Football: He suffered a broken leg at the start of the game, but partnered with Haaland!

Sun Yang stood on the grass and swallowed.

Regardless of past or present lives, anyone who has ever touched a football would recognize this South American fat man with ramen noodle hair.

Diego Maradona.

The true god of Napoli, the totem of Argentina. This is the epitome of a football legend.

"Hey kid, what are you spacing out for? Got dizzy from spinning around?" Maradona said, hands on his hips, his tone full of undisguised mockery.

He casually flicked his left foot upwards, and the soccer ball on the ground obediently bounced into the air.

"Zidane's tactics, against truly fearless South American defenders, would have resulted in your legs being broken three times already. One-on-one dribbling isn't dancing, it's murder!"

As Maradona spoke, he lightly tapped the ball with the instep of his left foot. The ball landed precisely on his right knee. He headed it five times in quick succession, using a slight push from his knee, and the ball rolled down his abdomen to his chest.

He leaned back sharply, his entire body arching like a bow. The ball rested perfectly still in the hollow of his chest. Then, with a powerful push of his shoulder, the ball leaped over his chest and head, landing on his broad back.

Maradona hunched his neck back and slightly moved his shoulders, the football rolling back and forth between his shoulder blades. No matter how he adjusted his posture, the ball remained perfectly obedient, never falling even a fraction.

Sun Yang stared in disbelief. He had only ever seen such exquisite ball control in videos.

"Think it flashy?" Maradona scoffed.

He thrust his back forward, sending the soccer ball soaring high into the air. Without even looking, he swung his left foot, striking the ball squarely in the center.

boom.

A muffled thud. The ball was propelled dozens of meters into the air by the immense force, nearly hitting the stadium's overhead lights.

A few seconds later, the ball plummeted downwards with tremendous gravitational acceleration.

Maradona stood still, his left leg steadily raised. In the fraction of a second that his foot touched the ball, he deftly pulled his left ankle back. This perfect movement neutralized the immense downward force.

The ball bounced obediently less than half a meter off his foot before he slammed it into the night sky.

The second time. The third time. The fourth time.

The football soared dozens of meters into the air time and time again, only to be caught steadily by that magical left foot each time. In a total of thirteen high-flying juggles, Maradona's footwork never exceeded three steps.

Sun Yang felt a chill run down his spine. For an average player, stopping a ball falling from dozens of meters in the air within three meters is considered acceptable. But under Maradona's feet, the ball became nothing more than a toy glued to his feet.

What followed was even more shocking to Sun Yang's worldview.

Maradona kicked the football into the stands, then reached into his pocket, pulled out a green tennis ball, and threw it to the ground.

He flicked his left toe. The tiny tennis ball bounced back and forth between the arches, insteps, and thighs of his two feet at an incredible speed, dazzling to behold.

Next, he pulled out a yellow orange. The orange peel was fragile, but he controlled the force of each touch with the ball perfectly. After dozens of rounds, the orange rolled on the instep of his foot, and the peel wasn't even scratched.

Finally, Maradona picked up a half-empty bottle of mineral water from the edge of the grass.

The water in the bottle sloshed about, its center of gravity shifting erratically. But he tossed the bottle up, his left ankle jerking repeatedly, managing to control the bottle's rise and fall using only his toes and the arch of his foot. The bottle tumbled up and down on his foot without hitting the ground.

"Got it, kid?" Maradona stopped the water bottle on his foot and looked directly at Sun Yang. "The first step in playing football is to become one with the ball."

"Don't treat the ball as an external object, or a tool for kicking people. It must be part of your body, your feet, your hands, an extension of your body. If you can't even fully control the ball, how can you expect to dribble past a thousand opponents?"

Maradona snapped his fingers. A net more than a meter high rose out of thin air in the center of the virtual stadium.

"Tonight, let's play some games from the favelas of South America." Maradona kicked a soccer ball over. "Net soccer. The ball can't touch the ground. You have to catch it with different parts of your body each time, and then kick it back. If you miss one, you have to run ten laps around here."

The hellish training began immediately.

Maradona's shots were incredibly fast and landed in tricky spots. They either smashed into the corner of the net or flew out along the sideline with tremendous spin.

Sun Yang initially couldn't catch the ball at all. Although his basic skills had been improved by the system, they were full of flaws in the face of this kind of micro-management netball. Either his ankle was too stiff and he would just knock the ball away, or he couldn't judge the ball's landing point after it spun.

Repeatedly mishandling the ball. Repeatedly running laps on the sidelines.

Fortunately, there were no physical limitations in the dream. Sun Yang ran countless ten laps before returning to face Maradona's onslaught.

After three thousand serves, Sun Yang finally began to find the knack. His ankles became more flexible, and every muscle gradually adapted to the weight and spin of the ball.

Once the netball training session was over, Maradona immediately removed the net.

"You're somewhat quick to learn. Now I'll teach you how to dribble and pull the ball past your opponent."

Maradona dribbled towards Sun Yang. His speed wasn't particularly fast, lacking the aggressive, high-speed presence of Mbappe.

Sun Yang immediately lowered his center of gravity, relying on his high defensive attribute of 70, and stared at Maradona's waist.

Maradona gently flicked the ball with the inside of his left foot, sending it rolling half a meter to the left front. Sun Yang immediately stretched out his leg to intercept.

The moment Sun Yang made his move, Maradona quickly followed with quick, short steps. He didn't even make any large feints; he simply pulled with the outside of his left foot in a very subtle way.

The ball abruptly changed its trajectory, slipping past Sun Yang's studs. Maradona simultaneously changed direction, whizzing past Sun Yang.

Clean and efficient. Extremely lethal.

Sun Yang was so shaken that he lost his balance and landed hard on the grass.

"That's called rhythm. That's called pace. Individual attacking doesn't require you to twist your waist and spin like a clown. In the half-second it takes for the opponent to kick, use the slightest touch to change the direction. Understand?" Maradona tossed the ball to Sun Yang. "Come on, defend me. Don't stop until you can stop me."

A long night.

Sun Yang was beaten by Maradona a full five thousand times on the virtual court. At first, he was easily fooled by Maradona's feints, then he could barely keep up for a couple of steps, and finally he gradually saw through Maradona's subtle flicking motion with his ankle.

This extreme mental torment caused Sun Yang to deeply imprint every technical detail into his subconscious.

Ring ring.

The sound of his phone alarm forcibly pulled Sun Yang out of his dream.

Sun Yang suddenly opened his eyes and sat up in bed. Although he wasn't sweating, he felt a throbbing pain in his head. Maradona's unreasonable change of direction and pull completely overturned his previous understanding of dribbling.