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September 5, 2004

No Place Like Home for a Soggy Nabisco

Sure enough, on a stormy September evening, all four home teams won their matches and advanced to the semifinal round. Furthermore, all but one of the matches were close, nail-biting affairs on extremely sloppy surfaces, in which the home field advantage surely played a part. Even the one match that was determined by a lopsided margin is a bit deceptive, since it was a close contest until late in the second half, and if the tournament had used a two-leg format, Gamba Osaka might have been more cautious after falling behind to FC Tokyo, knowing that they had a chance to recoup their deficit in the home leg. For a tournament that is already widely disparaged by some members of the press, this was not a good way to decide the four semifinalists. The only silver lining in all of this is that both Tokyo teams advanced to meet each other in one semifinal. Thus, at least half of the semifinal round will not be affected by a home field advantage.

Date	Home	.	Away
Sep 4		2-1 (ET)
Sep 4		2-1
Sep 4		3-2
Sep 4		4-1

3 - 2

Like the other three quarterfinal matches, this contest would be affected from start to finish by a steady downpour, but once again the Saitama Red Army turned out in force despite the elements, and cheered their team on throughout the contest. The character of the match was set in the first 15 minutes, as both teams came out at a blistering pace. Twelve minutes into the contest, Yokohama got the first break as a very minimal challenge at the right top corner of the box earned Makoto Hasebe a foul, and Yokohama a free kick from point-blank range. Daisuke Oku played a brilliant free kick, which curled over the wall, hooked towards the far post and caught the underside ofthe crossbar. Even reading the direction properly, keeper Ryota Tsuzuki never had a chance, and the Marinos were in the lead

But it took just three minutes for the Reds to return to parity, with a little luck of their own. As the Reds pressed hard against the Marinos back line, three attempts to penetrate failed to put a dent in the wall of blue jersies. But as he pulled the ball back for a fourth attempt, Nobuhisa Yamada slightly mishit a centering pass, and it rolled past Keita Suzuki towards an open space at the top of the penalty arc. Koji Yamase was the first to react, dashing forward from midfield towards the rolling ball. Two Marinos defenders also reacted, but were a half step late. Yamase's first touch pushed the ball past their outstretched legs, and his momentum took him into the wide-open spaces of the penalty box. All he had to do was slip the ball by the stranded keeper, and the score was level at 1-1.

The two teams battled back and forth for the remainder of the half, and though the Reds seemed to have a slight advantage in pace and aggressiveness, the veteran solidity of the Marinos kept play pretty much at a stalemate. It would take a spectacular individual effort to break the deadlock. Late in the half, Yuichiro Nagai surged down the right sideline, and despite fierce pressure from Dutra, managed to put on an added burst of acceleration that took him to the end line. With a lunging kick, he reached the ball just before it crossed the end line, and looped a pass in front of net. Emerson read the ball's trajectory beautifully, slipping between two defenders to catch the ball on the short-hop and drive it into the nylon.

As the second half began, the Reds threw cautiou to the wind, looking to break the Marinos backs by getting a quick goal and adding a bit of security to their lead. The pressure paid off as Emerson's speed proved too much for reserve defender Eisuke Nakanishi. The veteran's aging legs could not match those of the Reds's speedster, as he surged in from the right side, and a last desperate lunge for the ball simply produced a PK for Emerson to stuff into the right corner.

But the Marinos are not a team to lie down and die when the odds are against them. Despite the daunting challenge of pulling two goals back against a team like the Reds, they made a valiant effort at producing a comeback. Late in the second half, Daisuke Sakata scored the goal of the match with a remarkable indifidual effort. As Sakata shouldered up against the Reds defenders, just outside the penalty area, Oku lobbed a ball in hoping that Sakata could produce some sort of useful pass out of the post. But rather than simply trap the ball with his chest, with his back to goal, Sakata tried to back off and play the ball at his feet. With two Reds defenders pushingon his back, he nearly stumbled off the ball, but with a nice flick, he collected the pass and looped it over his own head while stumbling backwards into the box. Afraid of being called for a PK, both Reds defenders backed off for just an instant, and it was all Sakata needed to recover his balance, spin around, collect his own pass, and loop it over the head of the outrushing keeper.

But that was the extent of the offence that Yokohama could produce. With time running down, their efforst to add numbers to attack simply created even more dangerous counterattacking opportunities for Urawa, and though they failed to add another tally on two or threee excellent chances, down the stretch, the Reds hung on for the victory, and a place in the semifinals.

2 - 1

The second half as the exact opposite of the first, with Grampus dominating play from the opening whistle. It looked like Kashima was about to collapse, as pressure from the home team generated one scoring opportunity after another. Only some fine work in net by Hitoshi Sogahata prevented Grampus from extending their lead. But after 20 minutes of complete dominance, Nagoya suddenly found themselves victim to the same sort of shift in momentum that the Antlers suffered in the first half. Two substitutions by Kashima provided a bit of extra speed up front, and just moments after the two came on, Masaki Fukai turned the left corner and crossed to Yuki Nakashima for a wide-open header, to level the score.

But Grampus refused to relinquish their hold on the momentum, and the Antlers' depleted midfield was beginning to run out of gas. Several more Grampus scoring opportunities were turned away by Sogahata, but with ten minutes to go, Yusuke Nakatani sent a slant pass through the retreating Antlers line to Marques, who collected the ball at the left junction of the penalty arc and the box, then looped a shot into the far netting.

With time running down, the Antlers made a last desperate effort to throw numbers forward, and it very nearly paid off. Fukai used his remarkable acceleration to burst through the Grampus back line and dash into the box untouched. The keeper, Eiji Kawashima rushed out and tried to make a diving save, but Fukai pushed the ball past his sliding body and tried to hurdle into the clear. Kawashima threw up a leg and took down Fukai before he could get away for an easy tap-in, but his reward was a red card and a trip to the showers. With a chance to send the match into extra time, Fernando shanked his kick and missed the target, giving Nagoya a narrow escape in to the semifinal round.

4 - 1

Following the restart, the two teams battled back and forth for about 20 minutes, with Tokyo gradually taking hold of the match, but unable to produce a score. Finally, on the stroke of the hour, Kelly lobbed a high cross to Yoshiro Abe, about four meters out from the left post. Abe made a nice chest trap, and toed the ball inside the post to give Tokyo the lead.

This either destroyed Gamba's concentration, or gave Tokyo a boost of confidence (or perhaps a bit of both), since the next fifteen minutes saw a blaze of action in front of the Osaka goal. First, Kelly beat two defenders to the end line, on the left side, and sent a pass for the near post. Young Yohei Kajiyama threw up a boot in what looked like a karate kick, and defleted he ball inside the post with the bottom of his boot. Moments later, defender Jean Carlo Witte headed home a free kick to close out the late rush of scoring and send Tokyo into the semifinal.

2-1 (ET)

The contest between Verdy and S-Pulse was clearly the weakest of the four draws, and no doubt any one of the teams in the other three quarterfinal contests would have been happy to trade places with either of these two contestants. The standard of play was as sloppy as the pitch, and the TV cameras had to use a lot of zoom-ins on small sections of the crowd to try to hide the empty feeling that was created by having just 6,000 fans inside cavernous Ajinomoto Stadium.

S-Pulse took an early lead as their recent Korean acquisition Cho Jae-Jung sent a forty-meter line drive off the underside of the crossbar. The ricochet befuddled the keeper and bounded just across the goal line, putting S-Pulse in the lead. But Just before half time, Verdy responded on a drive by Takuya Yamada , which snuck into the right corner past the diving keeper.

Thereafter, the match remained deadlocked for 70 minutes, until the final seconds of the first overtime period. With even the tiny group of brave fans that did turn out for the match starting to drift for the exits, to escape the cold, drenching rain, Verdy won a free kick about 40 meters out, almost straight away from goal. Atsushi Yoneyama took the kick, and sent a blistering drive just over the wall and towards goal. Naoto Sakurai was dashing across the field from left to right, just behind the wall, and the line drive glanced off his shoulder as it curled towards the left post. It appeared to be just an accidental collision, but the result made Sakurai a hero, as the deflection flew just inside the right post, leaving the goalkeeper in a sprawling heap at the opposite side of the goal mouth. Thus, Verdy claimed their ticket to the semifinals, and will take on local rivals FC Tokyo in a match that should provide no home field advantage to either team, regardless of the venue.

Rumours and Rumblings

Olympic Coaches Looking for Work

The story surrounding the Japanese women's coach, Eiji Ueda, is comparatively clear-cut. Ueda earned a great deal of commendation for his work with the Olympic team, leading Japan to victory in the qualification round over their fiercest rival in Asia, North Korea, and then springing an upset of Sweden in the opening Olympic match. Though Japan lost all of its other matches, including a narrow defeat at the hands of the United States in the quarterfinal, Ueda seemed to acheive very positive results with the women, and was well regarded by his players. However, with four years to go until the next Olympics, and three years until the next women's World Cup, it would be hard for Ueda to gain much publicity or pride if he remained at the helm of the women's team. Thus, it came as no surprise when he announced plans to return to club football, following the Athens games.

Ueda began his coaching career at Bellmare Hiratsuka, and spent most of his career with that organisation starting in the 1970s when it was still the company team of Fujita Kogyo, and he was a starting midfielder. When the team joined the J.League, and changed its name to Bellmare Hiratsuka, Ueda advanced through the ranks from assistant coach to player development manager and finally head coach. However, when the team was relegated, and subsequently reorganised as "Shonan Bellmare", at the end of 1999, Ueda was sacked, and left Japan to take a position as the national team coach of Macau. Considering his strong ties to the Bellmare organisation, it came as no surprise to anyone when Ueda announced that he would retire from national team duties to take over as Shonan's new head coach.

The situation is a bit less clear for Masakuni Yamamoto, who has been involved in the men's National Teams, at the youth level, for nearly a decade. Yamamoto has taken most of the blame for Japan's weak performance in Athens, and much of this is probably deserved. His player selection and strategy throughout the campaign seemed to be poorly conceived. In his defence, he may have been dealing with a group of players that would have been difficult for any coach to whip into shape, but by the same token, he certainly did not do anything to resolve the glaring weaknesses that were apparent as early as 1999.

Upon his return from Athens, Yamamoto reportedly had some unpleasant exchanges with the JFA officials, and by last week he was telling the pres that he did not intend to complete the remaining two years of his contract with the JFA (which runs through the 2006 World Cup). On September 2, Yamamoto officially informed the JFA of his intention to step down, and though the Association did not immediately terminate his contract, his comments to the press left little doubt about the fact that there were irreconcilable differences between Yamamoto and the JFA. Though there have not been any solid reports of communication between Yamamoto and any J.League club, he did tell the press on several occasions since the September 2 JFA meeting that he wants to coach a J.League club next season. There are rumours that Jubilo Iwata may be interested in hiring Yamamoto, since that is where he got his first coaching experience. It is an open question, though, whether Jubilo fans would see this as a positive step, or a negative one.

Italian Trio Disinvited from India Match

This weekend, both Yanagisawa and Nakamura took part in the "Giuseppe Franza Memorial Tourney", an exhibition match between the three Serie A teams with Japanese members. The three-sided contest, played over three 45-minute periods, involved Yanagisawa's Messina, Nakamura's Reggina, and Fiorentina, which is currently the home of Hidetoshi Nakata. Nakata is still sidelined with a lingering groin injury, and was left out of both the lineup for the Giuseppe Franza Tourney and Japan's World Cup qualifier. However, the other two Japanese players took part in the event, playing all 45 minutes of the contest between Reggina and Messina (though both remained on the bench during the 45 mintues that their respective teams played against Fiorentina). Of the three, Yanagisawa is still the least well-known Japanese player in Italy, but he helped raise his profile by scoring the winning goal for Messina just minutes before the end of the 45-minute period. Messina drew their 45-minute contest against Fiorentina, and thus emerged as the tournament winners.