The players had devastated looks on their faces after finding out that Mateo would not be playing the match against Lesica United tomorrow and would in fact be out for an estimated time of three weeks, almost all of them.
"This isn't happening," Dave muttered as he made his way to Mateo who was sitting on the floor on the sidelines with a lot of his teammates already gathered around him.
"Did you have to tackle him that hard?" Merino couldn't hide how madly furious he was at Roger for putting Mateo in this condition.
"Calm down, Merino, he wasn't planning to injure him, he just wanted to dispossess him of the ball," Ferran said.
"Then he should have done it more carefully," Merino said. "How the heck are we supposed to beat Lesica United now." He muttered.
"Hey, please nobody should blame Roger for what has already happened," Adolf said as there were a lot of angry fingers already pointing at the midfielder. "This is not the first time something is happening and we all know that he didn't do it intentionally, why would he even do it intentionally?"
While everyone was saying their mind about the current situation and Norman was having some words with the medical team, Dave made his way to Mateo who was lying on the floor with his eyes closed.
"How does it feel?" The winger heard the goalkeeper's voice and slowly opened his eyes to see him kneeling beside him.
"Very painful." He muttered before gritting his teeth.
"I'm the one who should be sorry."
"I let the team down when they needed me the most, I've gotten fouled a lot of time this season, I've even been brought down under dangerous challenges but not once had I gotten injured, why did it have to be now that we're about to play our most important match of the season?"
"You didn't let anybody down," Dave said, shaking his head. "Bad things happen to all of us at some point in our lives and as much as we try to fight them, some of them still manage to hit us when we least expect them.
"Your injury is very bad for both you and the team but there's nothing we can do about it, it has already happened, and the best we can do is find a way to beat Lesica United without you, while you go get your treatments and rest and then return stronger."
After hearing him say that, a smile appeared on Mateo's face before he slowly turned his gaze to Ferran and his other teammates who were standing behind Dave now.
"I know you guys can do it, Lesica United may be tough with the return of Okafor but I know you guys can find a way to make that conference league qualification."
"We'll try our best," Ferran said with a nod.
After a few more minutes of exchanging nice words and a few jokes, the medical team returned to help the winger out of the area so that his healing process could begin.
After watching them until they were out of sight, the team continued their training session.
With arguably the most important player in the team unavailable now, they had to train harder and find a way to cover their dependence on him.
After training for about two hours, Norman took the players to the locker room to take them through the tactics and the changes he had made to the forward positions because Mateo was no longer available.
After taking them through the tactics, the players were allowed to go to get some rest before tomorrow's match in the afternoon.
Dave was one of the first players to make their way out of the stadium before quickly hopping into his car and zooming off to his house.
It didn't take him long to arrive home and after parking his car in his usual parking spot, he got down from the car and slowly made his way to the door.
He opened the door and just kept staring into the house with a devastated look on his face.
He let out a deep sigh before finally making his way into the house.
"I know I said we could beat Lesica United without Mateo but right now, I am not feeling it all." He said before making his way to the couch and crashing down on it.
'Didn't you see how we were struggling against Frono FC? Mateo is a game changer and we are going to need someone just like him in this match against Lesica United.' Dave replied.
'I know but I'm not so confident about it.' Dave replied. 'I have been feeling tense because of this match since last night and right now, it just got worse.'
Dave let out a sigh as he brought out his phone from his pocket to see that the time was 12:48 PM.
"I have to be at the stadium by 3:00 PM for the press conference." He muttered before unlocking his phone to see that he received a text from Emma.
'How's Mateo?' He read the message subconsciously after opening it.
"Of course, the news has started going around."
In Unique City's Publishing Company building, Emma's workplace, she had been summoned by her boss Miss. Nelly and for about three minutes now, she had just been standing there while Miss. Nelly worked on other things while pretending like she wasn't seeing her. But she made sure to turn her gaze to her after she was done with what she was doing on her desk.
"Emma." She said with a smile on her face.
"There's going to be a press conference at the Wondanimo Stadium by 3:00 PM today, are you aware of that?" She asked.
"Yeah," Emma replied with a nod.
"Good, now I want you to go over there and get the most information you can get from whoever is going to be there, I don't know who's going to be there, I didn't bother to check."
"It's Norman Tate the coach and Dave Richards, ma'am."
"Oh, your boyfriend and his coach, that's nice, at least he's going to listen to more of your questions," Nelly said.
"Yeah," Emma muttered, instantly regretting why she gave her that piece of information.
"And also you can confirm this Mateo Smith getting injured in training rumor that's flying around in the air."
"I don't know, haven't heard it from a trustworthy source, but you can confirm that in the press conference."
"If Mateo is really injured, that's not good for the team," Emma said.
"I know and I don't care that much," Nelly said. "Now go get yourself ready so that you can be there before 3:00 PM."
Emma didn't say anything as she slowly turned and began to walk out of the room.
"Instead of worrying about how his injury may affect the team, I should be worried about the type of injury he may have sustained, that is if the rumor is true." She muttered to herself. "I can't wait for the press conference when I have a very close source of information." She added before bringing her phone up.
Hope you enjoyed the chapter?
If we can hit 1000+ privilege unlocks before the end of this month, I'll do five chapters mass release on any day between the 20-25th of January.