Look guys, this match with Furuya starting is clearly to make sure that Furuya doesn’t just disappear and to build up to the moment our protagonist, Sawamura, gets to appear again, whether it’s in this match or next and show case his ace potential. This manga made us wait a lot for sure, but it has been amazing at building up momentum and exceeding our expectations as well as hyping us up. That is why this manga is so great, it doesn’t give us what us want immediately, yes it makes us wait for it, but it’s for the same reasons that we feel fulfilled when our protagonist finally achieves, we feel the similar sensations of craving, hard work, despair and desire the characters have in the same time we patiently wait for it to happen.
The author is clearly being careful here, that after sawamura gets the ace number, the story doesn’t suddenly fizzle out and lose its charm and intensity. Which is why Furuya is starting, it gives the story a chance to build up our expectations for the future match so again without using up all its hype all at once.
Because once the readers are satisfied, story’s become boring very quickly.
I’ve seen many recent mangas so this, especially with Isekais, they quickly establish a goal, quickly achieve it, and then the rest of the story turns to shit.
We’ve waited this long, we can wait just a little more till we get to see Sawamura shine and establish his position as ace on the team,