Three days after Andy joined Borussia Dortmund, the youth team entered a month-and-a-half-long break.
Unlike the senior squad, youth teams often experience significant personnel changes after a grueling season.
Players unwilling to grind in the regional leagues had already transferred to 3rd or even 2nd division clubs.
But Andy did not rest.
In addition to reporting to the club every day for relentless training, he had to aggressively brush up on his German.
It had to be said—he possessed a terrifying talent for languages. His learning efficiency when studying German surged to 500%!
As a result, he was conversing freely with his old landlord in just half a month.
His tutor, Teacher Tom, was absolutely amazed by his talent!
After a quick phone call with Comrade Andrew, Tom took the liberty of helping Andy apply for a degree in Applied Linguistics at the Technical University of Dortmund.
Andy fiercely protested.
He had zero desire to go back to school, but his protests were entirely ineffective.
Throughout the entire holiday, aside from studying and sleeping, Andy devoted every waking moment to training!
Soon, every coach in the training base knew his name!
They even gave him a new nickname: "Crazy"!
The team's health consultant, Cole, spent his days nervously examining him.
The reason was simple: Andy's training volume was completely mismatched with his age!
A normal athlete's routine was structured sensibly: breakfast + training + lunch + rest + training + recovery + dinner.
Andy's brutal schedule read: extra training + breakfast + training + lunch + extra training + training + dinner + extra training + recovery.
The youth supervisor even cut short his own vacation, rushing back to the base to give Andy proper guidance.
Unsurprisingly, Andy stubbornly refused to accept anyone's advice.
The side effect of this reckless training was a drop in his system's health stat panel, falling from 10+185 to 10+135 (bonus health).
Of course, there were tangible benefits; Andy's height increased from 168.3cm to 168.5cm!
On the day before the holiday ended, Borussia Dortmund officially announced the personnel changes for their youth squads.
"Dear Borussia Dortmund fans!
We are proud to announce that 18-year-old Chinese full-back Andy has officially joined the Borussia Dortmund youth team.
Andy joins us from the Benfica youth academy. We remain committed to discovering and developing exceptional young football talent.
Let's look forward to Andy's outstanding performances in black and yellow, and witness him strive towards higher football goals!"
Originally, the news of Andy's signing was buried at the very bottom as a tiny headline, attracting far less media attention than the first team's updates.
But!
Andy was once a well-known youth prospect in Portugal and had been selected for the list of the most promising midfielders under 18 in Europe.
Seizing the opportunity, many Portuguese media outlets published scathing reports to satirize German football.
[Benfica's Discarded Player Moves to Germany; Dortmund Successfully 'Snags' Him?]
[Looking at the "Desperate" Nature of German Football Through the Transfer of an "Ill" Player!]
[The "Hypocrisy" of German Football – Just How Tempting is the Market for Chinese Players?]
As soon as the news broke across the border, German domestic media outlets launched a fierce counterattack!
However, some cynical local outlets still fiercely criticized Dortmund's choice.
[Sky Sports Column: From the 3rd Division to the Regional League, the Signing of Andy is a Sign of Dortmund's Decline.]
[Bild: Insider Reveals Andy Joined the Team Through "Backdoor" Connections!]
This biased media reporting caused some uninformed Dortmund fans to grow suspicious, flooding the official website and social media with negative comments.
Fortunately, most Dortmund fans were quite rational; the immediate future of youth team members simply wasn't a major priority to them yet.
Chinese media outlets based in Germany immediately took notice of Andy's transfer, particularly galvanized by his nationality.
They hurriedly applied to their headquarters to investigate Andy's past career experiences to prepare for massive subsequent reporting.
Amidst the storm, Borussia Dortmund did not respond to the controversy.
CEO Watzke simply instructed the youth training director to organize a comprehensive physical test for the second team as soon as possible, ordering the data to be sent to his office immediately.
The youth team's holiday officially ended on July 23.
The entire squad immediately underwent two brutal days of health and physical data testing!
As Watzke hoped, the results proved Andy was perfectly healthy.
Furthermore, he completely outclassed all his teammates by maintaining a pristine body fat percentage of 12%!
Head coach Hans was beyond thrilled!
He also happily discovered that Andy could now communicate fluently with everyone around him—the language barrier was gone!
The next day, the detailed athletic data was measured.
Regarding speed testing:
Andy's 30-meter sprint clocked in at a blistering 4.21 seconds!
The 60-meter explosive sprint took only 7.08 seconds!
He consistently ran the 10-meter shuttle run in 2.5 seconds, remarkably maintaining this exact pace even after ten consecutive sprints!
These shocking statistics left the entire coaching staff completely dumbfounded!
A terrifying, speed-oriented winger had just been born!
For context, Aubameyang's 30-meter sprint record in the first team was 3.7 seconds, with an average time of around 4 seconds.
Andy, standing at less than 170cm tall, contained an absolutely explosive burst of energy!
Regarding jump tests:
Andy's vertical jump reached 70 centimeters, while his running jump soared to 85 centimeters.
This was completely different from his past medical data, to the point that the testing coach openly scoffed, "Benfica is completely unprofessional."
Next came the endurance test:
During the aerobic phase, Andy ran nearly 3,000 meters in just 12 minutes.
In the grueling anaerobic phase, participants had to perform multiple 30-second sprints, followed by only a 30-second rest before repeating the cycle.
Andy ruthlessly persisted for 10 sets, managing to maintain an above-average speed with incredibly stable movement quality.
Regarding strength testing:
Andy breezed past the upper body strength test by completing 20 strict pull-ups consecutively.
In terms of lower body strength, Andy, weighing a mere 72 kg, effortlessly completed 5 deep squats lifting 105 kg!
Regarding flexibility testing:
Andy's scores were also well above average in the forward bend, backbend, and splits tests.
Furthermore, Andy ranked firmly among the top three in the team in fundamental skills: ball control, passing, shooting, receiving, and dribbling!
Just as the entire coaching staff was reeling from Andy's new records for the Dortmund youth squad...
Andy's psychological test results shocked them all over again!
Failed.
The report explicitly stated that while Andy's tactical understanding was acceptable, his aggression levels were severely excessive!
After the results were announced, two team members were absolutely certain of the test's total accuracy!
Those two were Mitsuru Mitsumura and Pris!
Both of them had personally felt Andy's terrifying aggressiveness during the intra-squad practice matches.
In particular, it took a full week of rest at home for the swelling to completely subside from their bruised injuries.
When the massive data file finally hit the CEO's desk, Watzke made a decisive choice on the spot.
Give Andy a massive promotional push!
The moment he performs well in the youth team, immediately start marketing him heavily in the Asian market!
Just ahead of the new season in the Western Regional League, Ruhr Nachrichten, a newspaper closely tied to Borussia Dortmund, published a massive front-page headline.
[Exceptional Talent! The Phenomenal Statistics of the Young Full-Back Signed by Borussia Dortmund!]
The article not only recorded some of Andy's mind-boggling data but also vividly described his insane training ethic.
Rumor has it that after Benfica's management saw this exact article, they frantically ordered their data department to compile his old information overnight!