On the field, the tension reached a breaking point. Lee Seung-woo, the South Korean starlet for the Red Team, found himself swamped by Blue Team defenders inside the penalty area. He had a clear passing lane to his left, where an open winger was calling for the ball, but Lee, desperate to prove he was the better prospect, ignored the option.
He tried to shift the ball to his left and take a snap shot. In the eyes of his teammates, the choice was selfish. In the eyes of the scouts, it was amateur.
Lee's shot lacked power. It struck the shin of the Blue Team's center-back and deflected harmlessly into the air. The Blue Team goalkeeper jumped and comfortably plucked the ball from the sky, ending the threat.
A collective sigh of regret rippled through the crowd outside the fence. Lee Seung-woo instinctively clutched his head, a silent wail of frustration in his heart.
"Lee! Watch your decision-making! You had the pass!" Coach Oscar García shouted from the center circle. Acting as both referee and mentor, he didn't miss a single lapse in judgment.
Lee nodded helplessly, avoiding the resentful glares of his teammates. He knew he had missed a golden opportunity to break the deadlock and solidify his claim for the B-team roster.
[Typical. The kid is talented but too greedy.]
[Look at the Argentinian, Lorenzo. He hasn't even touched the ball yet. Is he just a spectator?]
[He's waiting. Look at his positioning, he's staying right on the edge of the last defender's vision.]
[This stream is insane. Lucia, show us more of the sidelines! Is that really Sacristán looking bored?]
In Lucia's live stream, the comments were a mix of tactical analysis and lingering skepticism toward Lorenzo. For many Argentinian fans watching back home, they were still waiting to see if the "thug" who hit the Coordinator's son actually had the talent to justify his attitude.
The match continued into the twenty-first minute. The tempo, dictated by Barcelona's high-frequency passing, began to tire the defenders in the Mediterranean heat.
For the Blue Team, the burden of progression fell to Munir El Haddadi. The elegant playmaker received the ball near the halfway line and surged forward. He danced past one challenge with a subtle feint and pushed into the final third, twenty yards from the Red Team's box.
Again, he faced the Red Team's organized "bus." The double-pivot of Sergi Samper and another defensive midfielder made the middle of the pitch feel like a fortress.
Munir hesitated. He looked for an opening, but the space was disappearing fast.
Sensing his teammate's struggle, Lorenzo made his move. He dropped back three yards from the offside line, dragging one of the Red Team's center-backs with him. This movement created a brief pocket of space for Munir to breathe.
Lee Seung-woo, who had tracked back to help the defense, stuck to Lorenzo like a shadow. At barely 170cm, Lee was dwarfed by Lorenzo's 184cm frame. Lorenzo used his shoulder to lean into the smaller player, establishing his territory with the casual dominance he had learned in the physical streets of Buenos Aires.
"Munir! Now!" a winger, Ilyas, shouted from the flank, signaling for a wide pass.
Coach García watched closely. "Transfer the ball! Go wide!" he urged.
But Munir, seeing Lorenzo's sudden half-turn and acceleration, ignored the safe option. He spotted the gap Lorenzo had just engineered. His right foot came down hard, poking a sharp, clinical through-ball straight into the heart of the penalty area.
Lorenzo reacted before the ball even left Munir's boot. He exploded into a sprint, his 'Speed' attribute of 81 allowing him to leave Lee Seung-woo in the dust in two strides.
"Damn it!" Lee hissed in Korean, reaching for Lorenzo's jersey but catching only air.
Lorenzo entered the eighteen-yard box with the ball at his feet. Immediately, three Red Team players converged on him, two center-backs closing the gap and a full-back racing over to block the angle.
"Lorenzo! Here! Pass it back!" Ilyas screamed from the wing. The defender marking him had been drawn toward Lorenzo, leaving Ilyas completely unmarked. A simple cut-back would have been the
"Barça way", the high-percentage play.
In the past, Lorenzo would have looked for the pass. He was a team player. But in this moment, an inexplicable surge of confidence washed over him. He felt the "King of the Penalty Area" skill vibrating in his muscles.
He didn't slow down. He didn't look for the pass. He took one more touch to settle the ball and prepared to shoot.
"Selfish!" one of the defenders growled as he lunged to block the line.
"What is he doing?" Sacristán muttered on the sidelines, his brow furrowing. "The angle is gone. He's going to hit the defender."
Kluivert, however, stood perfectly still. He saw the way Lorenzo's body was positioned, not as a panicked youth, but as a predator who had already seen the goal.
Lorenzo swung his right leg. In his mind, he was aiming for the near post, the "logical" target for a striker in such a tight spot. But as his foot made contact, an invisible force seemed to take over. His ankle locked with supernatural precision, and his weight shifted a fraction of an inch to the left.
Thump!
The sound was muffled but solid. Instead of the near post, the ball took a vicious, curling trajectory toward the far corner of the goal. It rose incredibly fast, whistling between the two closing center-backs like a heat-seeking missile.
The Red Team goalkeeper, rooted to his line, could only watch as the ball rocketed toward the "post and bar" intersection, the absolute dead corner.
"No way..." Munir gasped from the midfield.
The ball slammed into the back of the net with a violence that made the twine snap taut.
1-0.
The silence that followed was absolute. For a heartbeat, the only sound was the ball rolling back across the grass. Then, the crowd outside the fence erupted.
Lorenzo didn't celebrate wildly. He stood in the box, feeling the hum of the System fading back into his subconscious. He looked toward the sidelines, his eyes meeting Sacristán's shocked gaze.
First shot. First goal.
The "problem child" hadn't just scored; he had executed a strike that even a first-team veteran would have been proud of. In the heart of Barcelona, the King had just claimed his first piece of land.