Kawasaki Frontale 4 - 2 Avispa Fukuoka
Well, that turned out to be a decent week didn’t it? I’m currently desperately trying to work out what things I did differently before these games to unlock the mystery of how we managed to win two games in a row. The only connection I can find at the moment is that we seem to always win the game after I go to see a very loud gig. If you would like me to continue this streak, please send me donations asap. So now we have a 100% record in the ACL group so far without having conceded a goal and we’ve made it to the final of the Emperor’s Cup. In a recent post I pondered whether the 4-3-3 formation wasn’t actually the problem and it was instead the 4-3-3 with Ienaga playing on the right. He came back in this game and we scored four times so that shows how much I know, doesn’t it? Perhaps the real difference is that we’ve got a bit of confidence back. It’s not surprising that our morale has taken a bit of a battering this year as disappointing result after disappointing result came our way. And if a late goal in the ACL is enough to boost us, that certainly works for me. Of course, all of this positivity could come crashing down after a couple of terrible performances, but let’s enjoy it while we can. The scoreline suggests this was a hugely entertaining game with swashbuckling attack. The truth is slightly different I feel. Normally when reflecting on a game to write a blog post, I check and see if the stats reflect how I felt. For some reason stats for this game are very difficult to find and my normal site suggests that there were only eight shots in the entire match, six of which were goals. However the official Frontale site disagrees with this. The point I was looking to check was whether the first half was quite as bad as I remember it being and perhaps it was. We scored from a corner though! And I have to say that Wakizaka’s corners were a lot better in this game. There was some variation which helps, as normally there is only one variety of corner which is the one where he places it perfectly on the head of the first defender. But in this match, we looked dangerous! Which is a bit of luck, as in the first half as aside from the goal I don’t remember us doing much. The official site says we had two shots so that suggests that I was about right. We started quite well, (as obviously evidenced by the goal), but soon retreated back into our usual ineffective ways. The game got quite fiery and Avispa seemed to up for a scrap. From my obviously biased point of view, they seemed an extremely dirty team, and if their tactics were to attempt to kick us out of our comfort zone, it certainly worked. However, I'm not sure this can explain why we missed another penalty, (another shocker from Damiao, and this time they didn’t give us a second chance!), and conceded a totally horrible goal, basically giving them the ball from our throw in, just before half time.
Immediately after half time, it was a really different game. It seemed that their manager had put a rocket up their arses, whilst ours had put a sedative in our sports drinks. We were really bad right at the start of the second half. But we managed to shake out of it after about five horrible minutes where it looked like we were going to be in a lot of trouble. When we retook the lead through a significantly deflected Tachibanada shot into the same goal he’d scored against Ulsan four days before, things became a bit more comfortable. Marcinho’s goal was a lot of fun and Song-Ryung was delighted with his assist. And Damiao getting a goal from open play seemed to please him greatly. Much better than scoring another penalty. (Presumably he had been thinking the same as he took his run up). I have to say, I can’t really remember their second goal, only being aware of the fact that it was scored after the allotted injury time had expired, but at the same time acknowledging that during that time and before the ninety minutes were up, we’d been doing some magnificent time-wasting. A particular highlight was Ienaga telling Yamane to slow down when he went to jog to take a throw in. And of course, it’s always great to see Ienaga get subbed and have him leave the pitch so slowly that you start to think that perhaps time has stopped and gone into reverse. I say always, but I do remember moaning about him doing this when we were losing once so maybe always isn’t quite the right word. This wasn’t the greatest performance, but in 2023 I think we can really enjoy winning emphatically when we haven’t played particularly amazingly. The mood in the pub post game was quite different than it had been after the Niigata game and I don’t think this was all connected to the fact that this win had taken us to a final. I guess the big difference between this and other recent games is that we somehow took our chances in this game. Maybe that should be the tactical direction for all matches in the future. Such a simple game plan that I’m confused why we didn’t try it before. I’m not sure we did anything particularly differently in this game and there certainly weren’t any surprising selections. So I guess it’s mainly down to luck. And hopefully that will continue for the foreseeable future. I wonder if Gomis will ever score for us. He didn’t even make it on to the pitch in this game, even for the last five minutes, Right now, he looks like being a (presumably) expensive bench warmer. Although perhaps his arrival has reinvigorated Damiao, so maybe it was worth the money after all.
A few words about Avispa and the ref and VAR. As I mentioned above Avispa were pretty physical. Which makes it all the more surprising that Grolli goes down so easily. I know we were all expecting him to drop to the floor clutching some part of his body, urging the ref to call the police so they could arrest his assailant. But I don’t think anyone expected him to do this within the first 15 seconds of the game. Truly impressive rapidity in living up to his reputation! I haven’t seen a replay of Ideguchi’s tackle on Seko but it looked a bit dodgy at the time and I’ve been told that it was very surprising that it wasn’t changed to a red by VAR. Oh, VAR, how many times did we meet in this game? The ref Nakamurra, (had him once before, didn't moan much, but said he didn't like giving cards), seemed to want to check everything he possibly could. Perhaps recent events in the English Premier League might have encouraged refs to make sure that they don’t make any errors but Nakamura’s desire to check everything got quite tedious, quite quickly. Particularly when it didn’t change Ideguchi’s yellow to a red (wink). This ref loved referring to VAR so much that he probably asked it whether or not he needed to have a piss at half time. I know I’ve already made this ‘joke’ twice, but the third time’s a charm, isn’t it? At times it also seemed like he’d forgotten (again) that he could book players as plenty of bad tackles weren’t considered bad enough for a yellow. He did think Wakizaka’s foul was worthy of one though. If you showed someone that tackle and Ideguchi’s one and were told that both got the same punishment, I suspect they might be a bit surprised. I dunno, he was a bit rubbish, but I don’t think he was anywhere near as bad as some of the higher profile refs are. And I think that even though he used VAR to check everything, I don’t think it overturned any of his decisions for right or wrong, so maybe he did a decent job. Well either that or the VAR guy was useless too. Actually, it’s probably the latter, isn’t it?
Next up, a week and a half off, before we face… Avispa Fukuoka at home again on Friday 20th, this time in the league. Then, just four days later. we’re away in the ACL in Thailand. Not sure any of the currently injured players will be back by then. Hopefully we can give Avispa another pasting and then continue our positive start in the ACL. As I think I keep saying, we’re not playing particularly better than we were before, but somehow now, things have gone our way slightly, and long may that continue!
Team
GK 1. JUNG Sung-Ryong
DF 13. YAMANE Miki
DF 31. YAMAMURA Kazuya
DF 2. NOBORIZATO Kyohei
MF 8. TACHIBANADA Kento
MF 16. SEKO Tatsuki (Yellow card 28')
MF 14. WAKIZAKA Yasuto (Yellow card 66')
FW 41. IENAGA Akihiro
FW 9. LEANDRO DAMIAO (Yellow card 82')
FW 23. MARCINHO
Subs
GK 99. KAMIFUKUMOTO Naoto
MF 6. JOAO SCHMIDT (on for SEKO 75')
FW 17. TONO Daiya
FW 18. Bafetimbi GOMIS
FW 20. YAMADA Shin (on for LEANDRO DAMIAO 90+5')
DF 29. TAKAI Kota (on for IENAGA 90+2')
FW 30. SEGAWA Yusuke (on for MARCINHO 75')
My Frontale Man Of The Match
Damiao worked really hard in this game and looks like he’s getting back to where he was a few years ago. But it would be a bit of a shock if he got this as he missed his penalty. I don't know if people see the same things I do so maybe they won’t agree with me, but given that he spent most of the game skillfully avoiding being booted by the Avispa midfield, and the rest of the game being booted by them, I’m going to give this to …
SEKO Tatsuki - looks very comfortable on the ball and even though some of his passes go astray, that’s probably because he’s passing forwards instead of sideways or backwards.
SEKO Tatsuki - looks very comfortable on the ball and even though some of his passes go astray, that’s probably because he’s passing forwards instead of sideways or backwards.
Goals
YAMAMURA (Frontale) 5' 1-0
KANAMORI (Avispa) 42' 1-1
TACHIBANADA (Frontale) 53' 2-1
MARCINHO (Frontale) 70' 3-1
LEANDRO DAMIAO (Frontale) 81' 4-1
TSURUNO (Avispa) 90+6' 4-2
Highlights
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