The Ghost of Portugal

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Chapter 16 – Invisible Again

Sporting CP Academy, October 2014. Internal Showcase Week.

Rain slicked the pitch in waves as João jogged to the bench, warm-up bib crumpled in his hands.

He wasn't starting.

Not in this match. Not in the next.

Not in the three internal showcase games where Sporting scouts, agents, and youth technical directors lined the sidelines with clipboards and hard eyes.

Three games stand out—three games to show where you belonged in the system.

And João? João wasn't even in the system today.

He sat.

Fifteen minutes passed. He watched a teammate misplace a five-yard pass under no pressure.

The technical director scribbled something.

João's fingers twitched.

Not from nerves.

From rage.

Tiago stood nearby, arms crossed, jacket zipped up to the throat. He hadn't looked at João since the lineups dropped.

At halftime, João snapped.

He walked straight to him.

"You said I'd get minutes."

Tiago didn't blink. "Not this game."

"I'm fit. I've been tracking at the top of every metric all month. They know it. You know it."

"I do."

"Then why the bench?"

Tiago turned to him. Voice cold. "Because the other boys have agents who scream louder than you. Because you don't play politics. Because you don't smile when the technical director walks past. And because they don't know what to do with someone who sees the pitch like you do."

João's jaw locked.

"So I'm too good to play?"

"You're too dangerous to manage."

He walked away before João could speak.

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Second half.

João didn't sit. He stood by the technical area, arms folded, bib off, boots laced, staring daggers at the match.

The midfielder ahead of him misread three lines of play. The pivot kept turning into traffic.

João called every mistake in his head a second before it happened.

He knew the rhythm. The problem. The tempo.

The coaches didn't even glance at him.

Boa Morte sat silently in the upper rows, arms crossed. Watching.

Not the game.

João.

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That night, João skipped dinner.

He sat in the boot room, alone, lacing and unlacing his Mercurials. Dirt was still caked in the studs. His body buzzed with energy he couldn't burn.

Tiago found him there. Tossed a wrapped protein bar onto the bench.

"You think you're the only one who's been ghosted?"

João didn't look up.

"When I was sixteen," Tiago said, "I was benched for three straight months. Didn't say a word. Trained harder. Shut my mouth. Thought I'd get my shot."

He shrugged. "Didn't come."

João glanced sideways.

"What happened?"

Tiago smirked.

"I left. Got chewed up in Greece. Burned out in Turkey. Came home broken at 24."

João's eyes sharpened.

"That's not going to be me."

"No," Tiago said. "Because you're not going to wait for the system to pick you."

"You're going to force their hand."

João looked down at his boots. Then at the pitch outside, glowing under the stadium lights.

One more chance. That was all he needed.

He wouldn't be invisible much longer.

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