#tog fc spoilers

[victimhood]

On Nicolò di Genova within the TOG FC universe:

Because I’ve received a few questions on Nichi within The Beautiful Game universe and typed up replies I’m going to put them here for my own reference! 

TL;DR is that I’m not sure most of my readers realize how important Nichi is as a player unless you know about Italian football, but if you know Italian football, I think you would have instantly clocked that Nicky = center back = defender = catenaccio master = 100% Italian darling  = he is everyone’s son in Italy

I think I might have told several readers I had a chapter lined up for the Joe/Nicky backstory, but on second thought I have too much content to compress it into 1 chapter, so I’m going to queue it as a related work after I finish the main fic.

Nicky I would say is a Jordan Henderson type of captain--his main strength is consistency and dependability, working to clean up messes in the background, and consistency goes a very long way in a playing career. The fact that he's national team captain and club captain also speaks to the regard that other players and his managers have for him--he's basically the "heart" of a team and he has that ability to inspire/drive his teammates to do better. He is extremely loved by his country and fans of his club as well. Consistency, dependability, heart--I think these are some of the most wonderful attributes for a football player.

I reflected on my fic and realized I make a lot of broad assumptions that my readers can fill in the gaps which is only possible if you've been steeped in football culture your whole life. The way football works, there are certain types of players get more "glory" than others. The ones who score goals get the most hype. Most often, these are the forwards, wingers. Attacking midfielders get more attention than defensive midfielders. Full backs get more attention than center backs. Nicky is a center back. Some of my personal favorite players are defensive midfielders and while they don't have the kind of insane popularity, the fans who love them truly LOVE them in a terrifyingly undying manner. What is important to note is that Italian football is special because they've always been proud of their defensive play, and they treasure good defenders in particular, more than the rest of the world. As such, Nicky being Italian and a defender (center back) makes him a huge player in Italy. For Nicky to do Italy proud, in the most classically Italian manner, he couldn't have been in any other role than in defense.

In this story, Nicky's just one of those low key players--but he also actively chooses to opt out of the social media circus, which makes his online footprint even smaller. He doesn't have insta, twitter etc, so he doesn't have Booker/Lykon/Yusuf's level of fan engagement. Fan engagement is a huge thing in profit-driven football, since it sells merchandise. However, amongst journalists, managers, players, people who know their stuff--everyone respects Nicky for the traits he embodies.

+ here’s a bonus section on the Joe/Nicky backstory + how Cesare (Nichi’s dog, a rottweiler) came into their lives

Because I love dogs I have thought about how Cesare comes into their lives in this fic. In fact, it was originally supposed to be part of a single chapter on Nichi and Yusuf's backstory, but based on my fic planning, I might turn that backstory into a whole separate work because it's gonna take more words than a single chapter can accommodate. 

The summary of Yusuf and Nichi's backstory is that Joe was transferred to Inter Milan in Jan 2020, and Nichi reaches out to him to make peace (bc they fought in the player's tunnel a year before--enough to earn them both match bans). Because they're both young players they're not that well-off yet, and Nichi invites Joe to crash at his apartment while looking for his own place to save on hotel money. Unfortunately...this is Jan 2020 yeah? Joe, a young, immature footballer, doesn't put that much effort in finding his own place thinking he can take all the time in the world...and then the corona crisis happens. WHOOPS now he is stuck with Nichi 24/7 in a full lockdown--they can't even go out of the house except for essentials. (This is where Nichi starts joking about getting a dog so they have an excuse to go outside for a walk). 

One thing leads to another and...Joe and Nichi start sleeping together....but when lockdown restrictions are lifted, Joe moves out to cope with his complicated feelings and Nichi pretty much gets a dog to cope with his sadness of Joe moving out. Turns out these doofuses still love each other and like...yeah the separate house thing is just for show, for the parents, to pretend they are functioning adult individuals who are NOT very gay for each other oh no no no they're just friends...just bros...chilling 6 feet apart bc corona (and no homo). 

So the other thing about Cesare is that...Nichi got him as a puppy, and due to on/off corona restrictions Cesare just...wasn't very well socialized as a puppy--his main interactions are with Nichi and Yusuf, and puppy!Cesare has seen how happy Nichi gets when Yusuf comes over and catches on very well that Yusuf is Special to his Owner and becomes very very very very very protective of Yusuf as a result. Cesare has been kicked out of various puppy schools bc he is a v misunderstood dog unfortunately.

#tog fc #tog: the beautiful game #the old guard #kaysanova #joe x nicky #immortal husbands #tog fc spoilers #one thing about my fic that i really strive for is #the player that has your nationality in the fic you would be so immensely proud of in very specific ways #like if you’re Italian you would be proud of Nicky bc he’s a catenaccio heir #if you’re French you love the Booker Zidane comparisons #if you’re Ukrainian you love that Andy repped Shakhtar I hope #if you’re American Nile is one of your biggest USWNT stars #now on the question of Yusuf being Dutch #*cue evil laughter* #look I can see from 1000 miles away what’s coming up in the fic bc this is also my fic #but I have always wondered if any of my readers ever suspected #I have already named the big clue #I will say no more #except if you’re Dutch you MUST know

[adriata-archive]

@faenet event: kingdom of ash

“There are no gods left to watch, I’m afraid. And there are no gods left to help you now, Aelin Galathynius.” Aelin smiled, and Goldryn burned brighter. “I am a god.” 

#tog #aelin ashryver galathynius #aelin galathynius #koa #koa spoilers #kingdom of ash #togedit #gif #*gif #*edit #court: dawn #entry 2 #prev. changcho #first gifset aoisdja #the fc for aelin is imogen poots #usernuwanda #userkesh #userjulie #userlilabard #200

[pocthroneofglass]

poc throne of glass: FENRYS MOONBEAM

"What's your shield made of, then?" Fenrys tried and failed to shrug. But Gavriel muttered from where he worked on the still-whimpering pirate, "Arrogance."

#as promsed #poc tog #poctog edit #fenrys moonbeam #fenrys #koa #tog #throne of glass #koa spoilers #sjm #sarah j maas #aelin ashryver galathynius #gavriel #hope it lived up to the hype #also hope yall didnt mean a modern set with him #thought i should do this first #fc: #michael lockley

[victimhood]

Me thinking about upcoming parts of my fic: I’m not sure I have the emotional reserve to write this....

#some stuff is gonna get really intense??? #I’m questioning my decisions now #but you know what? #I am going to insert this song in the soundtrack #sooooo the chapter where I reference this song #that’s like...one of the crazy chapters 😂😂 #I think I’ve been procrastinating on writing because some of these chapters are going to be SO DAMN HARD #tog fc #tog fc spoilers #Spotify

[victimhood]

Thinking about that time I did a rescue dog walk in LA and there was a pittie that loved me and a husky that made me run everywhere I miss those two all the time I wish they knew I still think of them 😭😭😭😭

But we are here today for in-universe The Beautiful Game thoughts, specifically my answer to the question: “how do you think in-universe you would respond to "Yucky" becoming canon?”

It was so fun to think through what I would have done. In general, I've always tried to practice old-school rational fandom behavior, which, especially in RPS means never EVER touch the real people because we're shipping fictionalized versions of their personas. So I think from the point where Booker and Nile's marriage became known I would have been one of those fans trying to yell at everyone to stay calm and how we should always have expected this bc they're real people with real lives, and that I LOVE NILE and so many of "you" (imaginary fandom) are being lowkey racist+misogynist to Nile who is THE SWEETEST and does not deserve this. And then I would have reblogged 182732 posts from fellow amazed fans who are like, how did our boy Booker score with all-time legend Nile Freeman, like none of us thought Booker capable of this aksdjdsa. Beating Real Madrid? Winning the Champions League? Pfft anyone can do that. Dating Nile Freeman?? WHAT SKILL LEVEL ARE YOU AT

And then I would have favored some occasional Nile + Yooker threesome headcanons in which Nile dommes the hell out of the two boys lmao. So basically my fandom self, when Yucky becomes known, would have been like...WELL BOOKER IS ALREADY MARRIED SO IDK WHAT "YOU FOLKS" (imaginary fandom again) ARE SAD ABOUT.

And then someone would have dug up the historical Yucky moments...and I would have been like SHIT those are the years I wasn't paying attention WHOA IT WAS ALWAYS THERE IF YOU LOOKED but then someone would revive the wank (that was very unfortunately sponsored by Nichi) that sank Yucky as a ship all those years back and I think fandom would go into stupid wars again and at that point I would be screaming in agony trying to stay in my happy foursome corner LOL.

#this is a spoiler #but we have...nile's pregnancy brain sex dreams pornfest coming up #and like i have not been the same #it's like my brain is hosting a fandom pornfest #but i'm just RPing with myself and these imaginary characters #tog fc

[victimhood]

More TOG FC bc I’M AT A VERY EMOTIONAL CHAPTER OK

in this place there are no strangers, each person a blessing in kind.

#tog fc #I’m crying #spoiler: Booker cries too #maybe my OTP is Booker/tears

[victimhood]

As predicted, dear old predictable me is procrastinating again, but I’m fixated on the fact that @itsrottenvibes proposed that within my football!AU Yooker shippers call Yusuf/Nicky “Yucky” WHICH IS THE MOST AMAZING THING AND 100% ACCURATE

This is three Inception levels deep nonsense (The Old Guard > football alternate universe > “RPF” within this football universe) but I’m OBSESSED with thinking what the in-universe fandom is like. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, check out The Beautiful Game before you @ me.

Yusuf/Booker: MAJOR FANDOM SHIP. This ship attracts fans from rival clubs. Even AC Milan fans hate-follow Yooker on IG just to view their stories. There are wonderful, moderate Yooker fans, and then there are some SERIOUS DELULUS who comment on every IG post that Yusuf and Booker make with 4th wall breaking bad shit like “THIS REMINDS ME OF CHAPTER 14 OF [YOOKER FIC WITH 1000 KUDOS ON AO3]

Booker’s fanon characterization: major yt boi woobie, he is somehow the main character in 75% of Yooker fics, reflecting the unconscious racial biases of the fandom. He is granted all sorts of magical powers and leading roles in the most egregious AUs. Top or Bottom Booker discourse is something you never want to touch with a 10 foot pole. Top!Booker fans basically never interact with Bottom!Booker fans since the Great Fanwars of bad discourse.

Yusuf’s fanon characterization: depends on which part of fandom you look at, Yusuf is either the Gary Stu of Gary Stus, or some sort of Manic Pixie Dream Boy who fixes Broken White Boy Booker and helps him achieve his dreams. The most popular Yusuf POV fic is one in which he is a quasi-James Bond type character, and Booker is some sexy villain that seduces him on a mission. Fans with a Yusuf bias tend to be...the coolest part of fandom, and they have an incredible skillset in producing gifs/edits/media from clips of Yusuf floating on the internet (that Armani ad has been milked to death 28937428934 ways)

Yusuf/Nichi, aka “Yucky”: only Fandom Olds ship this, and even so it’s kinda a rarepair since so many left the fandom. It was a bit of a thing back in 2021, but like, there was this post about how problematic the Yucky BNFs were and everyone did a hate-pile on and since then Yucky’s kinda...an icky ship no one wants to touch.

The Yucky fans are disturbingly literate, and write incredibly prescient fics, but also kinda weirdly elitist about it. A group of Yucky fans, who apparently attend Ivy League-level colleges, made an exclusive community of fanfic writers where they write fics for each other. It’s this elitist group that attracted the hate. A lot of the good Yucky fics have either been deleted or orphaned on AO3, because their authors work in governmental-level positions now. The best Yucky fanfic is a space academia AU written by an actual PhD candidate and the quality of that fic is like...Margaret Atwood style prose.

Nicky’s fanon characterization: The Yucky writers write Nicky as a thoughtful, intelligent human being (despite...the misspelled tattoo and Eurotrash haircuts), which the Yooker shippers think is extremely OOC. These days (in the year of our lord 2027), Nicky is often the stock villain in Yooker fics. In Yooker fics, he is always some sort of weird possessive ex-boyfriend (of Booker, surprise twist), bc Booker is the woobie that needs to be saved from the evil captain by Yusuf.

Booker/Lykon: the cute happy corner of the most sensible fans. They know they’re not a big ship, but they love each other, and they write the cutest fics and they’ve offended no one.

Rachida/Booker: this pairing surged in popularity during the Women’s World Cup, for that enemies to lovers dynamic. However, as a het ship, just doesn’t reach the heights of Yooker, and is kinda seen as a crack thing.

Nile/Booker: someone wrote this fic after Nile 1 Booker 0 (it’s super porny and basically consists of Nile domming the heck out of Booker), and everyone went crazy over it like OMG THIS IS THE BEST CRACK...two months later WAT THE HECK THIS SHIP IS REAL??? 

Yooker fans pretty much have a total meltdown at the reveal that Nile/Booker is canon. Most go into delulu mode, and write compensatory fanfics in which Booker is somehow so deeply closeted he marries Nile to prove he is very het, but then he goes back to training at Inter and he can’t resist Yusuf anymore. The worst Yooker fans make Nile a total bitch, but they are just a vocal minority (like 10% of the fandom). Most Yooker fans continue because they are still being fed new content on an extremely regular basis, like when Booker posts photos of shakshuka captioned “brunch with the bestie”. Another 10-15% of the Yooker fandom start writing Nile/Booker/Yusuf threesome fics.

Andy/Booker: ...why. But they exist. They often get hate for the age gap in their ship.

Unfortunately, no one really knows that Quynh/Booker are a thing, although it is known Andy and Quynh are married (I think the...Olympic ski fandom is like...minuscule). But Andy + Quynh/doing kinky things to Booker fics exist on the internet.

[TOG FC SPOILERS BELOW]

On the eve of Yusuf’s wedding to Nichi, Booker gets invited to spa day with Yusuf. Of course he posts about this on his IG “spa day with the bestie”, which sparks 283291321932 Yooker angst fics. The predominant plotstrains are: (1a) Booker has been secretly in love with his best friend the whole time, and finally confessions to his friend at the spa. Yusuf calls off the wedding, and Yooker ride into the sunset. (1b) Yusuf and Booker have been on and off the whole time, and Yusuf confesses to Booker that he has doubts on his compatibility with Nichi. Booker makes a grand romantic gesture, and Yusuf calls off the wedding, and Yooker ride into the sunset. (3) Nichi is forcing Yusuf to marry him for [flimsy reason]. Booker, the hero of the day, swings in to saves Yusuf from abusive big bad Nichi. (4) Blatant pwp hammam porn fic

#this is deranged #it feels unhealthy to be this invested #tog fc #but omg ok there is one part of this headcanon that is stolen from real events #back in the day there WAS an elitist fanfic writer group in football RPF #some of those fics were insanely good #but the elitism of it was also...hummm...very uncool by 2020 standards #one of my all time favorite fics is a football rarepair by someone from that group #young and impressionable me adored the sheer wodehousian literary wit of that fic

[victimhood]

This is pretty spoilery for TOG FC but I’m thinking about Yusuf’s grandma, and I think Yusuf is her favorite grandchild (amongst all the doctors, engineers and lawyers!!!) and she watches every single one of Yusuf’s matches.

[SPOILER ALERT] There’s gonna be a match where Yusuf and Nichi play against each other.

On watching this particular match, I think grandma is going to call up Yusuf’s parents and she’s gonna be like “is our boy dating that Italian captain???”

And the parents are like “HE DID NOT TELL US THE IDENTITY OF HIS BOYFRIEND”

All three folks: *squints at television* 😱😱😱😱😱 GRANDMA IS RIGHT ...bros do not have their hands linger on other bros while jostling at a corner or do they???

Parents: 😱😱😱😱😱 our boy was so mysterious about the identity of his boyfriend and it’s this guy right there THE ENTIRE FUCKING TIME

Grandma: I always had a hunch but I ignored it but now it is impossible to ignore see I know my favorite grandchild so well

Other grandkids: can’t believe we graduated Yale summa cum laude and lost to this guy what’s the point of me being a world renowned facial reconstruction surgeon when grandma watches every single football match this guy is in and his entryway chandelier is the cost of my med school (200k)

#anyway I love the idea of grandma sharpening her knives in front of Nichi #BUT THEN she realizes Nichi is the guy that consumes her olive oil!!!! #and then she loves him immediately #I mean Nichi is major grandpa vibes #grandma will love him fine #tog fc

[victimhood]

[warning: MAJOR MAJOR TOG FC SPOILERS]

But jsjdhfhf I’m just thinking,

TOG FC Nicky wouldn’t say “I love you, he would say “I’m crazy about you”

TOG FC Nicky wouldn’t say “will you marry me?” he would say “please please marry me”

#tog fc #aksjjdjf I am shook by the character voice speaking to me #is this what it’s like to hear divine revelations #shit I have so many chapters before I get to the real good parts lol

[victimhood]

TOG FC spoilers...

Me: skipping 50 chapters ahead to dream of Nile and Booker’s wedding

#thinking of that combination of Toni Morrison and Songs of Solomon #IT’S SO GOOD GUYS #i’m crying lol #argh why can’t I write fast enough 😂😂😂 #i am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine