At the post-match press conference whereby, the press waited to watch the verbal sparring between the two managers, Mourinho took the initiative to praise the Forest team’s performance. He gave special praise to Gareth Bale’s performance after being brought on.
However, he did not admit that his team had performed badly. He thought that they were just a little unlucky.
Seemingly to prove that his words were true, Twain also praised Chelsea’s good performance and said that their unbeaten record for ten rounds was not due to luck. It was because they were a truly strong team.
But then, Twain switched and said he was even prouder of his players because Chelsea had done so well. Everyone had done a great job.
He even took the trouble to mention every player individually to praise them by name. But he did not especially draw attention to Bale. He stressed that it was not an individual victory. Rather, it was a team victory.
He deliberately dialed down the spotlight on Bale.
Some players could withstand the tremendous pressure on the field, but might not easily cope with the praise and expectations outside of the field. Bale was still young, and Twain wanted to protect him.
Even so, Twain could not manage the media’s frenzied speculation about the young player after the game.
At 16 years and 105 days old, he had scored his first professional goal for his team. He had just broken the new record for the youngest player to debut in the history of the football club and the Premier League with the Manchester City match. And now he had now broken new heights as the youngest goalscorer in the history of the football club and the Premier League. Before this, the record had been held by the Everton’s young player, James Vaughan in a match against Crystal Palace on April 11 of this year. Vaughan was only 16 years and 271 days old when he scored the goal.
Bale’s goal made everyone review the changes in the Premier League’s youngest ever goalscorer record in recent years:
The first was Wayne Rooney, who made his mark in the Everton versus Arsenal match on October 19, 2002. When he scored that goal, he was only 16 years and 361 days old. After that, on December 26 in the same year, the young Leeds United player James Milner broke the new record at 16 years and 357 days. Two and a half years later, James Vaughan, once again a young player from Everton, set the record at 16 years and 271 days.
And now Bale’s goal had pushed the record up by another 166 days.
At 16 years and 105 days, perhaps the new record might not be toppled for a very long time.
Therefore, Twain’s thought of wanting to protect Bale was good. But because of the goal, Bale had gained the same level of attention that Wayne Rooney had received in that year.
The next day after the game, every newspaper headline was dedicated to the young man. The feud between Twain and Mourinho lost to Gareth Bale’s shot.
All the Welsh people claimed that they had gained another genius while the English discussed the new record enthusiastically.
On the surface, it seemed like everyone was delighted. Only Twain was between laughter and tears when he looked at the overwhelmingly large photograph of Bale.
Dunn consoled him. “Gold will shine sooner or later. When you took him away from my team, you should have known that this day would come. Unless you had no faith in his ability.”
“Are you trying to console me?” Twain rolled his eyes at Dunn and sighed. “Whatever. Looking at this from a different perspective, this is what Bale has to experience.”
Just as he was speaking, Twain’s cell phone rang.
Twain looked down at his turned-over phone and suddenly laughed. “A message from Eastwood. He told me he watched the game with Chelsea and couldn’t wait to get back to the team. He even said he knew what I’m worried about now because Sabina already predicted it. He said that if he’d played that last free kick, the result would have been the same, but I wouldn’t have to worry about anything!”
※※※
After training started again, Twain read the Romani Gypsy’s message in front of all the players, who all laughed.
“Finally, he asked me to thank all of you on his behalf. He loves all of you.”
The players whistled.
“Good job, guys. We’ve taken the first place in the league. Was anyone too excited to sleep last night?”
Bale raised his hand.
He immediately drew everyone’s attention. Everyone laughed when they saw that it was Bale.
“You need more practice, Gareth. It’s only a game! If you’re too excited to sleep after winning, then you have to live with insomnia for the rest of your life.”
The laughter became even louder.
Bale’s head hung lower.
Upon seeing that, Twain cleared his throat. “All right, everybody, listen up. From now on I want you to forget yesterday’s game and put all your energies into a new battle. Our opponent is…”
Everyone knew which game he referred to, so they answered in unison. “Benfica!”
After that shout, everybody laughed. This was a team they had defeated in the past. They did not feel any pressure at all.
“Very good; we just beat them not long ago. Now we’re going to defeat them again!”
※※※
Since Leighton Baines was injured, Twain put the young Gareth Bale in the starting lineup for this game in Portugal.
Before the game, Twain joked to Bale, “You may be the youngest player in a starting lineup the history of the Champions League. Are you nervous?”
Bale shook his head. “Still okay, chief.”
If Bale had said that he was not nervous with certainty, Twain might worry about it. Instead, his mind was set at ease. “Go ahead, don’t think about anything else. It’s just a game.”
The jeers of tens of thousands of Benfica fans on their home ground did not make Bale’s legs go weak. He was already a professional player who had been baptized in fierce battle. He was no longer a child who had no confidence because others laughed at his appearance.
In the game, Nottingham Forest experienced a tough ninety minutes and won 1:0 against the group’s qualifying competitor, Benfica. Their double victories over Benfica helped the Forest team stabilize their ranking with seven points and second place in the group.
Real Madrid, who defeated Lille in their away game, was at the top.
In this game, everyone on the Forest team kept up their condition from the game with Chelsea. No matter what difficult situations they faced, they never gave up. They held on by the skin of their teeth in the team’s most difficult situation and did not let their opponents breach their goal. On the contrary, when Benfica was kept back, they succeeded with a sneak attack and completely reversed the situation on the field. Then the game submitted to the pace of the Forest team. Forest played well and with ease. Benfica became more and more impatient. Finally, they had to swallow the bitter fruit of their failure.
At the post-match press conference, Twain faced a room full of Portuguese media and said with conceit, “Until now, I believe many of you here were still skeptical about our strength and still believed that Benfica’s loss to Nottingham Forest in the previous game was an upset. An unexpected fluke. Now, we’ve proven you wrong. It would have been an upset if Benfica had beaten us!”