Lommo held my gaze for two seconds longer than was comfortable.
The crooked grin stayed on his face, but his eyes narrowed slightly. He knew. Of course he knew. He’d played in the same side as me for three seasons; he knew when I was uncomfortable because my voice pitched up half an octave.
He didn’t call me out on it, though. He just let the lie hang in the cold air between us and die quietly.
"Your Josh said you wouldn’t show," Lommo said, shifting the clipboard to his other arm.
"I nearly didn’t."
"Well. You’re here now." He clicked his biro twice click, click and scribbled something illegible across the top margin of a wet sheet of paper clamped to his board. "You know what tonight is, then?"
"Yeah," I lied again. "Course."
I didn’t have a clue. I assumed it was a standard youth team training session.
"Good," Lommo said, gesturing with his chin toward the group of twenty trialists currently gathering near the penalty arc. "Get in with the older group when they finish this passing drill. Let’s see what’s left of those legs of yours."
My legs.
I looked down at my feet.
I was wearing an old grey pair of tracksuit bottoms from my warehouse days and a faded pair of size 13 street trainers with smooth rubber soles.
I had come up here assuming I was going to stand on the touchline in a coat, drink a brew, and offer a few tactical pointers about defensive spacing.
I hadn’t brought boots. I hadn’t played a competitive eleven-a-side match since I walked off the pitch at Beck Road seven years ago under an FA investigation.
"I’ve not brought boots, Lommo," I said, holding up a foot. "I’m in trainers."
"There’s a canvas bag of spares in the equipment shed behind the dugout," Lommo replied without missing a beat.
"Kian’s dad brings in old pairs from the local high school every pre-season. What size are you? A twelve?"
"Thirteen."
Lommo looked down at my feet, then looked back up at my face. "Then you’re playing in trainers, soft lad. Try not to fall over."
And right then, standing under the white glare of the floodlights with the smell of wet synthetic rubber in my nose, a cold realization hit me square in the chest, knocking the wind right out of me.
A Tier 7 non-league club in the Northern Premier League doesn’t have the budget to hire a dedicated defensive coach for its youth setup.
Ellerby Bridge Town probably didn’t even have the money to pay Lommo a proper wage; he was likely getting fifty quid a week for petrol money and a tracktop while balancing his own day job and a family at home.
He was out here at seven o’clock on a freezing Sunday night, holding a clipboard with a biro tied to it by string, single-handedly trying to organize twenty disorganized teenagers on a school pitch. And he had personally called my brother Josh to track down my private mobile number because he needed help.
He wasn’t testing me to see if I was worthy of a job. He was doing me a massive, unprompted favor.
He was opening a door for a man who had been locked out of football for seven years, giving me a way back in when nobody else in the country would have let me near a pitch.
I looked at his system card hovering over his bobble hat. I tried to expand it, focusing my mind on his name the same way I had done with Josh in my hallway the night before, reaching out mentally to see the rest of his numbers.
A bold red bar flashed across the bottom of his profile.
Attributes: [LOCKED]
Staff & Player profiles remain restricted until formally affiliated with your club.
Same rule as before. The System was rigid. In Touchline Manager, you couldn’t view full backroom staff analytical data for another club’s coaches unless they were contracted to your organization or you paid a scouting fee to generate a report.
"Right! Gather round!" Lommo shouted, blowing a short, piercing blast on his whistle PHWEET!
The twenty trialists stopped their drills immediately. Footballs were kicked toward the mesh fence, bouncing off the green wire with heavy thwack sounds, and the lads trotted over, their breathing loud and ragged under the lights.
They formed a semi-circle around Lommo. I stood half a step behind him, feeling six-foot-four and completely out of place in my street trainers.
As they gathered, the trialists weren’t standing there like silent video game models. They were whispering among themselves, casting wary, sideways glances at my trainers and my face.
"Who’s the big bloke?" Mason, the tall lad with gelled hair, murmured to the boy next to him.
"I know him," whispered a kid in a worn Blackburn Rovers jersey, wiping sweat off his chin. "My dad showed me a clip on YouTube. That’s Matt Kershaw. He used to play for Hallowfield."
"The fella who got banned?" Mason’s eyes widened slightly, his lip curling into a smirk. "The one who took cash for corners?"
"Aye. Got banned for seven years. My uncle said he works in a warehouse in Rochdale now."
"What’s he doing here then? Teaching us how to throw a game?"
Their hushed chatter sizzled across the group like electricity through a damp wire. These weren’t NPCs without thoughts they were young, competitive lads raised on internet rumors, football banter, and local gossip. They saw me not as some legendary mentor, but as a disgraced ex-pro who had blown his career for a quick payday.
Lommo tapped his clipboard hard with his biro tap, tap, tap.
"Pay attention!" Lommo barked, his voice instantly cutting through their murmurs. "We’ve got thirty minutes left before the school turns the floodlights off. We’re running a full half-pitch eleven-a-side scrimmage. Bibs versus no-bibs."
He began pointing at trialists, assigning teams. "Kian, bib. Rhys, no-bib. Mason, bib. Hursty, no-bib..."
As he called out names, I scanned the group. The tall kid with the gelled hair Mason was an attacking midfielder with Pace 134 and a flashy pair of bright orange boots. The gangly kid Hursty was a central defender wearing boots that were clearly a size too big, his ankles wobbling slightly on the artificial turf.
Lommo stopped at the end of his list, then turned slightly and gestured toward me with his clipboard.
"Some of you lot think you’re footballers because you’ve got five hundred followers on TikTok and a pair of hundred-quid boots," Lommo said, his voice dropping into a hard, stern tone. "So I’ve brought someone in to show you what actual defending looks like. This is Matt Kershaw."
He didn’t shy away from my name, and he didn’t pretend the room was blind.
"Matt played four seasons in League One," Lommo continued, looking around the circle of teenagers, his eyes locking onto Mason. "Proper League One. Beck Road. Four hundred senior appearances. He’s going to slot in at centre-back for the no-bibs team tonight."
Mason smirked openly, stepping forward half an inch. "Did you actually play in League One, mate? Or did you just sell corners for five grand a pop?"
A sudden, deadly silence fell over the semi-circle. Two of the younger trialists gasped, while the plasterer’s lad at the back let out a low whistle.
My jaw clenched tight. The blood rushed to my ears, hot and loud. Seven years of warehouse silence hadn’t prepared me for a sixteen-year-old kid calling me a cheat to my face under floodlights.
Lommo didn’t hesitate. He stepped straight into Mason’s space, his chest practically touching the kid’s chin, his wooden clipboard raised like a club.
"You say another word like that, Mason," Lommo growled, his Lancashire accent dropping an octave into pure ice, "and you can pack your bag right now. You won’t even make the bench for the reserves. Am I clear?"
Mason swallowed hard, the smirk instantly vanishing from his face as he backed down. "Yes, gaffer."
"Matt made a mistake seven years ago," Lommo said, turning his head to glare at every single boy in the circle.
"He paid for it. He served his time. And he knows more about defending in his pinky finger than any of you lot will ever learn in your entire lives. So you will show him some bloody respect. If I see anyone try a dirty slide-tackle on him, you’ll be running laps until half-term. It’s 3G turf. The last soft lad who tried a sliding challenge on this rubber crumb had no skin left on his thigh for a month."
A couple of the younger trialists swallowed nervously, looking down at their boots. Lommo glared at them until nobody dared make a sound.
"And another thing," Lommo added, pointing his biro straight at Mason’s chest.
"Anyone who tries a fancy nutmeg or a step-over against a bloke who’s played four hundred League One games will find themselves sitting on the bench for the rest of the trial. Am I clear?"
"Yes, gaffer," Mason muttered quietly.
"Right. Bibs on the left, no-bibs on the right. Kershaw, get yourself back into the penalty box. Let’s see if you can still head a ball without falling over."
I nodded, turning to walk toward the 18-yard box.
My heart was hammering against my ribs, a fast, rhythmic pounding that had nothing to do with physical exertion and everything to do with pure, unadulterated nerves. I hadn’t felt this exact sensation in seven years the cold, electric jolt that hits your chest right before you step over the touchline and onto the grass.
I looked over toward the perimeter fence.
The three parents were still standing there. The plasterer in the high-vis jacket was watching me with folded arms, his face set in a hard, skeptical scowl. The woman in the faded Hallowfield Town scarf nudged him, watching me take my position at centre-back.
They were waiting to see if I was a washed-up fraud. The kids were waiting to see if I was a push-over. Lommo was waiting to see if I still had the stomach for the fight.
I took my position at centre-back for the no-bibs, settling into the middle of the back line next to young Hursty.
My trainers felt thin and slippery on the rubber crumb, offering almost no traction compared to proper studs, but my posture instinctively changed. My chest broadened, my knees bent slightly, and my arms went out to the sides to feel for the space around me.
The System cards flickered above the heads of the trialists lined up across from me.
On the opposite side, Mason was bouncing on his toes at attacking midfield, glaring at me with something to prove. Next to him, Rhys Barlow was standing out on the left flank, his posture relaxed, his eyes scanning the pitch like a cold-blooded assassin.
Lommo stood on the touchline, the chrome whistle raised to his lips, his clipboard held ready in his left hand.
He caught my eye across the turf, gave me one final, sharp nod, and blew the whistle.
PHWEET!
The ball was kicked off, and seven years of isolation vanished in an instant.