Chapter 25

On the last weekend of August 2000, the Van den Stock Stadium in Brussels was packed. With the whistle of the referee, the high-profile game officially started.

Nagi returned to the starting lineup for this game, and he looked very excited. Not long after the start of the game, he actively retreated to get the ball, then passed a defensive player, brought the ball to the edge of the penalty area and shot with his feet, but unfortunately the ball went higher than the goal frame.

This kind of offensive threat through personal ability has a great effect on improving the morale of the team. Genk also turned against the guest and launched a fierce attack on Anderlecht.

Nagi and Jason Aldridge on the front field are both young players, fast and explosive, attacking Anderlecht's defense in turn, while midfielders Carl Beth and Gareth Barry are responsible for organizing the attack and delivering shells , and the rest are actively fighting for defense.

In order to compete for the league title this season, Genk has shown the determination to win.

In the 10th minute, after receiving a through ball from Barry on the right, Nagi turned around and ran wildly along the side. Using his speed, he broke through the opponent's two defenders in one go, then dribbled the ball inside, and approached the penalty area obliquely.

Facing the pressing Nagi, the Anderlecht defender had no choice but to step forward to block, but Nagi took the ball forward in a calm manner and successfully rolled past the defender's crotch. Nagi also quickly passed the ball and he flitted past.

Seeing that Nagi was about to leave, Andrei's defender made a decisive move and pulled Nagi's clothes forcefully, causing him to lose his balance and fall to the ground.

"The referee blew his whistle, it was an obvious pulling foul, we could see that number 13 Bob Jones got a yellow card and Genk got a set-piece from the edge of the box."

"Let's take a look at the slow-motion replay. Indeed, there is no dispute about this penalty. If it is a little more advanced, Mina would enter the penalty area. If he commited another foul at that time, he would be awarded a penalty kick."

"From this ball, we can see that Mina's speed is at the dominant level, and his wild running on the wing is unstoppable."

When Beth walked to the penalty spot and was about to take the free kick, Chivu also leaned over. The two discussed in low voices for a while, and they stood side by side until the other side had set up a human wall, so that people could be separated. It is not clear who took the freekick.

Nagi was also wandering around the penalty area at this time, looking for opportunities. Although he had never scored a header, the stop training of various parts of his body during this period also gave him a deeper understanding of headers.

As the referee's whistle sounded, Beth and Chivu were preparing for a run-up, and the air inside and outside the court seemed to freeze.

As the two Genk free-throw shooters approached, the attacking players followed suit. The main defense against Nagi was a small central defender. Because Nagi never showed his header threat, Anderlecht did not pay attention to his defense.

But the central defender was not careless, he was holding on to Nagi's jersey tightly, and hurriedly followed when Nagi started to run, but was blocked by Aldridge halfway, and the jersey in his hand slipped off.

At the freekick spot, Beth ran over quickly, but did not touch the ball, and Chivu, who followed behind him, kicked directly, and the ball climbed rapidly and flew towards the penalty area.

After Nagi got rid of the defense through the pick-and-roll, he watched the incoming ball while judging where it would land. The penalty area was in chaos, and no one noticed that there was no one marking Nagi.

When the ball flew into the penalty area, it suddenly fell and the speed was very fast. Many players judged the wrong landing point. Relying on the feeling that Nagi was already in place, he jumped up high, exerted strength in his waist and abdomen, and pushed his head forward with force, directly hitting the flying ball.

After the ball was hit , it immediately changed its original flight trajectory and went directly into the net not far away. The goalkeeper swooped sideways, stretching his arms as far as he could, but was still beyond his reach.

"goooooooooooal! In the eleventh point, Genk's Nagi Mina scored with a header and opened the scoring for the team."

"This is also the first header he has scored in his career. Let us congratulate the 17-year-old. His offensive methods have been enriched again."

As soon as Nagi landed, he ignored the stunned defensive players around him, turned around and rushed out of the court, pointing to the sky and running all the way, celebrating his goal.

Behind him, his teammates also followed and hugged him to celebrate together.

"It was a set-piece from Genk, Chivu sent a high-quality pass, and Mina in the penalty area jumped high and scored with a header from close range. This is his one five of the season."

"Judging from the slow-motion playback, Genk's set-piece coordination was very clever this time, and Aldridge's pick-and-roll was just right, creating an unmarked space for Mina."

"Mina's header is also very impressive. His jumping ability is amazing. After jumping, his knees are close to the defender's chest. The angle of the top of his head was also very tricky. Although the goalkeeper tried his best to catch the ball, he still couldn't recover."

"Mina, who is in such a hot state, is unstoppable. I don't know if Andre's players recalled the shadow of being dominated by Mina in the Belgian Cup final last season."

In the first half, Genk led 1:0. Not long after the restart, it was another opportunity created by Nagi at the front of the penalty area. An outside instep hit the goal, and the ball went into the net.

2:0! Nagi scored twice!

In the 78th minute of the game, Beth took advantage of a quick counterattack to accurately find Nagi in the front field. Nagi used his bicycle to sway past the defensive players on the side and then made a pass. Barry followed and scored near the penalty spot. , basically sealed the victory for Genk.

At the last moment, Anderlecht relied on Jan Koller to pull back a goal and finally avoided the fate of being swept. The final score was also fixed at 3:1, and Genk took all three points.

After this game, Genk climbed to the top of the league standings with a one-point lead over Anderlecht, and Nagi, who contributed two shots and one pass, once again won the praise of major Belgian media.

Team manager Albert said in an interview: "So far, Mina is the best player in the league. We are confident that we will achieve breakthrough results in the league and the next Europa League."

Anderlecht's team manager said: "I'm sorry that we missed a superstar. Yes, I think Mina can definitely become a superstar."

He went on to add: "Our scouts have been very good. They discovered Jan Koller. Now his value should have increased by 30 times, but it is still not as high as Mina's increase. When they told me that Mina would become the second Jan Kohler, even better, I didn't believe it, it was my mistake."

Not only that, many media believe that after these few games, Nagi's performance has surpassed Jan Koller in an all-round way, and his age was 10 years younger than Jan Koller, so his future development will definitely be better.

On the second day after returning to Genk, Nagi came to the training room in the morning as usual, and first went to the gym for warm-up exercises. Personal trainer Abel Le Goff arrived in the training room after he had completed his warm-up routine.

"Obviously you have only played the whole game with Anderlecht, and you are exhausted. How did you get up so early to train?" Le Goff thought he had seen many players, but he had never met them. A hard-working and diligent person like Nagi.

"Maybe it's my love for football. I'm eager to become bett." Nagi replied with a smile. As he said that, he walked to the equipment and started strength training. At this stage, his resistance strength was still seriously insufficient, so strength training is essential in the training plan that Le Goff made for him.

Of course, strength training alone was not enough. This would make the muscles stronger but stiffer. It needs to be combined with flexibility training, such as yoga. The combination of the two can improve the performance on the court.

For Nagi, the training subjects and plans formulated by Le Goff are very reasonable, fully considering his age and physical fitness, and his body would not be deformed after training.

A morning passed in a blink of an eye. He did all the bench presses, squats, deadlifts and weightlifting, and he also did a set of yoga movements to soothe his muscles. After lunch, he would rest for two hours. Nagi usually browses various news during this time, not limited to football.

Swimming training is the main thing in the afternoon. Nagi was originally a landlubber. After receiving training from Le Goff, he quickly learned to swim. He gradually liked the feeling of being in the water, and his whole body would be very relaxed.

Today the rest of the players would rest, and tomorrow Beth and Chivu will come over in the afternoon, and they will work on their pass-catching skills together, and then the day after tomorrow, the whole team would start to gather for training and prepare for the weekend game, which is usually their week.

Of course, after the daily training camp, Nagi would still stay for extra training, which has almost become his habit. Le Goff sometimes feels incredible that a boy who was only seventeen years old can resist all kinds of temptations and devote himself to training.

Le Goff feels that compared with before, guiding Nagi was a very easy task. Nagi was very smart, and his ability to control his body can be described as unbelievable. He only needs to teach Nagi all the training movements once, and Nagi can always complete the training plans he made meticulously.

With the accumulation of training day after day, Le Goff believes that Nagi's future achievements were limitless.

During the training camp in Genk, some fans would gather outside the training ground to watch through the barbed wire every time. They would wear jerseys supporting the players and hold some cheering signs. Since Nagi came to Genk, more and more fans have supported him. Up to now, almost all the fans who come here were wearing Nagi's jersey.

Sometimes Nagi would greet them with a smile, which would attract bursts of cheers. There would also be fanatical female fans clamoring to give birth for him, which made Nagi blushed and his teammates laughed.

Genk team chairman Kevin Barani was accompanied by an official of the Belgian Football Association Rick Davis to watch Genk's training from a distance. In the European Championships that just ended in the summer, Belgium did not perform well. It first beat Sweden 2:1 with difficulty, then lost 0:2 to Italy, and then lost 0:2 to Turkey. Breakthrough in the group stage.

The Football Association is very dissatisfied with the current national team lineup, so it decided to inspect outstanding young players in each team, and at the same time wanted to hire Genk coach Aimee Antonis as the national team coach.

When seeing Genk fans cheering for Nagi so enthusiastically, Davis said in surprise: "I didn't expect Nagi to have such a high reputation among local fans."

Barani responded: "Yes, last season Genk relied on Nagi to get out of the quagmire of failure and win the Europa League seat and cup championship, but this season Nagi's performance is perfect, so everyone Likes him more."

"Nagi has become the well-deserved core of Genk, but the views of local players and some senior fans also have to be considered." Barani added: "Most team leaders are local youth players. , and foreign players rarely take on this role."

"A harmonious locker room is also one of the important factors for the team to win. Fortunately, there is no bad news in the Genk locker room. Everyone admires Nagi, and his hard work in training is well known."

Davis was a little surprised and said: "Well, it's no wonder he can perform so well. It's really not easy to be so self-disciplined at his age. He became famous at a young age without being arrogant. I expect him to achieve higher in the future."

After that, he felt a bit of solicitation, and asked, "Barani, I remember that Nagi hasn't played a game for the Japanese national team yet, right? Can you recruit him into our national team?"

Barani said with a wry smile: "To be honest, before the European Championships started, someone hinted that I would check Nagi's tone to see if he would like to represent Belgium, but he refused. He said that in the national team game, he will only play for Japan, even if he is not called up."

Davis couldn't help feeling a little regretful, but then skipped the topic and started talking about the performance of other players. The young forward Jason Aldridge entered their field of vision and scored two goals so far. , although it was all planned by Nagi, his ability to seize opportunities should not be underestimated.

"There are also many teams paying attention to him. Youth is Aldridge's biggest capital." Barani said with emotion: "It is difficult for us to retain strong players. They are often sold just after they are cultivated."

Davis said: "The level of the Belgian league is still too low. Let alone the second-tier top leagues such as the Portuguese Super League and the Eredivisie League, the Soviet Super League, the Russian Super League, and even the Olympic League are better than us."

"Although cultivating good players and then selling them to other leagues is an important source of income for you, it must be divided into gradients and situations, and you cannot exhaust the resources, which will cause a large loss of personnel." Davis said, Pakistan Lani nodded yes.

"Are you going to sell Nagi in the summer?" Davis asked curiously, and Barani nodded: "In the transfer window this summer, we planned to trade, and the price Paris offered was too high. But Nagi himself was unwilling, coupled with Antonis' active lobbying, he firmly believed that we would definitely make a breakthrough this season, so we stopped the transfer."

"Nagi has improved again this season. His ability has surpassed the level of the League One. I believe he is also eager to hone himself on a higher level platform. Up to now, there are many rich teams contacting us, hoping to get Nagi."