Chapter 511 - 117 — Istanbul (I)

United took the free kick short. Demien received it, and rather than slow the game the way Galatasaray probably expected, he noticed Boey still recovering from the previous attack and sent a diagonal straight at Garnacho.

Garnacho brought it down and attacked immediately, Højlund moving between the center-backs. The cross came in. Muslera got there just ahead of

「MATCH MISSION PROGRESS」 「Clear Chances Created: 2/4」

Demien then took control of the tempo deliberately.

「LEGENDARY SKILL ACTIVATED」 「Toni Kroos — Metronome」

Maguire, back, switch left, receive again once Galatasaray shifted, into Bruno, moving again — the crowd starting to whistle in frustration as United simply refused to give them anything to react to.

United lost the ball elsewhere eventually, and Galatasaray attacked immediately. Demien turned and recovered, but Zaha had received wide enough that closing him would have meant abandoning the middle entirely. United’s fullback had to handle it alone, and the danger produced a free kick near the edge of the final third.

In the twenty-ninth minute, the foul came from another United player entirely, nothing to do with Demien directly, a mistimed challenge just outside the D that the referee pointed to immediately.

Ziyech stood over it, taking his time, rolling the ball once under his boot while Onana organized the wall.

"Jump on my call," Onana shouted at the four players lined up in front of him. "Wait for it!"

Demien took his position at the edge of the wall as instructed, angled to block the low, straight option rather than jump for anything overhead.

Ziyech ran up and struck it with the outside of his boot, bending it away from the wall instead of over it. The wall jumped a fraction late. Onana got a hand to it but only managed to push it further into the net rather than keep it out.

GALATASARAY 1 — 2 MANCHESTER UNITEDHakim Ziyech 29’

Onana slammed both hands against the turf once, then got back up before anyone could reach him.

"My fault, that one, not the wall’s," he said to Maguire, already resetting his line.

"Onana will be disappointed with that," the commentator said. "Good technique from Ziyech, but that’s a save he’d want on another night."

"He won’t dwell on it, though," the co-commentator replied. "Two-one, and United still control this. The concern for Galatasaray is that they’ve needed a moment of individual quality just to get back into a game they’re being outplayed in."

Demien didn’t add anything to it. His only reaction was internal, and brief.

Two goals up again.

He didn’t let it sit any longer than that.

The goal transformed the stadium completely, Galatasaray’s players restarting with real energy now, the crowd fully believing again.

Galatasaray pressed the very next United possession, sensing the shift. Torreira came at Demien again, Ndombélé arriving right behind him.

Demien refused the rushed clearance.

「TRAIT ACTIVATED」 「Press Resistant」

He turned away from Torreira, shielded through Ndombélé’s challenge, and found Shaw. United escaped before Galatasaray could turn their goal into another attack within seconds.

He demanded it back, slowed it down, moved Galatasaray left, then switched right — United holding the ball for a sustained stretch, actively killing the emotional surge rather than just hoping it faded on its own.

Galatasaray eventually won it back and went long immediately, a diagonal toward an isolated Zaha against Wan-Bissaka. Demien started recovering but didn’t sprint blindly at him — Mertens had drifted centrally into the exact space he’d have left behind.

Wan-Bissaka delayed. Maguire shifted across. The resulting effort was blocked, and Demien got to the second ball.

「MATCH MISSION PROGRESS」 「Midfield Recoveries: 3/5」

He sent United forward immediately.

His recovery found Bruno, who returned it once Galatasaray closed his forward lane. Demien turned with it — Garnacho already running behind Boey, Højlund cutting through the center, Antony available on the far side.

He carried a few meters, Torreira backing off rather than stepping and exposing the pass behind him.

Demien chose Højlund, a sharp vertical ball. Højlund got goal-side, but Muslera came out fast and beat him to it.

「MATCH MISSION PROGRESS」 「Line-Breaking Actions: 6/8」 「Clear Chances Created: 3/4」

No dramatic reaction to the missed chance — just another one created, another reset.

Galatasaray answered almost immediately, Boey driving forward, Ziyech finding space inside, Mertens moving between the lines. Demien tracked Mertens specifically, and Ziyech fed Zaha wide instead — attacking the zone Demien wasn’t occupying, the same idea working itself out through a different pair of feet.

Zaha shot. Maguire blocked it.

By the thirty-ninth minute, Galatasaray had stopped committing Torreira toward Demien altogether, dropping their midfield back several yards to concentrate on shutting down Bruno, Højlund and Garnacho instead.

For the first time all night, Demien received the ball outside the final third with nobody closing him down at all.

He took one touch forward. Still nobody stepped.

Another touch. Twenty-five yards out now, a defender clearly expecting the pass toward Bruno.

Demien set himself instead.

「TRAIT ACTIVATED」 「Long Shot Taker」

He struck it clean, right foot driven through the ball, dipping late as it closed in on goal. Muslera got across just in time, palming it up and over the bar rather than catching it, then scrambled to reset his footing as the corner came in behind him.

No goal. Torreira jogged back into position without looking at him, like it wasn’t worth discussing. Bruno did look, jogging past on his way to the corner. "Next time," he said.

"That’s the warning shot," the commentator said. "Galatasaray back off him, and he simply carries the ball twenty-five yards and hits the crossbar area. There’s no safe way to defend that man tonight."

The corner came to nothing, McTominay heading over. The system didn’t credit the shot as a created chance — he’d made that one entirely for himself.

Galatasaray nearly leveled it anyway in the forty-second minute, because football didn’t get controlled from one position on the pitch no matter how well that position was played.

Boey found time in his own half as United’s press pushed too far up to recover, and lifted a long diagonal over the top of the line. Icardi was already sprinting between the center-backs, timing his run to stay level rather than break early.

Demien saw it from midfield and turned immediately, sprinting back regardless of whether it would matter. "Step up, step up!" he shouted at Lindelöf, already suspecting it was too late.

There was nothing to intercept once the ball was sailing over his head.

Icardi got goal-side of both center-backs. Onana came off his line to close the angle down. Icardi took one touch around him and rolled it into the empty net.

"Icardi thinks he’s made it two-two," the commentator said, "and on another night, that’s exactly the kind of finish that changes a match completely."

The stadium exploded, a wall of noise breaking over the pitch all at once.

For a few seconds, United players froze, the shape of Copenhagen suddenly right there in front of them again — a two-goal lead, a goal conceded from almost nothing, the crowd tipping straight back toward belief.

"Flag, was there a flag?" Maguire shouted, already turning toward the touchline instead of walking back to the center circle.

Demien looked straight at the assistant referee rather than react to the noise around him.

Flag up.

The referee held the restart and pointed to his ear, sending it upstairs anyway.

United’s players stood in a loose group near the halfway line while the big screen ran the replay twice. Onana paced a small circle inside his box without speaking to anyone. Bruno stood with his hands on his hips, watching the screen rather than the crowd.

"That looked level to me," Højlund said quietly, mostly to himself.

The graphic drew its lines. Icardi’s studs sat a fraction ahead of Maguire’s, right at the moment Boey’s boot met the ball.

Offside. No goal.

"Marginal, but it’s there," the commentator said. "A relief for United, because that sequence had nothing to do with anything they were doing well tonight. Sometimes the difference between two-one and two-two really is a couple of inches."

Galatasaray’s celebration had already died, replaced by arms thrown up in complaint toward a linesman who wasn’t changing his mind. United hadn’t controlled that sequence at all. They’d simply been saved by inches.

Galatasaray kept pushing after the restart. Demien dropped several meters deeper for the final possessions of the half, intercepting one pass meant for Mertens.

「MATCH MISSION PROGRESS」 「Midfield Recoveries: 4/5」

Rather than counter immediately, he carried it toward the touchline and forced Galatasaray into either a foul or a retreat, running down what was left of the clock.

The referee blew for halftime.

Fweeeeeetttttttt!

"United go in ahead," the commentator said, "but Galatasaray will feel there’s a way back into this, and they’d point to that Icardi flag as proof of it. For United, though, this has been Walter’s half more than anyone’s — an assist, a goal Muslera had to save, and barely a moment where he wasn’t the man dictating what happened next."

"The question now," his co-commentator added, "is whether Galatasaray have found anything in that second half of the first forty-five that they can actually build on, or whether backing off him has just given him more room to do even more damage."

HALFTIME — GALATASARAY 1 — 2 MANCHESTER UNITED

「HALFTIME MISSION UPDATE」 「Goal Contributions: 1 Assist」 「Clear Chances Created: 3/4」 「Line-Breaking Actions: 6/8」 「Midfield Recoveries: 4/5」 「Pass Accuracy: 95%」 「TEAM OBJECTIVE: Manchester United Lead 2-1」

One of the best players on the pitch through forty-five minutes, and United were still only a single goal ahead.

Ten Hag kept his dressing-room analysis short.

"United were two-nil up in Copenhagen," he said. "We were two-nil up here too. This time there’s no red card to explain it away if it happens again — we’ve still got eleven men. That’s the only difference. Don’t waste it."

The analysts ran the clip that mattered most — Galatasaray no longer sending Torreira at Demien on every touch, their midfield backing off instead, protecting the passing lanes rather than the man.

The freeze-frame held on the screen.

Grass in front of Demien. Real space. The same space he’d used for the shot Muslera had barely kept out before the whistle.

He looked at it without saying anything.