“Your foot is as stiff as a piece of wood. What did I just say? Relax, relax. When the ball comes down, at the moment it touches the top of your foot, you need to pull your foot back, cushion it downward! Try again!”

The second time, Logan Grant had nothing but “cushion, cushion” in his mind, but when the ball came down, he cushioned too early. As a result, the ball didn’t bounce up again, but simply rolled down along his foot.

“You cushioned too early. I said at the moment you touch the ball! The moment! Do you understand what a moment is? As soon as you touch the ball, immediately pull your foot down. Try again!”

The third time, Logan Grant finally grasped the concept of “the moment.” As soon as he received the ball, he cushioned downward, then immediately exerted force upward. But the ball flew straight up, even higher than his head.

“Not bad, you know how to cushion at the right moment now, but your movement isn’t smooth enough. After cushioning, you used too much force when kicking upward. The power should be gentle, don’t use too much strength. More force doesn’t mean better. Use a light touch, control the ball so it’s not too high or too low—ideally, it should rise just to your knee height. Again.”

And so, Logan Grant kept trying again and again. After each failure, Lucas would correct his mistakes, telling him what went wrong and what he should do.

During this process, Logan Grant gradually got the feel for juggling the ball. He finally managed to juggle the ball successfully several times in a row.

When he managed to juggle the ball twice in a row, he cheered with joy—of course, the ball then fell to the ground.

“Only two, what’s there to be happy about? Keep going, keep going.”

Logan Grant continued practicing with full confidence.

He felt better and better, and the number of successful juggles in a row kept increasing. From two, to four, to eight, to ten!

Logan Grant was learning faster and faster!

Watching from the side and seeing Logan Grant’s visible progress, Lucas was surprised.

It hadn’t even been half an hour, and Logan Grant could already juggle the ball ten times in a row! He seemed to have completely moved past the clueless beginner stage and entered the phase of repeated practice and deepening muscle memory.

How long did it take him, when he first started playing soccer, to juggle the ball ten times in a row without dropping it?

He thought about it, and then felt rather frustrated.

He also recalled how he had just tried to flick the ball past Logan Grant, only for Logan Grant to leap into the air and catch the ball with both hands.

That kid’s jumping ability is really scary!

Especially his explosive vertical leap!

His explosiveness is truly strong—no wonder he can run even faster than Rico. Who knows… maybe he could even outrun Kaka!

Lucas was startled by the thought that popped into his head.

Then he became especially interested in this Chinese rookie.

Is he really from China?

Why did he only start thinking about playing soccer at sixteen?

Why does he want to play soccer?

He turned his attention to Logan Grant, and saw that he was juggling the ball, his mouth moving silently, as if he was muttering something.

“Hey, Rong.”

As soon as he spoke, he startled Logan Grant, and the ball dropped.

“What were you muttering?”

Logan Grant looked at the ball on the ground with a pained expression, as if what had dropped wasn’t a ball, but money…

“I was counting,” he replied.

“So how many did you juggle just now?”

“Twenty-one dollars… ah, I mean, twenty-one. If you hadn’t talked to me, I could have kept going…” he complained.

“Idiot, if you can’t even handle this little bit of distraction, how can you be a professional player!” Lucas hadn’t expected Logan Grant to already be able to juggle the ball more than twenty times in such a short while, but he couldn’t just admit he’d interrupted him, so he narrowed his eyes and came up with a random excuse. “You need to let your body—no, every cell—remember the feel of the ball, not have to focus all your attention every time. When you can juggle the ball and do other things at the same time, that’s when you’ve got it!”

Logan Grant didn’t really understand, but he felt that Lucas sounded impressive, so he couldn’t help but nod.

Seeing him nod, Lucas was delighted—this kid is so naive, he believes everything I say!

“From now on, you juggle the ball while we chat. This is special training! It’s specifically to help you multitask! Your goal is to keep juggling the ball without letting it drop while talking to me.” Lucas found himself a perfectly legitimate reason to chat with Logan Grant.

Logan Grant didn’t suspect anything.

“So why did you only start learning soccer now, Rong?” Lucas asked.

Hugging the ball, Logan Grant said, “I want to play soccer to make money.” Then he tossed the ball and started juggling.

“Make money by playing soccer?”

“Yeah… ah!” Logan Grant had just spoken when the ball dropped, and he forgot to cushion it, so the ball bounced away and hit the ground.

“It’s fine, try again, try again.” Lucas didn’t mind at all, and continued asking questions he was interested in. “But you’re already sixteen. If you want to make money by playing soccer, isn’t it a bit late…”