The Rise of the Iron Wall!

Hoffenheim’s head coach also seemed to notice that his team was stuck in the midfield. In the end, the man finally made two changes.

The first one was to put a fresh midfielder to fight for the ball, trying to kill Schalke’s two hearts with new blood, and the second one was to take off Christoph Baumgartner for Ihlas Bebou, the new player who they had just recruited from Hannover 96 a few days ago.

Not a single one of Schalke’s players treated this seriously. After all, Ihlas Bebou was just a player who had only been wandering around second division teams, never even getting a chance to play in the Bundesliga even once. In their mind, this was just a substitution to add new blood, not a tactical one where the striker from Togo would catch them off guard.

However, that was at least what the outfield players thought. For Higo, this was a different case. His gaze hardened immediately, remembering what Kumiko said about that Togo striker.

"Even though Ihlas Bebou has just come, there is a probability that he will be used as a substitute, and when that time comes, you need to be aware of his style. He is rapid, probably the quickest one among all the Hoffenheim players, so if he really comes from the bench, he will try to beat everyone with his speed. He can also be anywhere, and his vision is also excellent. He will probably force Andrej Kramaric to operate behind him so that he could roam freely on the frontline, so be careful about him."

’Yeah, Kumiko-chan’s prediction sure is still unmatched.’ Higo could feel the corner of his lips twitching when he remembered that. Of course, with this intelligence, there was no way the boy would treat this casually. "Oz-san, get ready, don’t get beaten in speed so easily, okay? You too, Bastian-san." He reminded the two center backs immediately.

Those two caught the key word immediately and couldn’t help but give a solemn nod. They might be confident with almost everything on the back, but when it came to speed, those two knew their limitation. As two big guys with a height of around 190 cm and a weight of around 88 kg, mobility was definitely not their best trait, so they had to be careful with this.

Of course, knowing that was one thing, but before they experienced it, they would never know how devastating it was to be beaten by speed.

In the 70th minute, they finally realized how terrifying Ihlas Bebou’s speed was as Sebastian Rudy suddenly delivered a through ball to the channel area between Juan Miranda and Oczipka. Ihlas Bebou, who had been hovering around the offside line, suddenly rushed without anyone noticing, trying to get the ball first before those two players could do that.

"SHIT! OFFSIDE!" Oczika raised his hand, asking the linesman to raise the flag.

Unfortunately, the linesman didn’t even blink here. Hell, from his own perspective, Ihlas Bebou was even one step behind when the pass was delivered, and the only reason that striker managed to get ahead was that Oczipka got caught off guard when he turned around.

"Fuck! I told him to be careful, and what did he do?!" Higo couldn’t help but curse, rushing forward to shut down the space for the opponent’s striker to do something.

Fortunately, it wasn’t just him who took action. Juan Miranda was also quick enough to recover, using his body to pressure Ihlas Bebou. Even though he wasn’t as strong as the two center backs, his strength was still quite decent, and with a slight shoulder press, Ihlas Bebou lost control of his balance immediately, having to push the ball awkwardly straight to Higo’s foot.

Thud!

Higo reacted instinctively, blocking the ball with his foot. Fortunately, the shot was a weak one, so the bounce was not that far from him. With a big jump, he managed to get the rebound by himself, securing the ball in his possession.

"Oh, yes! Nice one, Juan!"

"That’s what we want to see!"

"Come on, defend the lead with your body!"

All the supporters cheered immediately when they saw this, and Juan Miranda also got flustered here. This was probably the first time he got cheered by those on the stand since he signed in with the team last summer, and it would be a lie if he said that he didn’t feel anything here.

Higo also let out a deep, relieved sigh, patting the Spaniard on the shoulder gratefully. As a goalkeeper, his thought process was simple. He would scold anyone who messed up, but he would also never forget to show his gratitude for those who fought so hard with him, and in this case, Juan Miranda was definitely his ally.

Oczipka, though, was a different matter, as Higo didn’t forget to send a stink glare at the man. ’We will sort it out later, Old Man.’ He mouthed quietly before throwing the ball to Hofmann to restart the game. The center back couldn’t help but shudder, somehow having already imagined himself being scolded once again by the coach later.

Honestly, it was such a strange sight, where all the defenders here were so afraid of Higo, a mere newcomer who had just been promoted from the second team a few months ago. It wasn’t as if Higo would beat them or do something violent if they made a mistake, but at this point, they had already recognized the boy’s authority in the team’s defensive line.

Well... If even their head coach listened to Higo carefully, they had no reason to do otherwise. It also didn’t help that Higo was so beloved in this city, and if they wanted to have a career here, offending the goalkeeper would be the least they wanted to do.

After this, Ihlas Bebou tried to take action again. This time, he roamed on the left side, and yet, Jonjoe Kenny managed to read the Togo striker perfectly, even sending a decisive tackle that killed the opponent’s momentum.

"YES, KENNY! Come on!"

"Good tackle! Let’s go, Schalke! We can do this!"

As time was ticking by, looking at how the defensive line started to get better, Higo couldn’t help but smirk, finally letting go of some tension on his shoulder.

’Yeah, this is how everything should be running, right?’

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