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January 1, 2004
A Modestly Happy New Year

Nevertheless, Jubilo Iwata fans will no doubt be pleased to celebrate the team's first Emperor's Cup trophy since the start of he J.League, as well as the impressive return of veteran Masashi "Gon" Nakayama, who spent almost the entire season in 2003 sidelined by injury, but came off the bench in the final to produce a stirring surge of momentum for his team, including the eventual winning goal.

At the other end of the stadium, Cerezo Osaka fans were rueing their fourth unsuccessful trip to the final match, but could only blame their own team for the disappointing result. Though Jubilo certainly played well enough to win, it was the accumulation of unforced errors, strategic mistakes and uncharacteristically poor finishing in front of the net that cost Cerezo this match. They seemed to be slidly in control for at least two thirds of the contest, yet were unable to produce any goals to show for it. Jubilo, on the other hand, displayed a rather sloppy performance for long spells (which gave the match its somewhat "ho-hum" character), but were able to fraise the level of play when it counted and produce the winning strike.

This could have been a very different match indeed if not for a glaring mistake in the opening minute. On their very first trip down the field, young Noriyuki Sakemoto weaved through the Jubilo defence and played a cushion pass to Baron, whose return found captain Hedeaki Morishima wide open just five meters out. But Morishima foolishly ignored the open net in front of him and tried to push the ball on to an even more wide-open Yoshito Okubo, at the far most. Unfortunately, the pass was behind Okubo, and a golden opportunity to start the match off with a bang went into the books as just a botched play.

Cerezo maintained strong forechecking pressure for about the first ten minutes, dominating play more thoroughly than they woud at any other stage excet the dying minutes. But eventually the players began to tire, and the press weakened allowing Jubilo to clear their end and develop a bit of passing rhythm at midfield. For the remainder of the first half, and at least 20 minutes of the second, the match deteriorated into a busy yet not particularly effective midfield game, with the two teams bustling back and fort without producing any real chances on goal. Errant passes were disturbingly frequent for a cup final, and neither team seemed to have a very good strategy for creating goals, apart from feeding the ball to their best strikers and hoping they could produce something on their own.

The turning point in this contest was strategic, and came early in the second half as both teams began bringing in substitutes to try to add life to their attack. Cerezo made what we consider to be two serious errors, taking out the rookie, Sakemoto, for veteran Takaaki Tokushige, And then substituting attacking midfielder Nobuki Hara for Akinori Nishizawa. Though both moves were "textbook" substitutions of one slightly more offense-minded player at the same position for a tiring teammate, neither move really changed the complexion of play, which had by this time stagnated into an almost sleep-inducing rhythm of back-and-forth surges at midfield with no real result.

Shortly thereafter, Jubilo made their move, and outgoing coach Masaaki Yanagishita demonstrated his keep appreciation for what was needed to break the stasis. Pulling defensive midfielder Sho Naruoka, Yanagishita brought on the inspirational veteran Nakayama as a third striker, and had defensive midfielder Takashi Fukunishi push forward on the wing, leaving. Toshiya Hattori as the lone volante in a sort of 3-1-3-3 formation. Obviously this was a roll of the dice, since the reduced support in defensive midfield might well have been exploited by Cerezo's speedy attack force. But with the attacking midfield applying ferocious pressure on the outlet passes, Jubilo was able to forestall any dangerous counters, while suddenly creating cracks in the Cerezo defence. Nakayama's enthusiastic, pell-mell dashes in the front line left the defenders scrambling for position, allowing the calm and precise Maeda and Gral to find the crucial opening. After two or three close calls, a long lead pass down the right side in the 71 minute allowed Maeda to turn the corner and drop a pass to Nakayama breaking in towards the top of the penalty arc. Nakayama hit a one-touch lob pass towards Gral just inside the penalty box. Though a defender had Gral well marked, he failed to find the ball with a solid clearance, and after a brief scramble, Gral was able to find the handle, take a half-step into space and fire a shot into the top of the net.

That might have put the match on ice, if not for a rather silly bit of excessive celebration by Gral, whose antics following a goal have begun to get out of hand, and are becoming an annoyance not only to opposing teams but to officials as well. the referee showed Gral a yellow card for the excessive performance, and hurried the teams back to the center spot. Cerezo were now in a jam, and began to put forth more desperate efforts to try to get the equaliser. This very nearly succeeded, a mere minute later, as Okubo dashed between two defenders to snatch a loose ball, ad drove a shot off the keeper's chest. The deflection fell to Morishima, who for the second time on the afternoon had a wide open net in front of him but blew the shot. Nevertheless, Cerezo were pushing hard, and Jubilo had to resort to equally fierce tactics to keep them in check. With ten minutes to play, Gral broke up a counterattack with a foul from behind, which was a bit rough but sufficiently aimed at the ball that the referee simply called a free kick. But rather than let play continue, Gral threw himself in front of Nishizawa to try to prevent a quick kick from being taken. Nishizawa, recognising an opportunity, did his best Rivaldo imitaion and the referee, though probably recognising an Oscar-winning performance when he saw one, had little choice but to book Gral again for obstructing play.

Reduced to ten men, Jubilo had a few nail-biting moments in the final ten minutes of play. But Cerezo were not on top of their game on this particular day, and despite some heroic efforts from Okubo (including a spectacular bicycle kick that would have graced highlight reels for the next century, had it gone in), they were unable to produce the equaliser and Jubilo danced off to collect their very first Emperor's Cup.

Below is the complete outline of the 2004 Emperor's Cup tournament table.

Rumours and Rumblings