Episode 19: Ryoma is Injured!



The episode started where it left off, and it's when Ryoma started going ambidextrous. The Fudoumine members were admirably shocked and contemplating as to who is this mysterious freshman who can do these things? Who really is Ryoma Echizen?

Anyway, the match continued. Ryoma seemed to be pushing Shinji quite hard. Tezuka, in the meanwhile, still contemplates about his discovery of the century. Suddenly, as Ryoma approaches assertively towards the net, Shinji lobbed the ball nicely and quite high, but our protagonist, jumped quite high too and hit the ball with his back facing Shinji. Tachibana thought that Shinji's still playing with Ryoma but then he realized that Shinji's really having a hard time.

Sometime along the match, Shinji started to hit Ryoma topspins and backspins alternately. The first one to notice this is Fuji-senpai and he immediately relied his observation to his team mates. Shinji just smiled as he hit these kind of shots, Ryoma doesn't notice a thing or two.

After quite some time of hitting backspins and topspins (and a lot of self-talk from Shinji), Ryoma just froze for a second as a ball passed him by. He was befuddled as to what happened and the reason of his being frozen for a second. He shrugged and didn't mind it. However, his team mates and the groupees are confused as to how Echizen could not have hit that easy ball?

No one seemed able to answer that question for the moment. Ryoma and Shinji just continued playing. Shinji resumed to hitting backspins and topspins to Ryoma's forehand and backhand alternately, and then again, for a second, Ryoma's left arm seemed to be frozen for a second.

Ryoma is now getting quite irritated (although he doesn't show it, but us viewers just *know* it). Ryoma can't seem to get the reason as to why is he freezing for a second? The match continues. Shinji just used the same style he plays and that's bombarding Ryoma with his usual alternate backspin and topspin. As Ryoma freezes for a second for the nth time. Ryoma got annoyed and spun himself to hit the ball, since his arm couldn't move, he decided that he'll just use his legs to move and place his racket. Wrong move Ryoma! As he spun around, Ryoma's temporarily paralyzed arm lost its grip on Ryoma's racket and then hit the right net pole then began zooming fast towards Ryoma's left eye. There are just few good things that happened when this accident occured. One is that we saw Tezuka display some kind of "emotion" and not being his usual robotic self. As I am now seeing why other fans call Tezuka, Tezubotka. ^o^. Another good thing is that we will see just how shocked the Fudoumine team was! It's such a treat.

Anyway, back to the woeful accident that happened to Ryoma: his left eyelid is now bleeding profusely although the eyeball is in perfect condition and wasn't in any way damaged. Sakuno (as always) came running towards the court and started fussing over Ryoma which he didn't appreciate the least. He just told Sakuno to get out of the court and that the game is still in progress. Coach Ryuzaki agreed and reprimanded her grand daughter (Ha! I'm sorry Sakuno fans, but I really don't like her that much).

The match stopped in the meantime for Seigaku to treat Ryoma's injuries. Oishi-senpai was the one cleaning Ryoma's wound and was quite worried when the wound wouldn't stop bleeding. He told Ryoma that it must've been a great disappointment to stop a match like that. Oishi really thought that Ryoma wouldn't be continuing his match. As Momoshiro picked up the broken pieces of Ryoma's racket, Ryoma suddenly called out to Momoshiro to get his spare racket and that he plans on continuing his match against Shinji. Oishi-senpai, of course, objected, being the mother hen that he is. He told Ryoma the seriousness of the situation and that he couldn't possibly play with a wound like that. Meanwhile, on Fudoumine's bench section, they're equally worried for Ryoma's condition (although, I know they're rejoicing inside XP). Tachibana knew that Shinji wouldn't be satisfied if Seigaku would forfeit this game. They were also equally shocked to see that Ryoma really wanted to continue their match. Coach Ryuzaki called Ryoma over and fixed his eyes up. She covered his left eye with a patch to stopped the bleeding temporarily for only 15 minutes, but now he's only got half of his vision. It would be difficult for him to judge the distance of the ball, etc. if he were to continue playing.

But ofcourse, Ryoma doesn't care if hisone of his eye's patched up. All he cares about is to finish his match against Shinji. At first, Oishi objected against Ryoma playing his match, but he was flabbergasted when Tezuka gave Ryoma his spare racket and that if he was to continue playing, he would only be given 10 minutes to finish the match. If he does't finish the match within 10 minutes, they will forfeit the game. Ryoma agreed to this and stepped on the court opposite of Shinji. He served a twist serve that was faster than ever and surprised the spectators.