Read Soccer Halfback for Free Online

it.
    As if both had the same idea, they leaped for theball, intending to strike it with their heads. Instead, they collided. Neither one touched the ball; it dropped behind them.
    As the two players came down side by side, Jabber felt Mel Jones’s elbow jab him in the ribs again. This time it hit deeper,
     feeling like a pointed ramrod as it knocked him off balance. He dropped to his side on the ground, his anger flaring.
    A whistle shrilled, and Jabber heard the ref yell, “Elbowing! Direct free-kick!”
    But the words bounced off Jabber’s ears as he scrambled to his feet, his hands balled into fists. Rushing at the Saber player,
     he grabbed him by a shoulder and spun him around.
    “Jones!” he snapped, his eyes flashing fire. “That’s the second time you’ve done that!”
    Mel Jones stared innocently at him. “Done what?” he snarled.
    “Elbowed me!”
    The whistle shrilled again. “Okay, you guys! Cut it out unless you both want to get kicked out of the game!” warned the ref.
    A crooked grin crossed Mel’s face. “You hear that, Morris?”
    “Yes, I hear that,” replied Jabber, his anger simmering. “But don’t you elbow me like that again.” He walked briskly away.
    “Here,” said the ref, handing Jabber the ball. “Take your shot from where the foul happened.”
    Jabber placed the ball on the ground and stepped back, lining it up with the Sabers’ goal.
    “Give it a long shot, Jab!” Stork yelled.
    Stork, all six-feet-three of him, was standing just beyond the center line, his long arms dangling at his sides. To his left
     were Jack Sylvan and Joe Sanford. Joe, a wing, was playing close to the touchline.
    Jabber ran up to the ball and booted it. Instead of aiming it for Stork, however, he met the ball slightly on its right side
     and kicked it over the center line toward Joe. The ball, spinning counterclockwise, curved through the air and came down neatly
     in front of the wing.
    At the same time, half a dozen Sabers rushed for the ball like a flock of birds after food. Jabber was moving too, rushing
     up the center behind Stork, who now had started to run toward the Sabers’ goal.
    Joe, stopping the spinning ball with his right foot, kicked it down the field closer to the goal line. Itseemed like an aimless kick, and some of the guys let him know it.
    “Hey, Joe! Who’s down there?”
    “Wrong direction, buddy!”
    Jabber couldn’t help letting a soft smile cross his face. The guys were forgetting that they often committed foolish mistakes
     themselves. You weren’t always able to think reasonably under pressure. And Joe had been under a lot of pressure during those
     few precious moments before he had kicked the ball.
    The ball bounced out-of-bounds. “White!” shouted the ref.
    A Saber got the ball, stood behind the touchline with the ball over his head, and tossed it back onto the field to a teammate.
     The teammate stopped it with his chest and booted it up the field toward Nugget territory.
    Stork and two Sabers raced after it, Stork’s long legs rising and falling in a blur. He reached the ball first, kicking it
     softly at an angle back up the field. Jack got it and dribbled it a couple of yards before a Saber rushed at him. Jabber recognized
     the strong-muscled body immediately. It was Mel Jones.
    Somehow Jack managed to kick the ball awayfrom Mel, and it skittered freely across the open space. Jabber and Mike, the closest to the play, sprinted after it.
    Suddenly Mike, who was losing the race to Jabber, ran off to the side. “To your right, Jab!” he yelled.
    Jabber got the message, but he had to get control of the ball first. And Mel was no easy man to contend with.
    They both arrived at the ball simultaneously. Their right feet met the ball simultaneously too, resulting in a crunching sound
     that did nothing to the ball except almost rivet it to the ground.
    Again and again they kicked the ball — abusing it, roughing it up — both staying in front of it to keep it