“Wow, what a gorgeous through ball!” “The Leicester City number 23 just delivered a 60-yard pass!” “Can Vardy make this count?” The announcer’s voice rose with the roar of the crowd.
The momentum on the pitch flipped in an instant.
The ball rolled ahead of him, perfectly weighted.
Vardy didn’t need a touch to settle it.
One stride to push it forward, and he was into the box.
The noise hammered at him from all sides: the commentary, the Stoke fans spewing venom.
Vardy’s eyes never left the goal.
He cocked his right leg back and ripped it.
Bang.
The ball became a blur, screaming toward the net guarded by Asmir Begović.
Too close.
Too fast.
The ball was already in the back of the net before Begović could do a thing.
He just threw his arms up in a gesture of surrender.
The white net billowed.
The two thousand Leicester fans who’d made the trip erupted.
The twenty thousand home fans behind them grabbed their heads in near-unison agony.
The Stoke players stared in disbelief.
One pass.
One shot.
And they’d been carved open.
And that through ball.
The one that split half the pitch.
How did that black-haired Asian kid pull that off?
“He took his chance!” “It’s in!!!” “Goal!
Goal!
Goal!” “Leicester have equalized!” The announcer’s voice climbed with passion, and the traveling fans roared.
But Vardy wasn’t celebrating.
He sprinted into the net, snatched the ball, and ran back toward the center circle.
Eighty-three minutes on the clock.
Time was running out for Leicester.
Every second counted.
He set the ball on the center spot.
Only then did he cross to Leo, smacking palms and pulling him into a quick embrace.
“Man, that pass was unreal.
How did you know I was making that run?” Leo had zero doubts about Vardy’s finishing.
This was the guy who’d shattered Van Nistelrooy’s record of consecutive Premier League goals in the title-winning season.
The man who’d win the Premier League Golden Boot at thirty-three.
He just smiled at Vardy’s question, half honest, half something else.
“Call it intuition.” Intuition?
Not even close.
The reason he could deliver a defense-splitting pass without even looking up was simple.
He had a system.
Right now, inside Leo’s mind, a holographic 2D pitch was projected.
His eleven teammates were blue pieces.
The opposition were red.
The entire flow of the match, every teammate, every opponent.
All of it, under his control.
That was the effect of the S-rank talent [God’s View], unlocked from the Peak Kevin De Bruyne player card.
And the reason his passing had suddenly jumped to another level?
The attribute he’d pulled from that same card.
Passing.
Which meant Leo Hale, right now, in this moment, had Peak Kevin De Bruyne’s vision and passing ability.
He kept his mouth shut, though.
The real answer ran through his head: Do I have to tell you I have a system?
“That kid who just came on.
His passing is lethal.” “A through ball like that.
Pure instinct.” “I’m calling it now.
I love this black-haired kid.” “What’s his name again?
Lin?
Ling?” The Leicester fans buzzed with excitement.
The rest of the squad crowded around the two of them, celebrating the goal.
Captain Wes Morgan clapped Leo on the back.
“Kid, congrats.
An assist on your debut.” The captain’s words hit him.
That was it.
His first touch of the ball, his first appearance for the senior squad.
And Leo had just registered his first competitive assist, pulling his team level.
And he’d only been on the pitch for three minutes.
It wasn’t Beckham’s halfway line strike or Owen’s solo run.
But wasn’t this its own kind of arrival?
The Leicester fans’ roar washed over him.
Leo let his eyes narrow, just a little, soaking it in.
This feeling.
Addictive.
On the touchline, Nigel Pearson and his assistant Steve Walsh hadn’t moved.
They were still stuck on that 60-yard through ball.
That pass sent Walsh’s mind back to a Champions League group stage match, Milan versus Real Madrid, back in the 02-03 season.
Milan’s number 10 had played a 60-yard killer through ball, setting up the number 7 striker for the only goal of the game.
“Steve, you saw that?” “You mean the through ball?” Pearson nodded.
“Your scouting report didn’t mention he could pass like that.” The whole goal looked simple on the surface.
One pass, one shot.
But Pearson and Walsh were professionals.
They saw the technical brilliance underneath.
To spot the passing lane in a split second.
To read a teammate’s run.
To deliver a ball that sliced through the entire defense and landed perfectly for the striker.
By their estimation, ninety-nine percent of professional players couldn’t play a through ball that lethal.
“Yeah.
Leo’s passing has always been decent.
Nothing like that, no penetration at all.” Pearson watched the black-haired kid on the pitch, looking completely unbothered.
“And did you notice?
He never looked up.
He made the decision the instant he got the ball.” Walsh’s eyebrows shot up.
“You’re saying he knew Jamie would make that run and be in that exact spot?” This was Leo’s first time with the senior squad.
He’d never trained with them, let alone memorized his teammates’ movement patterns.
Pearson and Walsh exchanged a look.
The same word rose in both their minds.
Genius.
“Did the kid’s brain just switch on?” “Let’s watch him a little more.
Could’ve been a fluke.” While Leicester’s camp buzzed with doubt and wonder, Stoke City’s manager Mark Hughes had processed Leo’s 60-yard miracle pass in his own way.
First, shock.
Then, a firm conclusion: fluke.
If his team hadn’t been pushed so high up, leaving the back exposed, there was no way that number 23 kid could’ve carved them open with one pass.
And if he could deliver balls like that consistently, Leicester would never have him on the bench wearing a number like 23.
So, yeah.
The black-haired Asian kid got lucky.
What nobody knew, what nobody could have guessed, was that Leo had startled himself too.
The weight.
The curve.
The timing and space.
The sense of his teammate’s run.
Most professional players couldn’t pull off a 60-yard ball like that.
And he’d done it so easily.
“The best attacking midfielder in the game right now.
KDB’s vision and passing are absolutely cracked.” For the first time, Leo truly understood the attributes he now possessed.
He could play the same kind of passes De Bruyne threaded into the mouths of his strikers.
And his teammates were Vardy and Mahrez.
Stars who’d tear the Premier League apart.
He looked up at the big screen.
One-one, with minutes left on the clock.
A wild thought surfaced in his mind.
Win this match.
With Vardy’s goal, it was one all.
Both teams back on level terms.
A few minutes of regular time remained.
Even with stoppage time, less than ten minutes.
Mark Hughes waved his arms forward, signaling his players to push up and attack.
The referee’s whistle blew.
The game restarted.
Stoke kept pressing, trying to batter down Leicester’s defense with long balls and aerial attacks.
Pearson, feeling his team’s surging morale, made his own call.
He threw his arms forward too.
Press high.
The players were all in.
Leicester, every man except the keeper, began swarming Stoke like a pack of relentless dogs, high pressing all over the pitch.
Even though this was Leo’s first time fighting alongside these teammates, he could anticipate their movement.
He could see the opposition’s positions and passing lanes.
Under that relentless pressure, Stoke’s players struggled to get the ball out.
Stoke’s nickname was known for aerial bombardment.
Traditional English route-one football was their strength.
But playing out from the back with the ball at their feet?
Not so much.
At the eighty-ninth minute, Leo read it.
He saw the pass Stoke’s defensive midfielder Steven Nzonzi was about to play and burst forward to intercept.
That stunning through ball was still fresh in everyone’s mind.
Stoke’s center-back and captain, Ryan Shawcross, sensed the danger.
He pointed at Leo and shouted.
“Don’t let him pass!” But just before the snarling midfielder could close him down, the corner of Leo’s mouth lifted.
He struck the ball with a disguised motion, his foot driving into the underside of it.
The ball rose, a perfect chip over the heads of Shawcross and the other center-back, Robert Huth, dropping toward the right side of Stoke’s penalty area.
And a blue shirt was already there, charging onto it.