He opened the shop on his phone, away from the table, and bought it.

[SKILL PURCHASED]

Training Manual: Development Pathway

Cost: 600 Skill Points

Skill Points Balance: 1550 → 950

[SKILL ACQUIRED]

Training Manual: Development Pathway

Rank: E Effect: Generates a limited development pathway for a signed G11 client based on current player profile, position, key weakness, and recent match data.

Limitations:

— Only works on signed G11 clients.

— Requires an existing Golden Eye scan or unlocked Client Profile.

— Generates no more than three priority training areas.

— Does not replace a qualified coach.

— Does not create medical, nutrition, gym-load, or injury-management plans.

— Cannot guarantee improvement.

— Updates only after new match data, training review, or system-recognised performance change.

It was not a flashy purchase. It was the practical one. He had a signed client and a real week to prepare for, and that was the only reason the skill would even open, because Jamie was a G11 player now with an unlocked profile behind his name.

It did not turn Garcia into a coach. He read the limitations and made sure he remembered that.

The plan it built was short.

It did not hand him a full professional syllabus. It gave him a seven-day focus and nothing more, the few things that mattered most before Tranmere’s staff put Jamie in front of them.

[TRAINING MANUAL ACTIVATED]

Client: Jamie Holt Position: Right Back Preparation Window: 7 Days Context: League Two academy trial-training assessment

Priority Focus:

First touch after defensive recovery

Body shape before receiving under pressure

Early low delivery or forward pass after overlap

Warning:

— Do not overload player before trial week.

— Do not add new technical habits too late unless they support existing strengths.

— Maintain recovery and confidence.

Garcia read the warning twice and agreed with it.

One week could not rebuild Jamie. It was not supposed to. The job was to make sure Tranmere saw the same player Northgate had seen, while shaving down the one weakness that could end the week before it started.

He closed the panel.

He stepped outside to the car to make the call, the late afternoon cool after the warm kitchen, and Rafi picked up on the third ring.

"He signed, then," Rafi said. Not a question.

"He signed. And we’ve got a week."

There was a pause, and then the complaint, because there was always the complaint first.

"A week. For what. I’m not a magician. You can’t hand me a sixteen-year-old and a calendar and—"

"It’s not a rebuild," Garcia said. "It’s sharp, not brutal. One club. A proper one. They want a full week with their academy and an internal match at the end."

The grumbling stopped.

"Which club," Rafi said. "What are they testing."

"Tranmere. They named his recovery and how he held up under pressure, so that’s what they’ll come back to." Garcia leaned against the car. "I need him comfortable receiving after he’s just recovered. Playing forward quicker once he’s won it. And getting the ball in low and early when he overlaps. That’s it. Those three."

"Receiving after recovery, forward quicker, low when he overlaps." Rafi repeated it flat, the way he did when he was already building the week in his head. "Right. A week’s not enough to rebuild a player."

"I know."

"But it’s enough to stop him walking in cold," Rafi said. "Bring him Monday. Early."

Back inside, Jamie was still on it.

"Why not Walsall, though." He tried to make it sound calm, and mostly managed, but it was eating at him. "It’s a bigger club. If I do well there—"

"If you do well there, in front of staff who already think you’re a spare body, you walk out and nobody writes your name down," Garcia said. He did not mock him for it. "Wanting the bigger badge is normal. I’d want it too, at your age, after what Millwall did. But the badge means nothing if they’re not actually curious about you. Tranmere is. That’s worth more than the name on the gate."

Jamie looked at the table.

Across from him, Alan watched the whole exchange without a word, and Garcia knew exactly what the man was checking. He was watching to see whether his agent flattered his son or told him the truth.

This was the truth. Alan let it land and said nothing, which was its own kind of approval.

"I’m saying Tranmere," Garcia said. "The club that watched you and asked for a real week. That’s the first route."

Alan turned to his son. "Can you take that? Properly. Not just nod."

Jamie did not answer at once.

Part of him was still up at the top of the screen with the bigger name, and Garcia could see him fighting it. Then he let a breath out through his nose.

"Yeah," he said. "Tranmere."

"We’re not throwing the other two away forever," Garcia added. "You can only do one trial week at a time. You’ve got one body and one shot at a first impression. We spend it where someone’s already paying attention."

Jamie nodded again, and this time it reached his shoulders.

Garcia wrote the reply himself, and he wrote it like an agency, not like a man who was grateful to be noticed.

He sent it through the proper route, copying Alan because Jamie was a minor, and confirmed that Jamie would attend the one-week trial-training block.

Then he asked for everything a real youth trial needed, so they could see he knew it was more than turn up and play. The schedule. The reporting time and location. A named staff contact. Kit requirements. The safeguarding arrangements for a sixteen-year-old. And whether the internal match would close out the Friday, so they could prepare him for it properly.

He read it back once.

It was clean. It was professional. It did not promise a thing it could not deliver.

He clicked send.

The room stayed quiet for a second, because the choice was made now and there was no taking it back. One door picked. Two left shut for later.

Jamie stared at the screen where the email had gone, and then he asked the thing he had been holding in since the names first appeared.

"What if they say no?"

Garcia looked at the sent message, then back at the boy.

"Then we make sure the next one doesn’t."