CHAPTER 678: AS IT STANDS.

The wall was up now.

Four men wide — white shirts clinging to red bodies, locked in place by barked instructions.

Gabriel. Saliba. Ødegaard.

And Izan — standing furthest to the right.

Raya barked again, waving his right hand in a low gesture, adjusting the angle of the wall by inches.

Inches could mean everything.

The noise inside Wembley dulled.

Phones had been pulled up in anticipation of the shot.

Every pair of eyes locked on that tiny stretch of grass 24 yards from goal.

"For all the talk about Salah," Alan Smith murmured, "I’ve got a feeling it’s Trent..."

For Raya..., that was the nightmare.

"They’ve done this before," Jim Beglin added. "It’s a disguise — a sleight of foot."

The referee stepped back, whistle in mouth as Trent glanced once to his left where Salah nodded and then— the sharp shriek of the whistle followed.

The shot was coming.

But from who?

Trent and Salah moved in perfect sync.

Same foot forward, same calculated arc towards the ball, just opposite.

A coordinated approach meant to unsettle every Arsenal mind on the pitch — and it worked.

Raya didn’t guess.

He committed.

The moment Salah hesitated and shaped his body as if to strike, Raya stepped.

A slight lean, a twitch of muscle, a step to his left — and that was all the time Trent Alexander-Arnold needed.

Salah peeled away at the very last moment, letting Trent glide past him, and in one graceful motion, the Liverpool vice-captain wrapped his right foot around the ball with surgical precision, sending it curling viciously over the top of the Arsenal wall.

Raya realised too late.

By the time he planted and pushed off his wrong foot, the ball was already slicing through the air — a spinning, bending missile hurtling toward the far corner of his goal.

He dived, outstretched and frantic, but it was hopeless.

The arc was too perfect, and the placement too cruel.

The ball struck the inside netting with a thundering kiss.

Wembley split in two.

One half exploded into pure ecstasy as the red half of Merseyside bellowed in triumph.

"GOAL! OH, IT’S BRILLIANT!" Jim Beglin shouted above the chaos as the Liverpool bench emptied.

"TRENT ALEXANDER-ARNOLD! Deception, power, pure execution! He’s stunned Arsenal — and Wembley can barely believe it!!"

Slot on the sidelines turned and pumped his fist furiously, while Robertson sprinted towards the dugout, yelling into the heavens.

Konaté was already mid-run toward the corner flag, his arms raised before the ball had even stopped rolling.

Alan Smith’s voice came through a second later, steady but urgent.

"It’s completely against the run of play. Arsenal were starting to build control, but that’s what Liverpool do. They stay alive, they wait, and then — just like that — they punish you. That’s a hammer blow. And as it stands now... they will be the ones going through."

Raya sat upright on the grass, frozen for a moment in disbelief, then slammed a palm into the turf in frustration.

Trent, away from his mates, kept running, head high.

He reached the touchline, right where the red shirts met the stunned North London crowd in white and burgundy.

He stopped and then turned to face them.

And he raised a single finger to his lips.

Shush.

And in that moment, for all their heartbreak, the Arsenal fans could do nothing but watch.

But before it could boil, Liverpool’s players arrived, swarming him.

Salah yanked him backwards by the collar, grinning while Van Dijk shoved his shoulder with a rare smile, while Diaz grabbed his head, yelling something wild in Spanish, only half of it football.

But the fourth official had seen enough.

The board went up, and the referee pointed furiously toward the centre circle.

The celebration was taking too long.

"And the referee’s not having it — celebrations dragging on here!" Alan Smith cut in sharply as the players jogged away.

"Liverpool might be ahead, but they’re not ahead of the clock."

Jim Beglin added, "Well, it’s emotional, isn’t it? Trent’s just silenced the Emirates in one strike. That one’s going to sting."

As the Reds reset in their half, the fourth official’s board flashed again.

Arsenal triple change.

Declan Rice off.

Worn down to the studs, sweat running on the sides of his head and on came Jorginho, for the former.

The next person to go off was Lewis Skelly.

He looked around for a bit, reluctant to leave the pitch, but he had to.

His legs were being done in by Salah’s quick pace and change of acceleration, and in came Calafiori, eyes scanning the Liverpool shape before he even stepped over the line.

And finally— Gabriel Jesus, shaking his head, muttering under his breath, came off for Kai Havertz.

Across the pitch, Liverpool matched the rhythm.

Tsimikas for Robertson and Curtis Jones for Szoboszlai.

"Tactical reaction now, both benches in motion," Smith narrated over the buzz.

"Arsenal going tall with Havertz, Liverpool firming up the middle with Jones, and it looks like there is still life left in this."

The referee checked his watch as both teams stood ready.

With the crowd rising again, Havertz tapped the ball sideways.

.......

The screen flickered inside The Quarry Arms, a dimly lit North London pub crammed wall to wall with faces locked in a shared expression — that grim, half-hoping squint only football could summon.

"Eight minutes remaining here at Wembley," Alan Smith’s voice echoed from the overhead speakers, carried by the flat-screen’s grainy broadcast.

"And as Arsenal pour bodies forward, spaces are starting to split wide open behind them."

"Are we gonna bottle this again?" a fan near the bar muttered into his pint, not really expecting an answer.

His red-and-white scarf was clutched like a noose in one hand, his knuckles tense.

Another swig and the pub’s air felt like a held breath.

......

Back at Wembley, the energy crackled with nervous urgency.

Arsenal’s setup — already stretching at the seams — was thinning dangerously now, lines fraying in the desperate push for an equaliser.

"On me, guys! Stay calm," Izan, who had settled in the midfield after Rice came off, shouted, waving a hand behind him like a conductor trying to steady a frantic orchestra.

"Don’t panic now."

But it was hard not to.

The stadium clock ticked down — 82:03 — and every second scraped at their nerves like broken glass under boots.

Jorginho, who had come on for Rice, floated forward near the centre circle, eyes up, always scanning.

He tried to inject something through the middle — a clipped ball intended for Calafiori’s blindside run — but it was snuffed out before it could grow teeth and Liverpool pounced.

Ryan Gravenberch, sharp as a switchblade, read the pass early and stepped in.

With a tight touch and then another, he was suddenly in possession.

His momentum carried him away from Jorginho as he angled his body, turning the interception into transition.

A smart pass slipped out like silk under pressure, rolling diagonally toward the right, towards the far right.

"Gravenberch—clever again—and now here’s Trent Alexander-Arnold with room to move..." Jim Beglin narrated, his voice hovering beneath the growing tremors from the stands.

Arsenal fans weren’t quiet — they couldn’t afford to be.

"Oh when the Gunners... go marching in..."

Their voices pushed, strained, hopeful and louder now as they tried to inject life into their players.

Arnold galloped onto the ball near the right touchline, where Leandro Trossard saw the threat, but his feet weren’t ready — not quick enough.

Trent ghosted past him like paper in the wind and scooped a lofted ball down the line with that signature effortless flick of the boot and

Salah was already there.

Liverpool’s right flank was a blaze of red and motion now, and Arsenal’s left — decimated by the switch to a back three — was a chasm.

But someone had read it. Someone was there.

Izan.

He didn’t hesitate.

The moment Trent released the ball, Izan had already burst out from the central channel, adjusting his path in real time like a bloodhound locked onto scent.

He tore after Salah with an engine that didn’t understand fatigue — seventeen years old and chasing history, chasing ghosts, chasing this game.

Salah felt him crawling up his neck, and the Egyptian slowed up, drawing Izan in like bait, trying to pin him, trap him, flick it off him for a corner — something to kill tempo, maybe waste a few seconds.

But Izan wasn’t biting.

He stopped short at the last second, bracing as Salah swung his hips to angle the ball off him — and dodged.

"Wonderful read by the teenager!" Alan Smith exclaimed, not hiding his admiration.

"Izan Miura, absolutely switched on—he knew what Salah wanted, and he’s turned the tables brilliantly. Arsenal aren’t dead yet!"

"ARSENAL! ARSENAL! ARSENAL!" The crowd roared, embers turning to flame.

They weren’t dead yet.

A/N: Okay, I intended to end the game with this Chapter but it would feel a bit rushed because of the path I took. Sorry about that. This is the last of the previous day. Hopefully, I will see you today with another extra Chapter for the Golden tickets because we are almost at 60. Have fun reading and I’ll see you in a bit.