood to listen to stories. He didn't think about why the club coach was here for the time being. He went straight to De Bruyne and asked, "Where's Batistuta?"

"Inside," De Bruyne gestured, "asleep."

"Well, that's great." Neymar looked at the living room door with a complicated look, "Can I go in now?"

This sounds strange.

De Bruyne narrowed his eyes: "What do you think you'll see in there?"

Neymar shrugged. He thought it would be at least higher than PG-13. "Anyway," Neymar said, "Is our captain better?"

"He was much better before we came," De Bruyne said matter-of-factly. "I think we just played a supporting role."

Any effect is good, Neymar just wants his captain to get better soon.

He tiptoed over and looked inside the door. Batty was still sleeping on the sofa, but his posture was more relaxed, and he was obviously in better condition than the robot in the past few days.

"Happy ending! Yeah!" Neymar closed the door and cheered quietly, then looked at his club teammates and head coach, "The question now is how do we get him back to the room without waking him up."

The three of them looked at each other for a while, and finally decided to leave it to the one with the steadiest hand skills - of course not any of them, because in the world of football, the one with the best hand skills is the goalkeeper.

Neymar called Ederson, and in order to maintain stability, they spent more than twice the time on the 6-7 minute journey. Finally, before midnight, Batistuta was sent back to his room.

They left the room quickly without disturbing him.

Before leaving, De Bruyne looked up at the photo hanging on the wall of the room. It was a photo of a young Batistuta, who was about 8 or 9 years old. He was standing in front of a broken railing with a football under his foot, arrogantly raising his middle finger to the camera, and there was a homemade gun hidden behind him.

"Kevin, hurry up." Neymar called him at the door.

De Bruyne took one last look at the photo, curled his lips slightly, then turned and left the room.

……

The next morning, when they went to the training ground to warm up, everyone was surprised to find that their familiar captain had returned.

"Hurry up! Run! You bastards stayed up late again last night, didn't you? Cheer up! Whoever falls behind in the afternoon shooting practice will be used as a target in front of the goal!"
"——Hey! Kick gently! I can't create a shadow clone, I can't catch a pass that high and far!"
"Hahahahaha! Who got pierced through the crotch again! Oh my god, I can't believe there are little idiots on our team! And more than one!"

Listen to this confident voice, or the familiar sweet curse, many players' eyes lit up when they heard this, and they vied with each other to perform in front of the captain.

"That's great. Yesterday I was still worried about whether Batistuta would be able to play in the round of 16. Now I have no doubts." The assistant coach in the distance said with relief. He looked at the head coach next to him, "You always said that he would be fine and that he would recover. Zizu, how did you know?"

"——I just know it." Zidane looked at Batistuta who was having fun on the field and showed a meaningful smile. Then he said to his assistant coach: "Go and prepare. Don't let your guard down just because it's an Asian team. This game is very important for us."

"clear."

Although the outside world is unanimously optimistic about the five-star Brazil, in Zidane's view, this 1/8 final against the South Korean team may become an important turning point for them in this World Cup.

(End of this chapter)