At the end of the first half, inside the Spanish commentary booth, Barcelona legend Samuel Eto'o and former Barcelona player Xavi looked at all the Barcelona players as Xavi talked about the Leo Lin he had come to know in the national team.
"Many fans may think Lin has been incredible in this match, but I can tell you that this still isn't the same as the version I saw with the Spanish national team."
"He hasn't fully reached his peak yet. He still hasn't completely brought out everything he's capable of on the pitch."
"We once did a very interesting little test. A lot of players took part in it."
"At the time, we were testing the players' awareness. We wanted to see whether they knew, based on the area they were in, what they could do to help the team."
Eto'o nodded. They had come across this kind of test many times before.
"And do you know what the scariest part was?"
Just hearing Xavi say that, Eto'o already knew Leo Lin must have done something that had shocked him deeply.
Because with Xavi's ability on the pitch, this kind of test was far too easy for him.
In Barcelona's past assessments, Xavi had always been able to finish in the top three, sometimes even getting close to Messi.
"That was the first time I had ever seen a player create 62 chances from 26 different positions on the pitch, and every one of those chances had more than a 60 percent probability of leading to a goal."
"I sent his test results to a lot of seniors and a lot of coaches, and in the end, they all gave the same evaluation. This guy is terrifying, almost inhuman."
Even Eto'o was stunned when he heard that result.
Being able to create chances from more than twenty different positions, and think of around three good attacking opportunities from each position on average, made calling him inhuman sound completely reasonable.
"But those were test results under ideal conditions. In other words, that is what he could ultimately produce on the pitch under ideal conditions. So the current Leo Lin still has room to grow."
"That is what excites me the most. I want to watch him keep rising, keep improving, and keep playing until he finally grows into the most ideal version of himself."
"Of course, growing into your ideal form is very difficult. But he has Barnett, and he also has an excellent attitude, so I think he has a very good chance."
Xavi's words gave the fans in the live stream a new understanding of Leo Lin.
Eto'o sighed. Barcelona really had no way to overtake Liverpool in this match. Although the game was not over yet, the two teams in the final were probably already decided.
At this moment, Leo Lin was sitting on the bench, thinking back over the first half.
He had not heard what Xavi said in the commentary booth. There was no way he could have heard it. But he did think back to that kind of test he had taken with the Spanish national team. Then he began combining the attacking methods he had suddenly thought of in different positions with the memorable points he had left in different areas of the pitch during the first half.
Leo Lin began this process of self-integration, self-repair, self-reflection, and self-diagnosis, finding problems, removing them, and achieving further self-integration and improvement.
Even Leo Lin himself did not realize that he was once again making a leap in football IQ.
If football IQ could be tested like ordinary IQ, Leo Lin's score would probably have already broken through the universe.
The more he fused those memory points together, the clearer his footballing thoughts became. When he returned to the pitch in the second half and looked toward the other side, it no longer felt like he was looking at a football pitch. It was more like looking at one radar after another.
In his eyes, every radar could connect with the surrounding squares, or with radar points farther away, and all of those connections would eventually converge at the goal.
What Leo Lin did not notice was that every point on his system interface suddenly dropped to zero at that moment.
Immediately afterward, a brand-new template began to emerge, going from dim and lightless to gradually bursting with radiance.
Leo Lin did not notice. He was enjoying the feeling of this leap in football IQ and began throwing himself back into the match. Liverpool would still treat the second half seriously, right until the match truly ended.
Busquets could feel that Leo Lin was looking at him differently, as if he was no longer a person, but an object related to football.
Rakitic felt it too. He thought that look in Leo Lin's eyes was terrifying.
Leo Lin became silent. He simply observed everything around his body, then began receiving the ball and making runs. Every choice seemed unreasonable, yet somehow became unexpectedly reasonable.
It was unreasonable to the other players, but to Leo Lin, it was the most reasonable choice, because he could turn those runs and transitions into real attacks.
The 56th minute of the match.
"Why does Leo Lin's current state feel so strange to me?"
"Rodri plays a through ball. Leo Lin receives it. There are plenty of choices ahead of him."
Mané and Salah both had very clear opportunities to receive the ball. Even the fans could see them, so Leo Lin was not going to make that pass.
He only saw the square where Firmino was and another nearby square linking together. Then Leo Lin struck the ball, sending it toward the patch of grass far away from Firmino.
Firmino did not even react at first. Only on the second beat did he start sprinting, receive Leo Lin's pass, and then realize that Liverpool's attacking situation had suddenly opened up completely because of that pass.
Firmino immediately sent it left. When Mané received the ball, the defensive connection between Roberto and Lenglet had completely disappeared.
Mané could have chosen to pass to Firmino, and he could also have assisted Salah. But in the empty square beside Lenglet, Leo Lin appeared again and pointed toward Mané.
Mané passed immediately.
After receiving the ball, Leo Lin did not beat anyone, and he did not stop it either. He chose to shoot.
A beautiful left-footed strike smashed another goal into the net behind Ter Stegen.
"Leo Lin has scored!"
"Completely unexpected!"
"How does he always appear in positions you could never imagine, then turn them into goals?"
"I didn't even expect the pass to Firmino at the start, because I never saw that the ball could be played into that area."
"Leo Lin's pass allowed Firmino to escape the defense, and I didn't notice that final area either. I kept staring at Salah at the far post. Clearly, that should have been the best place to score from."
"I'm the one watching the live broadcast here. For a normal player, being able to see Salah at the far post would already mean his vision is broad enough, and that his footballing mind is clear enough."
"But how is Leo Lin seeing it even more clearly than I am?"
"This can't even be called a gap anymore, can it?"
"This is a tear across the universe, isn't it?"
...
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