Chapter 823: Break
***7th November 2021***
Everton hosted Tottenham at Goodison Park, Liverpool for Conte’s first match in the premier league and the fans of the two sides were looking forward to the game as the two clubs were only one point away from each other.
Tottenham had 15 points after 10 games while Everton was right behind them with 14 points.
If Everton managed to beat Tottenham, then they would rise above them on the table while if Tottenham won, they would climb back to the 6th position on the table, just a little away from getting back in the top 4.
With both sides having it all to play for in this game, the game was filled with attacking football right from the off.
Everton looked brilliant on the attack and tried to make use of the flanks where they outnumbered the Tottenham players, however despite not being used to their new shape and tactics they managed to stay solid enough to keep Everton from getting easy shots at goal.
That didn’t stop the Everton players from trying though and every so often their brilliant winging pair of Demarai Gray and Antony Gordon would break away on the flanks, causing problems for the Tottenham defense.
On the attack, Tottenham was a bit quieter as Son and Moura hadn’t yet gotten the right balance between helping out in the middle of the pitch and supporting the attacks from up front as well and this reduced their attacking impact, but they still managed to put on an impressive performance.
At the end of the game, the two sides only managed to cancel each other out and neither side managed to score.
With Tottenham not even having one shot on target despite having 8 attempts and Everton only having 2 of their 12 attempts on target, it couldn’t be helped that neither team managed to score.
However the fans of neither side were too disappointed with the results as the two sides had looked pretty solid and entertained the fans with their play.
Thus Antonio Conte recorded his first game and first draw with his new team.
The London newspapers quickly got to work, reporting on the match in detail.
*New manager debut ends in a draw. Fan opinion still inconclusive*
*Tottenham end losing streak under new manager and secure first draw of the season*
Some articles were on the more pessimistic side as well.
*Premier League champion manager only manages to secure draw with Tottenham. Is winning still far off?*
The Tottenham players however weren’t paying much attention to the news and were more focused on the international break.
The players who received international callups were already halfway to their international camps by the time the articles surfaced while the others were enjoying a much needed break.
With almost half the squad away on international duties, the team couldn’t hold tactical training so there wasn’t any major training sessions.
Just some players doing some gym work and physical training.
Apart from that, Conte gave the players the first 4 days of the break off so for a the training grounds were devoid of players.
For Jason who had been been undergoing recovery for so long and couldn’t take any days off till now, this was his first break in a while so he asked for an extra six days of leave.
Under advice from the club’s medical team, Conte granted Jason the leave and Jason immediately took off on a plane to Toronto, Canada.
It was the starting point of the supercar rally, the gumball 3000 that he would be joining in on.
About a month prior, he had been invited to the event by Mr. Patino who he bought his Ferrari from in Italy.
As a car enthusiast, Mr Patino had also been a previous participant and had recommended Jason who was then invited directly.
Good that it happen like that too because Jason wasn’t going to cough up the ticket fee that was a whooping sum of $100k the last time he heard.
Thinking further about it, the gumball rally was a media and lifestyle event with sponsors and all so getting Jason to join for free was a profit for the sponsors.
Jason had sent his Ferrari to Toronto ahead of him and had it wrapped so that the event livery and stickers could be put on its body.
Once the event was over, he would only have to take the wrap off and his car would be restored.
Arriving at the Toronto Pearson international airport with his luggage for the next few days bundled into one bag, he took a cab to the carmedics workshop where his car was.
During the drive, Jason could not help thinking about whether this was the appropriate weather conditions to be doing a cross country rally event, considering how cold it was in North America at this time of year.
However it couldn’t be helped.
The event was originally scheduled to take place in the middle of the year, around June when it was still warm, but the COVID virus issue that had affected the world for the past year and half still cropped up every once in a while to cause issues.
In this case it had affected the planning and caused a huge delay, but against all odds, the event was still about to hold.
The weather wasn’t too bad yet anyway.
While it was a bit cold out and people had to wear thick clothes to keep warm and there was high chances of rain every so often, the chances for a snowfall were still low so it wasn’t too much of a problem.
Also, they wouldn’t be spending more than one day in Toronto before heading to USA, which was much warmer.
Deep in thoughts, he didn’t realize how much time flew by and only returned to the land of the living after the taxi stopped.
He paid the fare and got off heading into the auto shop where his car was waiting.
After meeting with the person in charge of working on his car, they headed to his car.
Apart from the livery, Jason had also wanted to remove the electrical battery in the car since he wasn’t one for electric motors and the Ferrari was a hybrid drive-train.
Not fully electric, but it felt a bit off for someone who preferred pure petrol engines.
Unfortunately, the battery couldn’t be taken out without a complete remodelling of the whole car due to how the electric motors were linked to the front axle and other important parts of the car.
So he left the car as is and didn’t bother with any modifications... He’d buy another fully petrol engine car for fun drives later... He was being paid enough to be that wilful these days.