So In My Musings On What If™ Kira Was Used Not As A Throwaway Character/shocking Elim But A Rival To

So in my musings on What If™ Kira was used not as a throwaway character/shocking elim but a rival to Jinpachi Ego himself in terms of ideology and moral value and was one of/The protagonist(s) of Blue Lock, I've accidentally created a rarepair (ship or platonic duo I can see it both ways) inside my mind so please get ready for the biggest hear me out [analysis and more thoughts under the cut just pls pls pls hear me out i am begging]. Look at them and then hear me out.

So! First off thank you for hearing me out.

First Selection: Oh boy Kira does not like this guy. He's a team player in a world of egoists, obviously he doesn't like this self-proclaimed king! He thinks the selfish playstyle is terrible but he's also not an idiot and can not deny that clearly, results are showing for the unsportsmanlike behavior.

Second Selection: I'm not too sure on how I'm gonna screw with this one for the purposes of adding in Kira, all I know is that I want him to play with Reo (I think he'd be really beneficial to him as a friend and teammate post ReoNagi breakup) so hey maybe he'll get to play against Barou at some point here if I screw with the 3v3? Anyway, I want them to be on opposite teams again and I want Kira to see the whole idea of devouring/Barou's villain complex and have a moment of "Maybe this is team play, it's just a selfish way of doing it??" and we see his whole power of friendship mentality shake a little bit.

Third Selection: Very few ideas for what the two of them do here in relation to each other. In all honesty it's not that important to me right now

U-20: Okay yeah I'm not a Kira fan to an unrealistic standpoint, he most likely benchwarms this game or maybe gets a few minutes of being subbed in because Ego knows showcasing the jewel of Japanese soccer will bring in some great publicity. Maybe he plays a few minutes in the first half of the match and he's subbed out when Barou subs in (maybe they directly switch??) and Kira gets to say something about "Ah, wish I could've gotten a closer look at your playstyle." or something to that effect. He's not really praising it but he's stopped outright condemning it. Character development!

Neo Egoist League: I want Kira on the Ubers. "Strategy and teamwork" and although he's gained a bit of an ego and some selfishness to survive up to this point, it doesn't discount that we've seen him display the love he has for his high school team in the beginning of the series. Anyway, my main point is that I think he's good enough, especially with his Blue Lock training for him to play really anywhere. However he'd probably stay an offensive player; maybe on Ubers they either do two main strikers with him and Barou as forwards or maybe they have him as left/right winger and he does more of a supportive role for Barou as he's one of the only people on the team to keep up with him offensively? He'll still be scoring goals for himself of course, and I can very easily see Blue Lock making him more of a teasing kind of guy, he'll pass to Barou once and then when Barou steals the ball from him later in the match, he says something like "Reading my moves means you care about what the rest of the team's doing! Good on you, you selfish team player." Also just imagine them playing together both as forwards like. "The King and his Crown" tell me you would not be scared to face those guys they have such a good narrative nickname.

In general—I think the opposing ideologies and playstyles of these characters make them an interesting pair. I think it would be fun to watch Kira go from detesting Barou to admiring him to considering him an ally. Barou is also a main driver of Kira developing an ego/selfishness as their bond strengthens throughout the series. I believe Barou would go from not caring about Kira (just another donkey, y'know?) to considering him a rival (not an enemy!) on equal standing. I think he would appreciate that Kira is a neat guy (headcanon) and although the friendliness can be a bit overbearing Kira seems to know when to pull back. I think Kira is important in Barou considering his team more. He obviously shouldn't change too much from his selfish ways, but I would love to see Kira giving him a little perspective switch—if he wants to command a team, he should understand his team. The most powerful king is one who knows his subjects, isn't it?

In sum, live laugh rarepair dynamics, I might actually turn these headcanons into an actual canon divergence AU because I really really wanna write for kira