Chapter 5: The End and the Beginning (5)

[Oh! McNeil! McNeil cuts in from the left again!]

The caster's shout was picked up by the commentator.

[To the right! He needs to play it to the right!]

[McNeil's cross! With Everton's defense drawn to the left, McNeil's cross finds Jay Rodriguez on the right, completely unmarked with no defenders in sight, and he goes for a header!]

[Oh, Everton's goalkeeper Jordan Pickford makes a great save! That should've gone in!]

As the commentator let out a disappointed exclamation, the caster continued.

[Jay Rodriguez knows it too—he's raising his hands to apologize to his teammates.]

[Burnley's interim manager leaps off the bench, clapping to encourage the players. Instead of sitting deep, the Burnley players press forward again.]

[I never imagined Burnley playing like this. Full-on pressing instead of retreating and locking things down?]

The caster shook his head in amazement, prompting the commentator to offer some analysis.

[They say the interim manager coached youth teams at RB Salzburg. It makes me wonder if Sean Dyche brought him in to blend Red Bull's pressing style into Burnley.]

[Either way, unlike their usual approach, Burnley's players are charging in to disrupt the opposition's buildup from the back!]

The commentator, the fans, and even the opposing players—accustomed to Burnley's typical defensive style of sitting back, winning the ball, and launching it long—were stunned by this drastic shift.

Burnley's forwards and midfielders, ignoring their opponents' bewildered state, pushed deep into Everton's half, pressing to disrupt the ball's movement.

Burnley's left and right wingers, Dwight McNeil and Jay Rodriguez, hounded Everton's right-back Seamus Coleman and left-back Lucas Digne, preventing them from receiving the ball comfortably.

Following Hyung-Min's instructions, Burnley's central striker Chris Wood ignored the pointless sideways passing between Everton's center-backs Ben Godfrey and Yerry Mina, instead positioning himself to block the passing lanes into midfield.

As a result, Everton, attempting to build from the back with lateral passes, faltered under the aggressive pressure from Burnley's three forwards. Unable to advance the ball, they traded passes among their defenders, racking up meaningless possession stats.

Frustrated Everton midfielders began dropping deeper to receive the ball, only to be closely marked by Burnley's midfielders.

This naturally widened the gap between Everton's attack and defense, and with both teams' players clustering tighter in Everton's half, the pressure Everton had hoped to avoid intensified.

"To me!"

Finally, an exasperated Jordan Pickford, Everton's goalkeeper, took a pass from center-back Yerry Mina and hoofed it long upfield.

"James!"

"Do it yourself!"

At the shout from captain Ben Mee, who was organizing the defensive line, Burnley's center-back James Tarkowski—positioned to intercept the incoming ball—grumbled but launched himself into the air.

Burnley's defense, dominant in numbers and height, centered around Ben Mee, aggressively blocked Everton's striker Dominic Calvert-Lewin from reaching the ball's landing spot.

Comfortably collecting the ball, James Tarkowski casually tapped a right-footed pass to Burnley's waiting right-back Matt Lowton, sparking another Burnley attack.

"I never thought this would actually work…"

In the 31st minute of the first half, veteran Burnley midfielder Jack Cork muttered to himself as he watched the game unfold according to the interim manager's predictions, recalling the previous afternoon.

"Look, it's forward pressing at its core, but we won't always win the ball. The goal is to stop them from building up comfortably with passes from the back. The forwards just need to block passing lanes and press the player with the ball."

Hyung-Min moved a magnet shaped like a ball from the opponent's defensive third to Burnley's on the tactics board.

"Then they'll go long, and our defenders—Ben, James, or Jack—can pick it up and feed it out to the wings."

"Won't we need to push the defensive line pretty high to press up top?"

It was the final tactical briefing the afternoon before the opener.

With the entire first-team squad gathered, listening intently to the interim manager, right-back Matt Lowton raised a point. The defenders and midfielders in attendance nodded in agreement.

"Right. We'll push the line up and use the offside trap. With VAR now, as long as we hold the line well, we're unlikely to concede due to a refereeing mistake."

"Will that work?"

"It'll work. Ben will lead the line adjustments, but if Ben has to step out for any reason, James, you take over."

Hyung-Min tasked captain and center-back Ben Mee, along with fellow center-back James Tarkowski, with maintaining the offside line and directing the other defenders' positions.

"What about the attack?"

With the defense sorted, midfielder Josh Brownhill asked about the attacking setup.

"On the surface, we'll focus our strength on the left. Dwight will go up as the left winger, and Charlie, as the left-back, will link up with him, moving straight up and down the sideline. Brownie, you join them on the left to pull Everton's defense over."

"…Brownie?"

Josh Brownhill muttered in disbelief as his ancestral surname was suddenly repurposed, while Hyung-Min smacked the tactics board on the wall.

"Focus! Focus! Meanwhile, Chris will loiter up top, acting as a decoy to drag out one or two defenders. He can link play if the chance arises or make a run himself if there's an opening."

"…Loiter?"

This time, veteran striker Chris Wood furrowed his brow in mild exasperation, but Hyung-Min pressed on undeterred.

"But the key thing to remember is this: after pulling Everton to the left, we raid the empty space on the right like burglars hitting an unguarded house. Jay starts as the right winger but cuts into the center where Chris has vacated, and Matt, stepping up from right-back, fills the space Jay leaves to maintain width. Finally, Westwood storms in from the center with a delayed run to clean up!"

"Burglars?"

"Clean up?"

Jay Rodriguez, Matt Lowton, and Ashley Westwood—suddenly cast as hardened criminals—exchanged baffled looks, but the Burnley squad tilted their heads without outright objecting to the tactics.

It was just one game, after all, and the bizarre training sessions over the past week had piqued their curiosity.

---

"Right, everyone! The core of this tactic is short passes and movement. Remember that! Short passes and movement!"

On the first day of training under the interim manager at Burnley Football Club's Barnfield Training Centre, Hyung-Min arrived with a pile of cones and balls, shouting to the assembled players.

"Movement requires stamina! But since we can't build stamina in a short time, we'll save that for later. First, short passes! We're starting with short passes! Normally, it'd be two touches, but since our friends aren't used to it yet, I'll allow up to three touches. Remember: receiving the ball and passing it counts as three touches total!"

"But we're all pros—short passes are…"

Vice-captain Jack Cork timidly protested, mindful of Arthur glaring nearby, only for Hyung-Min to set down the cones and balls, spread his arms wide, and shout.

"Oh, you've misunderstood me! I'm not saying to *do* a lot of short passes!"

"…Then what?"

"Long passes are banned! From now on, unless it's a designated situation, any pass over five meters in training comes with a fine!"

"…Huh?!"

Despite the players' confusion, Burnley's first-team squad dove into the new training regimen every day for the past five days without fail.

Each morning upon arriving at the training ground, the players split into rotating groups of three, moving constantly within variously sized spaces marked by cones and tape, swapping positions and exchanging short passes.

And if Hyung-Min judged that anyone touched the ball more than three times or sent a pass over five meters, he slapped them with a fine without mercy.

After spending the whole morning trading short passes within spaces that shrank and expanded, they'd eat lunch together in the canteen. Then, in the afternoon, they'd run short sprints until they felt like puking.

Sprinting at full speed for 10 seconds, resting for a minute, then sprinting again for 10 seconds—the cycle repeated until even these seasoned pros felt their lunch creeping back up their throats.

As they gasped for air, glaring resentfully at the interim manager leading the session, Hyung-Min beamed at them and shouted.

"You almost never sprint full-out for more than 10 seconds in a game! So run in 10-second bursts, recover in between, and you'll be fine! Come on, let's go one more time! You can do it!"