Glory Of The Football Manager System

Chapter 78: The Final Push III

After the match, Terry handed me another hundred pounds. "Four wins," he said. "Keep it up, Danny. Keep it up." I nodded. I was exhausted. I had not slept more than four hours a night in two weeks. My body ached. My eyes burned. But we were winning. That was all that mattered.

That night at the store, I fell asleep standing up. I woke up when a customer asked for lottery tickets. I had been asleep for maybe thirty seconds, leaning against the cigarette display. The customer did not seem to notice. Or maybe he did and was just being polite. I served him, then went to the back room and splashed cold water on my face. Two more games. Just two more games. I could do this.

The fifth game was on Saturday, March 6th, away to Glossop North End, who were already relegated and had nothing to play for. The system’s analysis showed a team that had given up, a team that was already on its summer holidays.

I expected an easy game. I was wrong. Glossop played with freedom, with abandon, with nothing to lose. They pressed high, they took risks, they played with a joy that we, weighed down by the pressure of the promotion race, could not match. And in the fifty-sixth minute, they scored. A long-range shot that took a wicked deflection and looped over our goalkeeper’s head. 1-0 down. The dream was dying.

I made changes. I brought on fresh legs. I pushed everyone forward. I told the team to forget about tactics, forget about shape, just go and win the game. "Throw everything at them," I said.

"Everything." In the seventy-third minute, JJ picked up the ball on the edge of the box. He was surrounded by three defenders.

He somehow wriggled through them, creating just enough space to get a shot away. The ball flew into the bottom corner. 1-1. In the eighty-eighth minute, we won a free kick thirty yards from goal.

JJ stood over it. I had seen him practice these a thousand times in training. He hit it perfectly. The ball curled over the wall, dipped at the last second, and nestled into the top corner. The goalkeeper was rooted to the spot. 2-1. When the final whistle blew, I sank to my knees. JJ had saved us. Again.

not go to the convenience store that night. I could not. I was physically

I did not care. I went home, collapsed into bed, and slept for fourteen hours straight. When I woke up,

sixth and final game before the final day was on Tuesday, March 9th, away to Curzon Ashton, a team we respected, a team we had battled with all season. The match was played in a spirit of

football. No cynicism. No gamesmanship. Just two teams giving everything for

sixty-first minute a long-range effort from Marcus Chen that flew into the top corner.

away changing room, staring at my phone. The Salford

to the final day. Saturday, March 13th. We were playing away against a mid-table team with nothing to play for. Salford were playing at home against a team that

me sitting there, staring into space. She sat down next to me, not saying anything. After a long silence, she spoke. "You’ve done

be enough," I

doesn’t mean it

What if JJ turned

than money," she said. "You’ll have taught him that some things are worth fighting for, even if you don’t win.

nodded. She was right.

said. "Ninety minutes.