"Hmph. The kid's got a decent personality, at least. Already blending in."
Daniel, the team manager, stood at the edge of the grass with Head Coach Montella, watching Renzo Uzumaki exchange laughs with the veterans. Daniel was trying his hardest to find a silver lining in what looked like a disastrous winter window. If he couldn't sell the kid's talent, he'd sell his charisma.
"I hope his social skills aren't his only contribution," Montella muttered.
The coach still held a flickering candle of hope for the boy. He came from an English academy; surely, he had some physical bite? But as his assistant handed over the fresh medical report, that candle was snuffed out by a cold draft of reality.
Montella scanned the pages and sighed, shaking his head. "I thought a product of the English system would at least be a physical specimen. I was overthinking it."
Daniel leaned in to look. Ren stood at 1.86 meters and weighed 80 kilograms—a solid, imposing frame for a midfielder. On paper, he looked like a tank. But the data told a different story. His raw strength was "average." His explosiveness and top speed? Even less impressive.
Montella felt a weight settle in his gut. He had prepared for the worst—a boy with no professional experience—but he had hoped for a "utility" player. If the kid was a physical beast, Montella could have molded him into a midfield destroyer, a blunt instrument to provide defensive toughness while the team lacked a creator.
But this? A player with no professional experience and mediocre physicals? In the tactical, grinding world of Serie A, a player like that was a liability. He wouldn't even be able to shield the defense.
"Ren! Come over here," Montella called out, his voice weary. "It's your first day. You seem to have made friends already, so let's skip the pleasantries and get you into the drills."
The coach just wanted to see him move. Maybe the data was wrong. Maybe "fate" would intervene.
"Coach! Ren hasn't shown us his 'specialty' yet!"
The voice belonged to Juan Cuadrado. The Colombian winger had a habit of speaking before his brain caught up, and his words instantly turned the air on the training ground to ice.
At Fiorentina, the "Specialty Showcase" was a tradition. When a new player arrived, they had to demonstrate their best individual skill. Salah had recently wowed the squad by leaving the defenders in his dust with a burst of pure, terrifying speed. It was a way for the veterans to size up the newcomer. If the kid was good, he earned respect; if he was mediocre, he became the butt of a few jokes that broke the ice.
But today, the joke wasn't funny. The team was reeling from the loss of Borja Valero, their midfield heartbeat. The fans were furious, and the manager was drowning. Asking a sixteen-year-old "nobody" to show off now wasn't ice-breaking—it was rubbing salt into a gaping tactical wound.
Cuadrado felt the sudden shift in temperature. He looked at Captain Pasqual. "Did I say something wrong?"
Pasqual rolled his eyes. "What do you think, Juan? You just opened the one door we were trying to keep locked."
Montella glared at Cuadrado, ready to dismiss the idea and move on, but Renzo Uzumaki spoke up before he could intervene.
"A specialty?" Ren asked, his expression neutral. "Someone mentioned that earlier. I suppose it's my passing. Specifically... short passing."
The silence that followed was deafening.
Training Ground No. 1 wasn't just any pitch; it was the dedicated zone for technical passing drills. Montella was a disciple of the ground-game, a man who demanded his players treat the ball like fine china. Short passing was the very foundation of his philosophy—and it was the specific throne that Borja Valero had sat upon.
For Renzo Uzumaki to claim "short passing" as his crown was a bold move. It was practically an invitation to be judged by the highest standards in Italy. What made it worse was that the specialized passing equipment—the narrow targets and rebound boards—was standing right behind them, practically daring him to try.
Montella shook his head. He had wanted the boy to stay under the radar, to avoid being the target of the veterans' cynicism. But the gauntlet had been thrown.
Fine, Montella thought. Let him fail now and get it over with.
The coach didn't believe a word of it. A sixteen-year-old rookie boasting about his passing in a league defined by its tactical maestros? It was laughable. If the kid could even match the average level of the current squad, Montella would consider it a miracle.
"The equipment is right there, Ren," Montella said, gesturing toward the targets. "Show us this 'specialty' of yours."