In Blue Lock episode 3, Isagi and his dormmates faced were informed by Jinpachi that their team will be playing their first match against team X. However, they also got to know an interesting rule of the first selection that completely changed their perspective of the first selection. It turns out that the players from the top two teams of the round-robin will not be the only ones to make it to the next round. But the players who score the highest number of goals for their respective teams from the bottom three eliminated teams will also participate in the second selection.
When the match finally starts, the aforementioned stipulation makes team Z strikers play selfishly and fight among themselves. Although team X also faces a similar problem initially, Barou Shouei forces them to unite with his aggressive approach on the field. As team X’s approach changes for the better and they play well with each other, team Z just falls apart as all players are only thinking of themselves. By the time the match ends, the score is 5-1 with team Z tasting a demoralizing defeat.
Later in the dressing room, Isagi tells his teammates that he has finally made sense of Jinpachi’s cryptic message of creating soccer from zero. He argues that every player in the team tried to play for themselves in today’s game- which is not what soccer is about. According to him, the chaotic situation is what exactly one should call being at zero. However, team X manages to get themselves out of that thanks to Barou’s goal who played aggressively and showed everyone the way. Once the goals started coming, the whole team quickly got united and played as one.
So, Barou turned the zero of chaotic bunched up soccer into one. In the same manner, the entire team can then go on to become 10 or 100 but all one needs to do first is to become 1, just like team X. It is ultimately a striker’s responsibility to turn a zero into one. The rule of top scorers being selected for the next round was ingeniously added so that the players could figure out that in soccer a team is created by an irresistible striker, who takes it upon himself to unite the team and play as one.
