The grass on Pitch 4 had dried out under the morning heat, turning stiff and abrasive where the sprinklers hadn’t reached.
Alejandro stood near the center circle, tracing the edge of his white training cone with the toe of his boot.
Beneath his thick navy sock, the zinc oxide tape pulled tight against the raw blister, a sharp, stinging reminder of yesterday’s rough session.
Davies blew his whistle twice.
“Two-touch rondo!
Five in the middle, outer ring keeps the ball low!”
The drill started immediately.
Harrison clipped a sharp pass across the circle.
Alejandro moved to meet it, but his mind lagged half a second behind his legs.
He misjudged the pace on the dry turf, letting the ball bounce awkwardly off his instep and roll past his standing foot out of bounds.
“Focus, Jesse!” Davies snapped, standing by the touchline with his hands tucked into his tracksuit pockets.
“If you can’t control a simple ten-yard pass on flat ground, you might as well board that two o’clock plane right now.”
Alejandro wiped the sweat from his eyebrow with the back of his sleeve, jogged to retrieve the ball, and threw it back to the middle.
His phone was sitting under a dry towel on the bench twenty yards away.
Every time a delivery truck shifted gears on the main avenue beyond the perimeter wall, his head turned automatically toward the bench.
By 9:18 AM Lisbon time—10:18 AM in London—a series of rapid vibrations rattled against the wooden bench.
Alejandro didn’t wait for Davies’s signal.
He walked off the grid, grabbed the towel, and flipped his phone over.
Three notifications sat on the screen from David, sent thirty seconds apart:
David: Estate agent found an old desktop flatbed scanner in the back storeroom.
David: Clean PDF generated.
No sun flare over the witness clause.
David: Uploaded directly to the FA intake queue at 10:14 UK time.
Alejandro stared at the timestamps.
10:14 AM UK time meant the document had hit the queue with exactly sixteen minutes remaining before Corrigan’s hard deadline.
He looked up toward the far corner of the facility.
James Corrigan was standing beside the silver Mercedes parked near the gates, holding his phone against his left ear with his shoulder while leaning down to sign a paper clipboard held by the Sporting legal representative.
The legal representative checked his wrist watch, tapped the screen of his tablet, and handed Corrigan a heavy yellow manila folder.
Corrigan didn’t smile.
He didn’t wave or gesture toward Pitch 4.
He simply slid the folder under his arm, stepped back into the passenger seat of the sedan, and pulled the door shut.
The Mercedes reversed down the gravel driveway and disappeared through the main iron gates.
Davies blew his whistle to end the passing drill at 9:32 AM.
The players walked over to the bench to grab their water bottles.
Harrison sat on the grass, unlacing his boots while watching Alejandro, who remained standing by the fence with his phone clutched in his right hand.
Davies walked over, pulling a folded white slip of paper from his pocket and tossing it onto the wooden bench next to Alejandro’s towel.
“FA transfer ledger updated at ten-twenty-eight London time,” Davies said, his tone dry and entirely devoid of fanfare.
“Solihull’s objection is officially cleared.
International Transfer Certificate is stamped.”
Alejandro took a slow breath, his chest rising as he stared at the paper slip.
“So the clearance is valid?”
“The clearance is valid,” Davies replied, reaching for his own paper coffee cup.
“Which means Sporting’s board accepted the registration file for the U19 regional tournament.”
He paused, taking a sip before continuing.
“However, Corrigan didn’t get them to waive the performance clause.
The preliminary contract they drafted is a six-month non-guaranteed scholar agreement.
You get a bed in the academy dormitory, three meals a day, and a match-day stipend.
If you don’t break into the starting eleven for the U19 regional group by November, the release clause triggers automatically.”
Alejandro looked down at his feet.
The skin on his right toe throbbed where the tape had rubbed against the inner lining of his shoe.
He had passed the administrative trial, cleared the legal hurdle, and secured a spot in the building—but there was no signing bonus, no multi-year stability, and no promise of a professional contract.
He had simply bought himself six months on a dry pitch five hundred miles away from home.
His phone buzzed again in his palm.
It was a text from David:
David: Estate agent charged me four quid for using his scanner.
David: I told him you’d pay him back when you get your first match check.
David: Don’t ruin those new boots Davies gave you.
Alejandro sat down on the edge of the wooden bench, his thumb hovering over the keypad as he typed back:
Alejandro: The contract is only six months.
Alejandro: Non-guaranteed.
The reply from South London came back within ten seconds:
David: Six months is enough time to show them who you are.
David: Call your sister tonight.
She thinks you’re still in London.
Alejandro closed the messaging app, slipping the phone back into his pocket.
He unlaced Harrison’s oversized boots, pulled his feet free, and stripped away the greyed zinc oxide tape from his right toe.
The raw skin beneath was tender, but the bleeding had stopped.
Harrison leaned over, tossing a clean pair of dry cotton socks onto Alejandro’s lap.
“You staying or going?” Harrison asked quietly.
“I’m staying,” Alejandro said, pulling the dry sock over his right foot.
“Good,” Harrison said, standing up and slinging his sports bag over his shoulder.
“Because the dormitory food in Lisbon is terrible, and you’re going to need someone to translate the dinner menu.”
Davies walked past the bench toward the administration building, his clipboard tucked tightly under his arm.
He didn’t look back, but as he reached the metal gate, he called out over his shoulder without stopping:
“Evening session starts at four o’clock sharp, Jesse.
Don’t be late.”
Alejandro stood up on the dry grass, the cool morning breeze catching the hem of his navy tracksuit jacket.
The blue gates of Pitch 4 remained wide open behind him, leading out toward the concrete dormitory blocks standing tall against the horizon.