I warn that I probably indulged my inner SasuSaku when it came to Sasuke's turn but I got more balls-y as the story progressed. (*whispers* how could that even be possible?) Nevertheless, I can't abandon you all now without them both in one article speaking in frivolous or smirking tones.

Behold...

Sasuke Uchiha, born and bred family-man with a penchant for being talented. Who knew? We all did.

The first time I met Sasuke Uchiha, he had just won his first collegiate championship title against Sound University and he had just turned nineteen. Fast track to now, Sasuke thinks that the game had been "extremely fun" but an incredibly lethal revelation to his super expectant parents.

Sasuke Uchiha is the son of Japan's most successful businessman by the name of Fugaku Uchiha. Though he is the youngest and second by birth to an older brother, Itachi Uchiha, there was a sort of expectation from his father that he too would dine with the nobility in the reverential boardroom table of Uchiha Corporations. He had quietly allowed to acquiesce his father's wishes by taking in Business Management as his major but he was too much his mother's passionate little boy to be fully accredited for his three years of Bachelor's.

From endorsing the biggest pair of basketball shoes ever sold to his Armani-clad behind splashed on every billboard in the country, Sasuke Uchiha has more to be said about him than what he likes to say about himself...

There's a tailored modesty in the way Uchiha Sasuke reclines when he is not over-represented in his team's colours of black and red. One could say that he's a closet aficionado, but from the way he looks in casual black slacks, a Ted Baker shirt underneath a slim-fit navy blue sweater of the same name, he looks far from the undaunted captain on court. Leaning on a signature tartan coat by one Sakura Haruno, he looks relaxed and amplified to take advantage of the end of the season and enjoy the team's overpowering win against the former defending champions of Iwagakure.

The long-held rivalry between the two teams spanned way before the young captain has made his way on the professional court at twenty-one. Is it a burden then, to be the captain on the year the Akatsuki's have finally taken the title from their greatest opponent?

"I suppose," he shrugs. "But the game has evolved ever since that [rivalry], and each team has gotten stronger, better, and faster. It's anyone's game now."

For a kid who grew up in the rather affluent section of Konoha, Uchiha Sasuke never demanded nor persuaded in self-importance. His mother encouraged his love for the game and nurtured a sense of commonality and unrelenting poignance to his fellow peers that translates on court. He is a captain with a heart of a captain.

His father, on the other hand, drilled in him the kind of work ethics he expected from his children: passion, work endurance, and resilience. Mastering the art of balance and workmanship, Sasuke enrolled himself to Konoha University by his own means at eighteen before an encouragement to apply for a scholarship became his game-changer.

"It was the best game I've ever played," he says, recalling his thirty-points and fifteen turnovers against Sound University that committed him to the starting five of every scouter in the league. The rest plays on with the Uchiha. He was selected with the fourth overall pick in the 2008 NBA Draft by the Konoha Akatsukis and after hiring former player Kakashi Hatake as head coach, the Akatsukis honed on the Uchiha's unnerving passes and incredible three-pointers, having scored a career high 26 points on a first quarter match at the Conference Semifinals against the Kirigakure Tailed Beasts.

There is an air of honesty and predilection about Sasuke Uchiha that makes you think of someone wizened beyond their years but at the same time, too charismatic for their own good. We sit in their living room at The Grand at Trafalgar (I feel blessed) where he, Sakura and Sarada occupy as they stay for the fashion week in London. The Uchihas certainly make home wherever they go in their itinerant lifestyle; Sarada's customised Akatsuki jersey - of the cutest pink and green - hangs on the side of the couch where Sasuke reclines, folders of Sakura's pre-show notes lay scattered on the dining room table, and Sasuke's work-out shoes sit by the door.

Ten years has passed since Sasuke had allowed his thoughts to wander on his failed attempt to appease his father into taking on the company. But these days, he finds himself adjusting to the idea of being a businessman. Given that his own wife has managed to bloom and blossom and competently handle her own moniker brand in an industry as fastidious and deprecatory as the fashion industry, he thinks, lamely, that he could probably make his way around it too.

I ask him what he would do if he does take Sakura's advice. As if on cue, he fishes his phone from his pocket and utters an "excuse me, would you?" before leaving to take the call.

Sasuke had been a game-changer in his line of work as much as the game has progressed. Though his heart lies on the game, having Sarada has changed his perspective in his life more than he thought it would. He thrives on being a new dad despite the game's capricious nature and he couldn't help but feel that he is getting on along in years with a game as taxing as basketball.

"It was Sakura," he returns not long after and settling himself down again. "She's asking me how everything's going. What did you think I said?"

Who knew he's a front man joker too?

He shows me a photograph of Sarada at her birthday party and qualms that she's growing up too fast, a note that Uchiha Sasuke is as much a doting father as he is a daunting machine on court. He thrives on excellency in the game, waking up as early as six a.m. to workout and a strict health and eating regimen which, fortunately for him, suits his supermodel goddess-wife. His words, not mine. But he sometimes thinks that his end in the game could possibly be approaching.

He asks me about what I thought I would do if I told him that he was planning to retire.

"I could be a full-time muse," he says. And you know that his heart has always been Sakura Haruno's as much as hers is his.

"My wife always laughs about it," mentioning my previous interview about the odyssey of their fairy tale romance always permanently discussed by the common folk. "But she didn't really remember me and I had to prove a point."

Sasuke speaks of that day ("Not that ice hockey game, that was - I can't believe that was her first impression of me.") when he first spotted Sakura at a basketball game at Konoha University. His best friend (and best man at his wedding) had snickered that she's the one he would end up marrying. But one lack of looking at his direction like the entire stadium had been, and he knew he had finally met his match.

Sasuke leans forward and pulls out his sleek smart phone from one of his pockets before typing his complicated password that was apparently Sarada's doing. "She put a combination of all our names and days of birth." He thinks that if he could have two more of her, he would retire by thirty-five.

Uchiha Sasuke had been in the limelight at twenty-one and his fame only continues to grow and no one can take for granted that as a physical specimen, he ticks the boxes: he is all angles and planes, strong and powerful but oozing charisma and charm at every breath. It's not a wonder that he is the face of Men's Health, GQ and been named People's Sexiest Man Alive. But he is self-deprecating in his looks, often avoiding the topic of how to unravel his deferential enigma. He speaks in low tones but you can feel that his shift in perspective plays heavy in his seemingly indoctrinated nature to pursue mastery over the game.

"There's a way to play the game in enjoyment and a way to play the game to be the best," he swishes his Scotch on the rocks like we're in a James Bond movie before breathing a sigh. "Players pursue greatness while others have it thrust upon them and they lose their mental stability. They need security, relationships, a family. I've learned their great importance, especially having your own, in how you play the game better. You're faster, stronger, you're more motivated. It's what gets you going."

Uchiha Sasuke doesn't insist that there is more to him than what he has given or implied. He's still young but he's come through and will continue do so. He's weathered ups and downs of marriage, career and family and that by forty, he claims that he would have outlasted the negativity often thrown at someone whose popularity, no matter the damage control, continues to grow.

In our conversation about family, life, marriage, basketball, he recollects the moment that he got suited up for the day with a sense of contentment and happiness at where he is currently at. He'd buy a pet fish with Sarada when they return to Konoha after the show, go on a holiday for an entirety of two weeks in paradise then back to routine with Sakura on the phone checking on them twice a day, listening to his little one talk to herself and her green dinosaur about papa or mama or both, and then finally taking a deep breath and settling down when the lights are all turned off, knowing all is well.

"Grateful," he says. "Just grateful."