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National Team Match: |
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Zico Japan reached a new low in their contest against Hungary, not only losing the match to a rather weak opponent, but playing such pitifully poor football over the first 70 minutes of play that it was almost impossible to watch. The subtitle of this fiasco is not hard to write; "To Thine Own Self be True". The horrendous performance put on by the national team over much of this contest was a direct result of Zico's foolish decision to take the advice of his detractors, abandon the system which he believes in, and select players based on their ppularity among the Japanese paparazzi, rather than their ability to play football. Amazingly, Japan very nearly pulled the match out of the firre, when Zico finally hauled off the Jubilo pretenders who had been stinking up the stadium and brought in the much-maligned Masashi Motoyama, who proceeded to singlehandedly engineer a comeback that -- if not for a pitifully poor free kick from the edge of the box by Atsuhiro Miura -- might have produced a comeback victory. But in the end, the better team prevailed. Hungary deserved this win, considering how thoroughly they outplayed Japan over the first 70 minutes. Aalthough some may dispute the penalty kick, awarded in injury time after a seemingly innocuous shove in the back by Takayuki Chano, it was little more than poetic justice for the home side.
If ANYTHING good comes out of this match, it will be the fact that the clueless Jubilo fanboys in the media finally have to shut up and let the national team be run by somebody who at least has SOME clue about which players have the ability to play at the international level. Not to be overly harsh on the worst offenders, but for all his finishing skills, Norihro Nishi has always demonstrated a total lack of positioning sense, as well as a tendency to try to do too much himself. Moreover his passing skills, while perhaps not that bad by J.League standards, are by no means National team quality. We have debated Toshiya Fujita's poor suitability for the national team at length, in the past, and can only add that at this stage of NT preparation, there is no point in naming a player who will surely be over-the-hill when the ball is kicked off at WC2006. If age is not a consideration, then Zico surely should have named Hiroshi Nanami, rather than Fujita, since the former is far more skilled, not to mention mentally solid, and is far more deserving of a chance to put on the blue Japan shirt. Makoto Tanaka, meanwhile, is a brutal thug who has managed a reasonable degree of career success only due to the fact that incompetent J.League officials dont penalise him for his blatantly illegal defending tactics. But as quickly became apparent in this match (particularly on the fould he committed that led to the first Hungary goal), international referees do not simply look the other way because Tanaka happens to be a Jubilo prima donna.
The only Jubilo player who really deserves to be playing at this level is Takashi Fukunishi, and even he has his weaknesses -- particularly in long passing and ball control against pressure. These weaknesses were on display against Hungary, though it may simply be that Fukunishi was having a bad night.
The result of Zico's "experiment" with a three-back formation and a Jubilo-studded midfield was, without any doubt whatsoever, the most dreadfully dull, sloppy and disappointing 70 minutes of NT football that we have witnessed in the past decade. Even colour commentator Ruy Ramos -- who professed his fanboyish admiration for Nishi, Fujita and Fukunishi at the start of the telecast -- could barely disguise his disgust at the appallingly poor passing and horrendous movement off the ball. After a first half that virtually silenced the crowd (it was hard to say whether they were all asleep, or just retching with disgust), a blundering hack from behind by Tanaka on Hungary's ace striker gave Japan's opponents their first free kick opportunity just a few meters outside the box, on the left side. Inexplicably, nobody went to cover the near post, and when the Hungarian kicker sent the ball for the post, defender Attila Kuttor was able to poke it into the near corner, unchallenged.
Yet even after going down by a goal, Japan simply seemed incapable of lifting their performance. As passes continued to go astray (Nishi must have thought his team was playing in white, since nearly all of his passes over the course of the match went to Hungarian players) and defensive assingments continued to be missed (Takayuki Chano did as poorly as Tanaka in failing to remain with his man, and even Keisuke Tsuboi looked uncertain, at the heart of the defence), you could tell that theings were only going to get worse. Sure enough, in the 68 minute a counterattack by Hungary produced a 3-on-3 rush, and the cross from the wing was inch-perfect for Roland Juhasz, in full sprint, who sent a powerful header past the keeper.
At last, Zico seemed to realise what a fiasco was brewing, and to his belated credit, he pulled the three worst offenders -- Nishi, Fukunishi and Fujita -- and replaced them with Akira Kaji, Atsuhiro Miura and Masashi Motoyama.
The difference in the team's play between the first 71 minutes and the performance after Motoyama stepped onto the pitch, in the 72 minute, was like the difference between a chokingly hot August night in a cramped Kyoto condominium, and a brilliantly brisk April afternoon in the cherry-blossom-bedecked hillsides of Yamanashi. It was like the sun rising in a clearing sky after a deadly typhoon, or a fountain of sweet, sparkling water in a desert of dreary decreptitude. Within 30 seconds of taking the pitch, Motoyama made a dash down the left side and just missed connections with Kubo on his cross into the box. But on the very next play, Kaji ran an overlap and was fed into the box by Kubo, for a shot that screamed just wide. Three minutes after the "watershed" substitution, Kubo fed a pass towards Motoyama, at the top of the penalty arc. Though the ball was behind him, Motoyama lunged at it valiantly and managed to get just enough contact on the ball to push it past the last defender, to Reysol striker Keiji Tamada, who buried his uncontested shor in the low left corner.
After pulling a goal back, the surge of momentum energised the entire team, and Japan suddenly had Hungry on the ropes. Two minutes after the first goal, Motoyama dribbled through the defence and, spotting acres of open space in the box, pushed a soft ball into the path of Kubo. The Marinos ace held up his run to avoid the offside trap, and when Motoyama released the ball, dashed forward into the open pasture for an easy half-volley. Suddenly, the score was tied and Japan were on a roll! With just minutes left to play, Motoyama nearly put the cap on a truly heroic rescue effort, making a weaving dash through the Hungarian defence and turning towards goal sith just one man to beat. But the defender took no chances, and hauled Motoyama down at the edge of the box, and Atsuhiro Miura squandered what could have been the decisive free kick, ballooning it over the crossbar.
As injury time ran down, Hungary got a last counterattack, and as Chano and a Hungarian striker, Husztsi chased the last pass, Chano jostled his man in the back -- inadvertaently, it seemed, but enough to prompt the opportunistic Husztsi to throw himself to the pitch. The acting job was good enough to convince the referee, and Hungary claimed the win. Given the pathetic performance of Japan's starting players, over the first 70 minutes, this result was nothing less than they deserved. Nevertheless, considering how vastly different the team performed once pretenders like Nishi and Fujita were replaced with legitimate offensive threats like Kaji and Motoyama, one must simply hope that this result provides a clear lesson for Zico, and he resists any further temptation to alter his tactics and player selection on the basis of what might be "popular" with the sports tabloids.
National Team
Overseas Players
Japan 2 - 3 Hungary 