The rest of the training session was very hectic. Given that we only had a couple of days to prepare for our first match of the season. It was a Champions League qualifying match against RB Salzburg from Austria. Although we had preseason to work on fitness and other things, we still needed to finetune our tactics before we travelled to Austria and played against Salzburg.
It was a big match, and the stakes involved was quite evident from the way everyone trained. From the coach to the players, including myself, you could see that we were preparing for something big.
Eventually, the training session came to an end and once again, the coach called everyone together and addressed them again. The match against RB Salzburg was a big match, and for most of us on the team, the biggest match we'd ever play in our careers so far. It was important for him to motivate us and make sure that we had the right mentality to win.
For me however, mentality wasn't a problem. I came up the ranks at Ajax's academy and from a young age, we'd been taught to win. There wasn't anything like "it doesn't matter if you win or not, what mattered is that you tried your best". We weren't taught to think like that, instead we were taught that it doesn't matter if we tried our best or not as long as we didn't win.
As such, every match that I'd ever played so far, I approached it with a winning mentality, and this match wasn't going to be any different.
After Joseph finished addressing us, everyone gradually went their separate ways. I walked all the way back to my apartment, and as soon as I got inside, I ordered quite a lot of food to eat and went to the living room, facing my television set.
As soon as I turned it on, it started playing a match, between RB Salzburg and Wolves, a random game during preseason, but it was still worth watching. So far during preseason, and during the training sessions, I was playing as an eight which was dare I say the most important position in the midfield. I was the orchestrator, the controller responsible for setting the tempo of the match. Responsible for progressing the ball from defense to attack while still being expected to create chances and help out defensively. I had it all to do.
Because of that, my preparation for matchdays involved a lot more than what the average player would do. One of the things I liked to do was to watch several matches of the oppositions, particularly observing their midfield and how they played, how they progressed the ball, how they settled themselves off the ball and all that.
Usually, we had match analysts employed to do that for us, but these type of things just felt a lot better when I was doing them by myself.
I spent quite a few hours watching the games, taking note of the midfield strengths and weaknesses. I had a notebook beside me where I wrote down anything that I managed to observe. In the end I fell asleep while watching the matches.
The next day, I was woken up by the alarm on my phone. Seeing as I fell asleep on the couch in the living room, my body felt a little bit sore as I slowly climbed out of the couch and made my way to the toilet after stretching my body a little bit.
My mornings were pretty much routine at this point. After I finished showering and brushing my teeth, I walked down to FC Twente's training ground. This time, I didn't have to flash my identification to the security guards before they let me in. Turns out that they managed to recognize me this time around.
As soon as I went into the facilities, I immediately went to check in with the club staff. They asked me basic questions to check on me and I told them I felt a little sore due to how I fell asleep the day before. After reprimanding me a little bit, they allowed me go and join the rest of the team in the breakfast room.
Just like the previous day, the atmosphere during breakfast was very good. Everyone joked around with each other, casually laughing and bantering.
"I wonder if I'm going to start tomorrow". I muttered to Harrie who was sat beside me, as I put a spoonful of my meal inside my mouth.
"I think you would". Harrie replied. "Joseph hasn't exactly been hiding how much he likes you. I'm the one that should be worried about whether I'm starting or not".
My lips twitched when I heard Harrie's last sentence as I tried my best not to laugh. It wasn't like I was being a bad person or I didn't believe in him or anything like that. In fact, it was the complete opposite. Harrie was one of the best midfield prospects in the academy at the moment. I believed his debut for the first team was a matter of when rather than if. It was just that him playing, not to talk of starting in the match was unlikely. He just came back from a knock and the next match was a champions league qualifier match.
"You were going to laugh, weren't you". It seemed like my brief moment of laughter didn't go unnoticed by Harrie.
"I wasn't". I answered with a straight face. I had already recovered from my brief moment of amusement and was now keeping a poker face.
"Just know I'm tel-"
Harrie couldn't finish his sentence, he was interrupted by one of the assistant coaches who clapped his fingers twice.
"Alright boys, hurry up and finish eating so you can get checked up and we can start training!" The coach shouted, "Salzburg aren't going to play themselves and more importantly, they aren't going to beat themselves!"
After the assistant coach finished talking, Harrie and I sped up the rate at which we ate. We really did need to do a lot of work if we were to beat Salzburg. We were the underdogs after all.