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July 21, 2002
Dont Mind the Heat; Its Just July

The post-World Cup "bounce" that the J.League enjoyed last week shows no signs of fading away. After Urawa Reds came within a whisker of selling out Saitama Stadium last weekend, FC Tokyo din the truly improbable and packed the cavernous Tokyo Soccer Stadium with 46,000 fans for their match with Jubilo this week. Several other matches drew crowds that were well above the average, particularly for a steamy night in July. Best of all, the teams gave their supporters their money's worth, playing some very exciting football in closely-fought contests. Before we begin to look at the action, though, here is a summary of this week's J1 results.

Date	Home	.	Visitor	Venue
20 Jul		3-2		Kashima Stadium
20 Jul		0-1		Ichihara Seaside
20 Jul		2-1(ET)		Kokuritsu Stad.
20 Jul		0-2		Tokyo Stadium
20 Jul		1-0		Nihondaira
20 Jul		1-2(ET)		Kobe Wing
21 Jul		2-1		Kokuritsu Stad.
21 Jul		3-2(ET)		Expo '70 Stadium

3-2

The Antlers' started off with a surge of pressure on the Kashiwa goal, and they very nearly took an early lead as Augusto took the ball deep into the corner and crossed in to midfielder Masashi Motoyama at the top of the box. But Motoyama's shot was inches wide of the right post. As the first half developed, the two teams assumed the strategies that are most typical when the two play one another, with the Antlers controlling posession in midfield and trying to crack the opposing defence, and Reysol sagging back into their own end, looking for a counterattack. Kashiwa have traditionally depended on solid defending, and this match was no different. Despite the fact that the Antlers had the vast majority of possession inthe first half, it was Reysol who struck first. In the 20 minute, Tomonori Hirayama got free on a conterattack and carried the ball down the right sideline before crossing into the box. Reysol's Korean ace, Yoo Sang-Chul sped into the box and met the cross in full stride, driving a powerful header past the keeper to put Kashiwa in the lead.

Reysol's advantage lasted until the break, but when the Antlers emerged from the locker room, they quickly ratcheted up the pressure to an even higher level, and quickly saw results. Seven minutes into the second stanza, Mitsuo Ogasawara collected a cleared ball up the right side and lobbed a perfect cross onto the head of Kashima's newest player, Elias De Carvalho (Euller), as he cut into the box. For the second week in a row, Euller showed what a fine finisher he can be, nodding the ball over his shoulder and into the low left corner.

After celebrating their equalizer, the Antlers went right back on the attack, not relinquishing the pressure in the slightest. Ten minutes after Euller's first goal, his strike partner Atsushi Yanagisawa came within a whisker of getting one of his own, with a blistering header that was denied only by a spectacular, acrobatic save by Yuta Minami. However, the rebound fell softly to Yutaka Akita, who was trailing the play, and he was able to tuck the ball away at the opposite post.

Despite playing on the back foot all night long, Reysol refused to abandon hope. Just one minute after Akita's strike, Reysol got a quick conterattack that caught the Antlers defence with its guard down. Mitsuteru Watanabe carried the ball into the box, to the right of goal, and at the last possible second he cut the ball back at a difficult angle to Hideaki Kitajima, at the right post. Kitajima flicked the ball on, and caught keeper Hitoshi Sogahata unprepared. His shot slipped just inside the far post, knotting the score once more.

But as the clock ticked down, Toninho Cerezo brought on striker Yoshiyuki Hasegawa, a wily veteran with a long history of late-match heroics. The move paid off immediately. As the match went into injury time, Akira Narahashi won a free kick from the right corner and lobbed it to the far post. As he has done so many times before, Hasegawa eluded his defender and slipped into space, heading the ball home to give Kashima a last-second victory.

Lineups:
Hitoshi Sogahata, Fabiano, Yutaka Akita, Akira Narahashi, Augusto, Koji Nakata, Koji Kumagai , Mitsuo Ogasawara, Masashi Motoyama (Yoshiyuki Hasegawa 88), Atsushi Yanagisawa (Takuya Nozawa 77), Euller
Yuta Minami (Dai Sato 75), Shigenori Hagimura, Takeshi Watanabe (Kensuke Nebiki 65), Norihiro Satsukawa, Tomokazu Myojin, Mitsuteru Watanabe, Cesar Sampaio, Tomonori Hirayama, Harutaka Ono, Yoo Sang-Chul, Hideaki Kitajima (Tadamichi Machida 83)

2-1(ET)

As was the case last week, the Reds showed a great deal of attacking flair, driven mainly by the Brazilian strike team of Tuto and Emerson, point man Masahiro Fukuda and right wing Nobuhisa Yamada, whose play at both ends of the field has reached the point where, surely, he deserves at least a chance to show what he can do on the national team. Unfortunately, as was the case last week, the Reds also showed the tendency to fall asleep on defence, and allow dangerous counters. One such error put them in a hole at half time, as Consadole managed to turn their only real scoring opportunity of the first half into a goal. In the 8 minute, as Sapporo broke out of their end, a long lob found midfielder Naoki Sakai streaking down the right sideline with no Reds defender in sight. Although it looked like he may have been marginally offside, the fact that he was given so much space to run into shows that Urawa still needs to plug some gaps in the back line. As Sakai curled in towards the edge of the box, he spotted Takafumi Ogura cutting for goal, in support, and lobbed a perfect cross onto the tall striker's head. Ogura had only to nod the ball down and into the low corner for Sapporo's first goal.

The Reds responded with fierce pressure on the Consadole goal, and in the 28 minute, a spectacular run by Emerson knotted the score. Emerson picked up the ball about five meters inside his own half, and turned on the warp engines. Like the proverbial Red Ball Express, Emerson blew right past one defender and hurtled shoulder to shoulder with a second defender towards the right post. With no one else back for Sapporo, Tuto trailed the play towards the left post with acres of open pasture around him, awaiting the cross that was sure to come. But Emerson went all the way into the box, and only cut the ball back at the last second. It is hard to say whether he intended it as a shot or a pass, since Tuto was in position to tap the ball home if it had strayed wide. But the ball caught the inside of the left post and bounded into the net.

Urawa continued to create opportunities for the remainder of the match, but repeatedly missed the last shot. The most egregious error of the night came after a blistering shot by Emerson from the edge of the box was blocked by the keeper, and fell right to Harison, five meters out and with a wide-open goal in front of him. But Harison rushed his vollen, and sent it over the bar. For their part, Sapporo had two or three dangerous counters, which continued to show up the leaky defending by Urawa, but none of them came to anything. Regulation time ended with the score still 1-1, and Urawa faced the dreaded golden goal extra time, which has been their bane all season long.

This week, however, the Reds finally managed to rewrite the script. In the 14 minute of extra time, Urawa won a throw in on the right sideline. Yamada took a long throw to the top right corner of the box, where veteran Fukuda headed it on. Timing his run perfectly, the Reds' young striker Tatsuya Tanaka, who came on as a late substitution, swooped in and headed a bullet into the back of the net, sending the 28,000 fans into roars of celebration.

Lineups:
Nobuhiro Yamagishi, Tadaaki Tsuboi, Masami Ihara, Ichiei Muroi, Nobuhisa Yamada, Hideki Uchidate, Harison, Ryuji Michiki (Tadaaki Hirakawa 73), Masahiro Fukuda, Tuto (Tatsuya Tanaka 96), Emerson
Yohei Sato, Yasuyuki Konno, Tsuyoshi Furukawa, Tomohiro Wanami Hitoshi Morishita, Biju (Tomokazu Hirama 66), Naoki Sakai (Ryuji Tabuchi 70), Koji Yamase, Jadilson, Bajak, Takafumi Ogura (Yushi Soda 98)

0-2

Jubilo got the scoring started in the 16 minute, on a sparkling combination play started by midfielder Hiroshi Nanami. Picking up a pass about 40 meters from goal, Nanami spotted Takashi Fukunishi slanting into the box, and lobbed a pass over the defence that led the midfielder perfectly. Catching up with the ball just before it went over the end line, Fukunishi cut a low line drive across the face of goal, and Naohiro Takahara collected the cross for a very easy put-in behind the stranded keeper.

Tokyo did its best to battle back, and nearly knotted the score just after half time, when Ishikawa made a sparkling run towards the box from the right side, and unleashed a blast that Arno VanZwam was just barely able to tip round the post. But just a few minutes later, Jubilo added an insurance goal on a corner kick from the left side. Once again, it was Takahara who sailed over the pack to head the ball home. Jubilo then fended off the desperate efforts of Tokyo to get back into the match, and claimed a well-deserved victory.

Lineups:
Yoichi Doi, Ryuji Fujiyama (Teruyuki Moniwa 80), Jean Carlo Witte, Tetsuya Ito, Akira Kaji, Takahiko Shimotaira (Tetsuhiro Kina 63), Masashi Miyazawa, Naohiro Ishikawa, Kelly, Mitsuhiro Toda, Kenji Fukuda (Amaral 45)
Arno VanZwam, Go Oiwa (Takahiro Kawamura 80), Makoto Tanaka, Takahiro Yamanishi, Toshihiro Hattori, Toshiya Fujita, Takashi Fukunishi, Jo Kanazawa, Hiroshi Nanami, Rodrigo Gral (Nobuo Kawaguchi 57), Naohiro Takahara (Yasumasa Nishino 87)

1-0

After his missed assignments cost Shimizu a match last weekend, national team winger Alex Santos found himself riding the pine, as coach Zemunovic opted to use a veteran defender, Takuma Koga, at right wing. The defensive orientation helped to contain Vegalta's active attack, centering on midfielder Teruo Iwamoto and strikers Marcos and Yoshiteru Yamashita. Though both teams had a few opportunities in the first half, none was truly dangerous. It was not until the 54 minute that S-Pulse finally broke the deadlock. Striker a href="../../jleague/spulse/kuboyama.html">Yoshikiyo Kuboyama set up the play with a nice spin move to get past his defender, abotu 35 meters from goal, and then threaded a pass to Baron, cutting into the box. The quick turn and pass caught Vegalta's defence flat-footed, and before they could close in on Baron, he pulled the trigger and sent his shot into the low left corner.

Vegalta tried to get back into the match, but the solid checking at midfield by S-Pulse reduced them to long, searching passes for Marcos and Yamashita, which were closed down fairly easily by the S-Pulse back line. In the end, Shimizu's wall was too hard to crack, and their lone goal stood up as the winner.

Lineups:
Masanori Sanada, Tomohiro Ikeda, Ryuzo Morioka, Toshihide Saito, Takuma Koga, Daisuke Ichikawa, Kazuyuki Toda, Teruyoshi Ito, Masaaki Sawanobori (Kohei Hiramatsu 74), Baron, Yoshikiyo Kuboyama (Alessandro Santos 67)
Norio Takahashi, Kenji Suzuki, Ricardo Ribeiro, Norio Omura, Tomohiro Katanosaka, Naoki Chiba, Silvinho, Nobuyuki Zaizen (Kazuhiro Murakami 61, Shin Nakamura 76), Teruo Iwamoto, Yoshiteru Yamashita (Shinya Mitsuoka 86), Marcos

0-1

It wasnt until twenty minutes into the second half that the scoreless drought was finally broken. As has been the case time and again over the past two seasons, the goal was created by midfielder Chikara Fujimoto and striker Tatsuhiko Kubo. After a good exchange in the midfield with Yuki Matsushita, Fujimoto split two defenders and cut towards the box. As the back line tried to react to his drive, Fujimoto chipped the ball in front of goal, and Kubo soared through the air to head it into the nylon.

Lineups:
Takashi Shimoda, Yuichi Komano, Michel Pensee Billong, Marcus Tulio Tanaka, Kota Hattori, Kazuyuki Morisaki, Kentaro Sawada Shinya Kawashima, Yuki Matsushita, Chikara Fujimoto, Susumu Oki (Yutaka Takahashi 78), Tatsuhiko Kubo
Ryo Kushino, Takayuki Chano, Zelko Milinovic, Eisuke Nakanishi, Masataka Sakamoto (Takenori Hayashi 69), Shinichi Muto (Shigetoshi Hasebe 50), Yuki Abe, Shinji Murai, Tadatoshi Masuda (Naotake Hanyu 79), Katsutomo Oshiba, Mitsutoshi Watada

2-1(ET)

The score remained 1-0 until the dying seconds of the second half. But just when it looked like they had the match wrapped up, Kobe scored a late equalizer on an unchallenged breakaway. For the second week in a row, their lone goal was scored by a defender, Sidiclei. This is certainly not a good sign on a team that has worked to obtain several big-name strikers over the past two years, including Shoji Jo, Ryuji Bando and Kazu Miura, not to mention two strikers-turned-midfielder, in Masayuki Okano and Masaya Nishitani. To make matters worse, Sidiclei followed up his goal with a second yellow card, which reduced Kobe to ten men, three minutes into the extra period.

After regulation time expired with the two teams deadlocked at 1-1, Park played the hero, scoring the winning goal 14 minutes into the first period of extra time. Park picked up the deflection of a shot from Shingo Suzuki, at the top of the box, and hammered it into the low right corner.

Lineups:
Makoto Kakegawa, Sidiclei, Yukio Tsuchiya, Kunie Kitamoto (Takeshi Hirano 76), Shigeyoshi Mochizuki, Ataliba, Masaya Nishitani (Daniel 76), Masayuki Okano (Koji Yoshimura 86), Kazu Miura, Ryuji Bando, Shoji Jo
Naoto Tsuboi, Kazuhiro Suzuki, Kazuki Teshima, Makoto Kakuta, Tadashi Nakamura, Daisuke Saito (Shigeki Tsujimoto 110), Kiyotaka Ishimaru, Makoto Atsuta (Park Ji-Sung 58), Teruaki Kurobe (Yusaku Ueno 71), Daisuke Matsui (Daisuke Nakaharai 71)

2-1

Early in the match, things did not go entirely the Marinos way. Despite their poor record this season, Tokyo Verdy are improving steadily, and they put up a good fight. Over the first 20 minutes, in fact, Verdy held the upper hand, and this point was enphasized when a well-placed free kick by Edmundo put them in the early lead. After Marquinhos was fouled about four meters outside the penalty area, Edmundo lined up and took a perfectly placed shot, which split the wall and snuck into the left corner.

But this was Nakamura's night, and he did his best to go out on a positive note. After flubbing one free kick early in the half, Nakamura got another chance in the 34 minute, from about six meters outside the box, on the right side. This time, his kick was well placed, falling right between the keeper and the onrushing Marinos players. Daijiro Takakuwa came off his line, and seemed to have the ball in his sights, but rather than trying to catch the hard shot, he elected to punch it out. Unfortunately, he punched the ball directly into the back of Naza's head. and the ball ricocheted back into the goal.

After the fluke goal by Naza, Nakamura put the cap on the evening by winning a PK on a drive into the box. Nakamura split his two defenders and drove for goal, then went down as all three players collided. Though there certainly was body contact, the referee was rather generous in awarding a PK. All the same, this gave Nakamura a chance to convert his own penalty, and thus tally what may be his last J.League goal.

Verdy shuffled their lineup in the second half to try to get back into the game, but excellent defensive play by Yokohama, and particularly by captain Naoki Matsuda, shut down their attack and allowed the Marinos to cruise through the second half without conceding any truly dangerous chances. The match ended with the score unchanged, at 2-1 for Yokohama.

Lineups:
Tatsuya Enomoto, Yuji Nakazawa, Naoki Matsuda, Naza, Yasuhiro Hato, Yoshiharu Ueno, Daisuke Oku, Dutra, Shunsuke Nakamura (Daisuke Sakata 89), Norihisa Shimizu (Akihiro Endo 83), Will (Tomoyuki Hirase 71)
Daijiro Takakuwa, Seitaro Tomisawa, Naoki Soma, Alexandre Lopez, Takuya Yamada, Daigo Kobayashi (Kazuki Hiramoto 63), Masayuki Yanagisawa (Yoshiyuki Kobayashi 45), Hayuma Tanaka, Michiuyasu Osada (Hideki Nagai 45), Edmundo, Marquinhos

3-2(ET)

The match started in a rush, as Gamba got the scoring started in the 7 minute on a sparkling combination play by the two forwards. Toru Araiba lobbed a lead pass into the penalty area, and Kota Yoshihara dashed onto it, volleying the ball out of the air and right at the feet of Magrao. The big striker pulled the trigger qwuickly and Gamba were in front, 1-0.

However, Grampus responded just as quickly. Just five minutes after conceding the lead, Nagoya produced a highlight reel play of their own, as Croatian/Austrian striker Ivica Vastic Rounded his defender on the left wing and sent a slant pass to Nagoya's impressive young midfielder, Naoshi Nakamura. Nakamura put on a burst of speed to split the last two defenders and send a thundering drive inside the left post.

Just before half time, Magrao got his second goal, though this time most of the credit goes to Shigeru Morioka who, like Magrao, has been a revelation since the World Cup break after a rather unimpressive start to the season. Morioka received the ball on a counterattack, and made a zigzagging drive into the box for a solid shot on goal. The ball was blocked by Seigo Narazaki, but the rebound fell right to Magrao for the easy head-in.

Shortly after the intermission, Vastic got his first J.League goal on a stinging line drive from the edge of the box, which was set up by a fine drop pass from Ueslei. The two teams then traded thrusts for the final 40 minutes, but neither was able to break the deadlock. Regulation time ended with the score all even at 2-2. But just 3 minutes after the restart, Gamba clinched victory on a drive from reserve striker Masanobu Matsunami , whose 25-meter blast off a clearance from inside the box looked like a replay of Vastic's goal, but for the other team.

Lineups:
Ryota Tsuzuki, Hiroshige Yanagimoto (Tsuneyasu Miyamoto 64), Satoshi Yamaguchi, Masao Kiba, Toru Araiba, Shigeru Morioka (Masayuki Matsunami 81), Yasuhito Endo, Fabinho (Marcelinho Carioca 53), Takahiro Futagawa, Kota Yoshihara, Magrao
Seigo Narazaki, Masahiro Koga, Andrej Panadic, Masayuki Omori, Tomoyuki Sakai, Motohiro Yamaguchi, Kei Yamaguchi (Kunihiko Takizawa 90), Yusuke Nakatani, Naoshi Nakamura, Ivica Vastic, Ueslei

And so, this is how the standings look after nine matches. Yokohama Marinos hold their two-point lead over Jubilo Iwata, while Gamba slip one point further off the pace, despite their win. Vegalta and Kashima are still in the race, but will have to make a move soon if they hope to have a chance of success. Kyoto Purple Sanga have advanced to a respectable seventh place, while Vissel Kobe, Consadole Sapporo and Verdy Tokyo all look like good candidates for relagation.

Rumours and Rumblings

Kawabuchi Takes Over JFA Reins

Film clips courtesy of Internet Soccer Program J-Ole. Visit their web site at http://www.j-ole.com/ for results and highlights of all J.League matches.

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