God Of football

Chapter 957: Anfield Has Fallen!

Izan walked over to the corner, eyes flicking once toward the box, after he got there, before seemingly changing his mind about something.

Rice stepped closer a moment later, exchanging a curt nod with Izan, who passed the ball to the former as the Liverpool players came forward, before receiving it in space.

"Interesting," the commentator said, voice dipping in anticipation.

"Very interesting choice."

Izan took the return pass and paused, just long enough for Mac Allister to shift his feet.

A small feint followed, shoulders dipping toward the box, and then Izan spun the other way, darting toward the byline.

Mac Allister reacted quickly, sliding across his path, but Izan pushed the ball one way and slipped around him on the other, reclaiming it a step from the chalk.

A ripple of noise rose as he planted his right foot and shielded the ball, body low, back slightly hunched.

Salah hovered nearby, arms out, waiting for a mistake, while Wirtz was also closing the space from the inside.

The commentary grew louder, faster, words stacking on top of each other, before they could fully think it.

"He’s still got it. He’s still got it. You’re thinking he has to pass from there, surely?"

Izan continued, rolling the ball under his sole before shifting it half a yard, where he felt the pressure brush against him.

A hand came across his shoulder while another body leaned in.

For a split second, he lost his balance, boot skidding as he began to fall.

But then he hit it.

From the tightest of angles, almost no room to work with, Izan wrapped his foot around the ball and sent it curling high toward the far side.

The strike was instinctive, desperate and beautiful.

It arced over Alisson’s shoulder, kissed the inside of the top corner, and dropped in.

For a heartbeat, the little world at Anfield froze as the Arsenal end erupted.

Izan pushed himself up from the turf, fists clenching, mouth open as he turned to celebrate.

He had taken two steps before the sound cut through everything.

A whistle to pause all things.

The noise fractured as cheers turned to confusion, then anger.

Izan stopped dead, face twisting into confusion.

He turned back toward the referee, hands out slightly, palms open.

"What?" he said, breathless, more questioningly than angry. "Come on. What now?"

The commentator’s tone shifted, suddenly analytical.

"Hang on. The referee has spotted something here. Look at Izan’s arm. There. As he shields the ball."

The replay flashed up on the screen where Izan’s forearm came up as Wirtz pressed in, the contact brief but clear enough, and Wirtz was already on the ground with Salah nearby, gesturing toward his face.

The referee pointed decisively, shaking his head.

"Free kick," the commentator continued. "He’s judged that Izan has used his arm there. No goal."

The boos poured down from the away end, raw and relentless, while Izan stood still for a moment, jaw tight, eyes locked on the official.

He shook his head once, then twice, lips pressed together.

No more words came.

He turned away, jogging back toward his half as the decision settled in, while Alisson waited patiently as the ball was handed to him, giving his mates room to breathe and settle before the game continued.

He bounced it once afterwards before setting it down.

Then, he glanced upfield, and without ceremony, drove it long and hard back toward the centre of the pitch where play moved on.

The clock slipped into the thirtieth minute, and even Martin Tyler’s successor cadence could not hide the tension creeping into the game.

Peter Drury let out a soft sigh, carrying over the broadcast.

"Half an hour gone," he said, voice steady but thoughtful. "Let me bring you in here. What are you seeing?"

Beside him, the analyst shook his head slowly, eyes never leaving the pitch.

"Honestly? Liverpool have been lucky. Very lucky."

Drury glanced sideways, inviting more.

"Explain that."

The timing was perfect.

Alisson had just raced off his line to smother a sharp pass slid through by Izan, one that Madueke had chased with everything he had but arrived a step too late.

The goalkeeper wrapped the ball into his chest and went to ground, the Kop exhaling in relief.

"There," the analyst continued. "That’s another one. Arsenal are carving them open. On another day, this is already two or three."

Drury nodded, following the movement as Alisson rolled the ball away.

"Break it down for us, will you, Steve?"

"It starts with the save earlier," the analyst said. "That header. It should have been the opener. Then, Izan’s goal that gets chalked off. Marginal call, but still. And now the offside a moment ago. Arsenal keep finding answers, but something keeps getting in the way."

"Fine margins," Drury replied, eyes back on the pitch. "Thank you."

He shifted gears smoothly, his voice lifting as Arsenal worked the ball again.

From left to right it went, patiently at first, then quicker as Liverpool’s shape bent and stretched, red shirts sliding across the grass in unison, trying to keep the gaps closed.

"Arsenal probing here once more," Drury narrated. "Pulling Liverpool side to side and hoping that something breaks."

When that "something did", Rice had the ball in hand, and he spotted it.

He stepped into the ball and fired a precise pass into Gyökeres, who had positioned himself perfectly between the lines.

Konaté was tight to his back, arms braced, ready for the duel.

The latter absorbed the contact, leaned back into the striker, and timed his jump.

He met the ball cleanly, neck muscles straining as he guided the header down, but it did not reach its intended target.

Instead, it dropped invitingly at Izan’s feet.

A low whistle swept around Anfield as Izan cushioned the ball on his laces, killed its bounce, and then, without looking, flicked it up and over Gravenberch’s outstretched leg.

"Oh," Drury breathed as Gravenberch spun, wrong-footed, and Izan was already moving.

His body leaned left, selling the feint, shoulders dipping as if to drive into that channel and once again Gravenberch bit.

And with that, Izan snapped back the other way, the change of direction so sharp it drew another wave of noise from the stands.

"That is lovely," the analyst muttered, barely audible beneath the crowd.

Izan opened his body and slid a delicate trivela pass out wide, the outside of his boot wrapping the ball perfectly into Madueke’s path.

And when he found the ball, Madueke did not hesitate.

He drove just a few metres toward the byline and smashed a low cross across the face of the goal.

Gyokeres stepped into it, looking to get a touch or a toe poke, but a red shirt flew in and clipped the ball away.

It popped up and dropped just outside the box, and Izan was there again.

He chested it down calmly, a few metres from the penalty area, eyes already scanning.

The defenders rushed out, legs pumping, arms flailing and desperate to close down the Arsenal player, and as he shaped to cross, Mac Allister reacted instantly, throwing himself into the lane, feet leaving the ground while trying to block what he thought was coming.

Izan pulled the ball back at the last second, the commentary pulling back with him before, "Oh, he’s wound it up," Drury shouted while Izan drew his legs back, body coiled.

In that space of a second, Virgil Van Dijk reacted a bit quicker, and his body moved instantly.

"Not again," he muttered under his breath as he stepped across Izan’s body, long stride cutting the angle, timing the block the way he had done a thousand times before.

For a moment, it looked right.

The shooting lane was gone, and the space had closed, but then Izan clipped the ball back again, like he had been waiting for just that moment.

Van Dijk’s leg swept through nothing but air, the sound of it almost audible in the sudden gasp that rolled around Anfield as Izan slipped past him in the same motion, the ball glued to his foot while he made his way into the box, calm where everyone else was scrambling.

It became clear then.

He had never planned to shoot before.

Alisson set himself, weight on his toes, reading the body shape.

Izan leaned right, selling the near-post effort, forcing the keeper to shift, but then a heartbeat later, he opened his foot and placed it.

The ball bent across the face of goal, kissing the grass as it travelled, curling toward the far corner with a quiet certainty that felt cruel in its confidence.

Alisson stretched, full length, fingertips clawing at empty space, but all he heard behind him was the sound of the ball climbing the net as the Arsenal end erupted in one violent release of noise.

Red and white bodies jumped, arms thrown skyward, voices colliding into one raw sound as Peter Drury found his breath in the chaos.

"Oh, that is astonishing," he cried. "Absolutely astonishing. He invites them in, he draws the giants toward him, and then he slips through the crack like it was always meant to be there."

Izan turned slowly, almost deliberately, toward the away section, the roar crashing into him.

His face was calm as he raised a finger to his lips, then brought both hands down in front of him, palms flat, pressing the air.

Calma.

The gesture only made them sound louder as his mates crashed into him from the sides.

"Listen to that," Drury continued, voice rising with the moment.

"Anfield, ain’t got nothing on that ball. He is magical!"

Behind him, Liverpool players stood still for a moment.

Van Dijk straightened up, hands on his hips, eyes following Izan as he jogged back toward the halfway line.

The resistance had finally cracked.