Everton’s Finch Farm training ground.
Sitting just on outskirts of Liverpool, it had been the foundation of Everton’s youth setup for years.
The place had watched countless homegrown boys step off this ground and into professional football, Rooney himself had started on this very grass before dazzling all of English football.
Youth coach Lynn stood at the edge of the pitch, dressed in full training kit, a tactics whistle clutched in his hand.
On the pitch, ten boys of the right age were lined up warming up—shuttle runs, stretching, ball control drills, every movement was practiced and orderly in rhythm of a regular training session.
The car pulled into the facility’s car park.
The four of them got out and walked straight toward the training pitch, David was striding ahead the whole way, everything was already prepared in advance.
On the drive over, he’d already asked all the questions he needed: Dean had never touched proper football before and had no boots of his own; Ethan had spent years practicing privately and had his own set of old gear.
Even so, David had gone out of his way to make a special stop, buying each of them a brand-new pair of boots.
He pulled two new pairs out of his sports bag and held them out to the two brothers.
“Get changed.
Quickly.”
Ethan crouched down at once to change, his movements were skilful, his eyes had gone bright with excitement.
Dean bent down in silence, took the boots, and changed without a word.
Lynn, over at the edge of the pitch, noticed the group’s arrival, called a halt to training, and walked over.
His eyes swept over the two unfamiliar boys before settling on David.
“New trialists?
What’s the situation—position, level?
You were in such a rush, the players I called in are only about average.”
David nodded.
“That’ll do.”
He pointed at Ethan.
“This one’s played years of pickup football, mainly on the wing—he’s got real pace and dribbling underneath it.”
Then he looked at Dean and paused slightly.
“This one…
zero background, never really played a proper match…
I’ve only seen him play once.
Defender?
Maybe?”
Lynn’s eyebrows shot up at once, his eyes were full of disbelief.
A kid with zero football background, who’d never even touched a ball, coming in for an Everton academy trial?
It made no sense at all.
What was David playing at?
Before he could voice the question, Dalglish, standing nearby, suddenly spoke up.
“Put him in as a defensive midfielder.”
Lynn turned to look at Dalglish.
He hadn’t clocked him at first, but now his surprise only deepened.
Doubts started forming about who exactly this boy was.
What kind of family did this kid come from, that Dalglish himself had come along to an Everton academy trial?
Dalglish turned to Dean beside him.
Just watch the one midfielder on the other side, mark the man in your position, don’t let him get comfortable on the ball, don’t let him get comfortable playing it out.
Do that one thing well.
That’s all you need.”
Only then did Lynn find his opening, staring at Dalglish in disbelief.
“Kenny?
I had no idea you’d be coming down to Finch Farm.”
Dalglish gave a faint smile.
“Had nothing better to do.
Thought I’d come watch a trial.”
Lynn pushed down his own surprise and pressed on.
“Since you’re taking a personal interest, why not just bring these two promising lads to Liverpool’s academy instead?”
The moment those words landed, David stepped in at once, cutting him off with a laugh.
“Ha, no chance.
These are boys I dug up myself.
Their roots are at Everton.
Naturally, they’re our future.
There’s no way I’m handing them over to Liverpool.”
He reached out and clapped Lynn on the shoulder, hurrying him along.
“Right, right, enough chatting—get the trial sorted, quick.
I want this wrapped up early today, I’ve got a date with Jenny tonight, can’t be late for that.”
Lynn shrugged looking resigned.
He blew his whistle.
“Everyone, come over, we’re running a practice match.”
The boys warming up on the pitch all turned to look, staring with curiosity at the two unfamiliar faces on the sideline.
And Dalglish’s presence set off a wave of murmuring among them.
“Oh, that’s Kenny!”
“God, what’s he doing here?”
Dean felt a flicker of nerves.
He straightened up, feeling the new boots under his feet, the grass beneath them was startlingly real and present.
He still didn’t understand tactics.
Didn’t understand positions.
Didn’t understand what a defensive midfielder’s job even was.
He only remembered one line: don’t let your man get comfortable on the ball.
But, once the match actually began, Dean felt the enormous gap between a proper academy and a pickup game on some patch of grass.
The boys in Everton’s academy sides had spent years in structured training—their positioning, their ball protection, their transitions between attack and defence were all fully formed, professional patterns.
It was an entirely different dimension from street football.
Ethan pushed up on the wing, receiving his teammate’s first pass.
The downsides of years of pickup football exposed themselves instantly.
His first touch was slow, his adjustments were underfoot clumsy and excessive, there was no sense of shielding the ball or positioning his body.
The instant the ball was won, the other side launched straight into a counterattack—both wings were pushing forward, the middle was flooding in behind, the whole sequence was flowing smoothly.
The entire defensive line was ripped wide open in an instant.
Dean held tight to what he’d been told, sticking firmly to his marker.
He chased and covered with everything he had, but the gap left by having zero football background was plain to see.
His opponent kept switching—sudden stops, changes of direction, feints with his body and something as simple as a shift in weight was enough to throw off Dean’s read entirely, his footing were scrambling, his balance was sent flying.
He watched, helpless, as the man he was marking shook off his cover and slid a ball across, the gap in the middle laid completely bare, and the striker met it first time with a thundering strike.
In it went.
After that, the pace on the pitch kept climbing, the academy boys’ competitive edge was showing in full.
Since it was a trial, Ethan got a lot of the ball, his teammates were passing to him repeatedly, but every time he tried to take it forward, he was shut down and dispossessed with ease.
His whole wing was paralyzed, unable to build any real forward momentum.
Dean worked hard, tracking back over and over, but he could never quite keep pace with the proper academy rhythm of attack and defence.
The middle of the pitch kept getting sliced open by the other side, gap after gap was exposed at the back.
A few of the academy boys started letting their irritation show on their faces, passing to Ethan less and less, their attacking and defensive coordination was growing sloppier and more half-hearted, clearly unhappy about the two temporary new additions.
On the sideline, Lynn stood with his arms crossed, shaking his head over and over with forehead furrowed tight.
He turned to David beside him.
“This is the talented prospect you were talking about?
Rough pickup-football foundation, defends purely on brute strength, zero tactical awareness—he can’t keep up with the squad’s rhythm at all.”
David, for his part, still sounded confident.
“Give it a bit longer.
Dean’s never trained properly—that’s completely normal.”
Only Kenny Dalglish stood silent, his gaze was on Dean the whole time, refusing to jump to any conclusion.
A legend who had watched more players than anyone could count—he saw details that everyone else was overlooking.
Out on the pitch.
Dean kept running at full intensity the entire time, constantly correcting his defensive position.
Even after being caught out of position again and again, he never once stopped moving.
In one hurried midfield touch, the ball grazed the tip of his boot.
Three faint points of light suddenly flared to life in Dean’s field of vision, suspended somewhere deep in his sight.
The three beads hung arranged left, centre, right.
The one on the left, which had carried nothing but that single faint thread of blue, showed a fresh trace of blue now, at the exact instant the ball had brushed his foot.
Something clicked in his mind.
Understanding hit him all at once.
It was football!
The blue from before—football had caused it!
As the faint blue light surfaced, that same all-encompassing awareness swept over his entire body once more.
The whole layout of the pitch, the players’ running lines, the gaps and blind spots—it all seemed to spread out across his mind at once.
Who was pushing forward, who was dropping back, the direction his opponent’s next change of direction would take, where a pass would land.
Right now, all of it came with some faint, rough sense of prediction attached.
His ability to read the game, in this instant, was suddenly, boundlessly amplified.