Kawasaki Frontale 0 - 0 Tokyo Verdy
After a brief diversion into the world of defeats, we’re now back in the comfortable warm embrace of draws again. We’ve now had every possible draw up to and including 3-3 in the last five games. First, the slightly crazy anything could happen, (anything including injuries to all of our squad thanks to the useless ref ‘letting the game flow’) 2-2 against Machida, then the throwing away a lead and almost turning a win into a defeat 3-3 against YFM, (where the ref was alright), and after that the 1-1 against Shimizu where another less well known ref did a decent job. To complete the set we have this 0-0 against Verdy. I’d like to make some pithy comment about it, but the fact is, this was just an abomination of a game. Although perhaps using the word abomination is giving it a bit too much credit. Certainly the standard of football on display was diabolical, but the experience of watching the match was much closer to absolute soul-crushing tedium, rather than any kind of thrilling horror show. I’ve been saying for most of the season that I feel that we’ve been holding back a bit with the ACL looming large, but in this game, we held back so much that we came close to slipping into reverse at times. Thankfully now we’ve headed off to the ACL and can stop worrying about picking up (more) injuries before and go for it 100%. However, there is one horrible nagging doubt that is lingering in the back of my mind. I really hope we have been holding back in recent games. If that was us going for it 100%… well, that’s not a very pleasant thought.
Us -
Totally understandable starting line up as far as I was concerned. Given that we hadn’t won in five games it made sense for us to start with the first choice players and get back some of those good feelings with a nice win which would help us start the Saudi part of the ACL in good spirits and good form. Admittedly there would always be the slight risk that someone might get injured and throw a spanner in the works, but given that morale is an important part of football it definitely made sense to go full strength and finally get back to winning ways. The only possible thing that could go wrong could be if the first choice players dithered their way to another disappointing result putting in another rotten performance. Oh dear… Well at least we didn’t seem to pick up any more injuries. In hindsight maybe we could have played some players who might have something to prove, but I think the win was the most important thing, so Hasebe didn’t want to risk it. Obviously we didn’t get the win though. Perhaps we could have seen some more dramatic changes a bit earlier in the game when it looked like things weren’t going our way. We definitely could have done with Kanda coming on a bit earlier. And Ito too. After all, there were no shortage of players who deserved to be changed. Whilst I think Ozeki is getting better and better, I don’t think he’s really the impact sub that some might think he is. I guess the truth is that we didn’t have that many options off the bench. Yamauchi and Verhon seem to have now very much dropped out of favour and Miyagi, who was Hasebe’s preferred reserve is now injured. As long as we are apparently determined to stick with the 4-2-3-1 or 4-3-3 or whatever you want to call it, I am worried we are going to remain as ineffective as we’ve been recently. Against Shimizu we scored when we went with two up front. And then failed to score again after we changed back to the usual formation. It’s a shame we can’t try 4-4-2 from the start of a game. But I think this is mainly due to Wakizaka, who maybe doesn’t want to play on the wing. Hasebe did say that he wouldn’t change much initially this year as we had the ACL to think about, so hopefully he will start making his own mark on the team when we’re back to thinking about the league. Hopefully that won’t be as early as next Monday morning.
Them -
There’s nothing to say in this section. Verdy weren’t very good, but neither were we. We had the ACL in mind, but I don’t know what they were holding back for. They’ve had a dodgy start to the season and having only one shot on target in a game against us in the form that we’re in at the moment doesn’t bode well for the rest of their season. Some might look at us getting a clean sheet in this match as a positive, but I think we probably could have got one even if we’d played Mecaboo (I didn’t know that was how you spell it…) as a lone centre back. I don’t have anything amusing to write here, so dull was this game. Ok, hmmm, let’s introduce a new section to pad this out a bit.
The wind -
Certainly the wind played a significant part in this match. In the first half we were kicking into it and seemed incapable of dealing with it. I was willing the first half to end as the number of times we were skewing clearances out of defence into the wind and somehow conceding a corner was starting to get a bit worrying. So bring on the second half I thought, when we could really feel the benefit. Sadly we struggled with it just as much, any apparent benefits that Verdy had got from it, deserting us when we were playing with it at our backs. I guess you could probably blame the wind for the general shitness on display from both teams.
Ref -
Ikeuchi was back again and as reliably useless as ever. On this occasion his signature move seemed to be him flapping his hand towards himself to encourage someone to take a goal kick or a throw in quickly. The rest of the match he seemed to be wandering around looking as if he were on work experience and was waiting for his mentor to tell him what to do. At one stage I was worried we might get stuck in an infinitely long match when the ball went out of play and clearly neither the ref or linesman had a clue whose throw it should be, and both waited for the other to do something. There were some truly bizarre decisions Ikeuchi made in this match, but to be honest, that’s probably exactly what we’d expect from him. Hopefully we won’t have him again for a while. It really says something that the less well known refs seem to be doing a much better job recently. Normally I’d expect them to be equally useless, but this year it seems that the less familiar names seem to know what they’re doing a bit more. Anyway, Ikeuchi was the perfect ref for this match, as we were awful and Verdy were awful, so it made sense that we had an awful ref too.
So, a terrible game that had no redeeming features as far as I’m concerned. When I checked into the game on Futbology it reminded me that exactly one year before I had been in the same seat watching us play Tokyo Verdy in a terrible game that finished 0-0. I guess some things never change! Both teams in this match seemed to want to try and play football but were incapable of doing so. It was a bit like watching your friend show you how they’re learning to juggle and instead of starting with two balls, they’ve instead jumped straight to the five chainsaws stage. There was no way it was going to end well. At the same time it felt a bit like being told that someone was going to cook you a delicious meal, but that person kept repeatedly dropping both the ingredients and the cooking utensils, the only thing they were able to keep hold of being the thought that they were a good cook. Or maybe (why not make it a trio of not quite right comparisons…) watching a 110m hurdle race between two athletes who plough into every hurdle and fall over repeatedly. It should be easy for their opponent to win, but each one seems to outdo the other when it comes to lack of ability. Funnily enough, the most entertaining and exiting part of this match was the half time relay race which was very close and did end up with someone falling just before the line as it looked like they were about to win, and smashing their face on the track. Why did I bother coming up with all those comparisons when the half time show perfectly reflected the match? Well actually, I guess the half time show did have a winner and some drama and excitement, so maybe the comparison doesn’t work so well.
Next up, our ACL quarter final against Al-Sadd of Qatar. Their recent form is five wins in a row. Our recent form is… well you don’t need reminding about that. I don’t know anything about them or their players, but that clearly is down to me rather than a reflection on them. We can be hopeful that it will be a good game and a good performance from us, but I guess it doesn’t look like that is very likely right now. I have a horrible feeling though that we’ll end up getting knocked out of this competition by our despicable neighbours YFM. Of course that would require a few things to happen before though. When you look back on the last few games, you’ve got to think that the only way is up, so let’s end on some positivity and cling to the hope that we’ve been taking it easy till now in 2025 and are about to start playing to the best of our abilities. Big fingers crossed for that.
Us -
Totally understandable starting line up as far as I was concerned. Given that we hadn’t won in five games it made sense for us to start with the first choice players and get back some of those good feelings with a nice win which would help us start the Saudi part of the ACL in good spirits and good form. Admittedly there would always be the slight risk that someone might get injured and throw a spanner in the works, but given that morale is an important part of football it definitely made sense to go full strength and finally get back to winning ways. The only possible thing that could go wrong could be if the first choice players dithered their way to another disappointing result putting in another rotten performance. Oh dear… Well at least we didn’t seem to pick up any more injuries. In hindsight maybe we could have played some players who might have something to prove, but I think the win was the most important thing, so Hasebe didn’t want to risk it. Obviously we didn’t get the win though. Perhaps we could have seen some more dramatic changes a bit earlier in the game when it looked like things weren’t going our way. We definitely could have done with Kanda coming on a bit earlier. And Ito too. After all, there were no shortage of players who deserved to be changed. Whilst I think Ozeki is getting better and better, I don’t think he’s really the impact sub that some might think he is. I guess the truth is that we didn’t have that many options off the bench. Yamauchi and Verhon seem to have now very much dropped out of favour and Miyagi, who was Hasebe’s preferred reserve is now injured. As long as we are apparently determined to stick with the 4-2-3-1 or 4-3-3 or whatever you want to call it, I am worried we are going to remain as ineffective as we’ve been recently. Against Shimizu we scored when we went with two up front. And then failed to score again after we changed back to the usual formation. It’s a shame we can’t try 4-4-2 from the start of a game. But I think this is mainly due to Wakizaka, who maybe doesn’t want to play on the wing. Hasebe did say that he wouldn’t change much initially this year as we had the ACL to think about, so hopefully he will start making his own mark on the team when we’re back to thinking about the league. Hopefully that won’t be as early as next Monday morning.
 |
| Don't be fooled. Although this looks like something exciting happened, I can assure you it didn't. |
Them -
There’s nothing to say in this section. Verdy weren’t very good, but neither were we. We had the ACL in mind, but I don’t know what they were holding back for. They’ve had a dodgy start to the season and having only one shot on target in a game against us in the form that we’re in at the moment doesn’t bode well for the rest of their season. Some might look at us getting a clean sheet in this match as a positive, but I think we probably could have got one even if we’d played Mecaboo (I didn’t know that was how you spell it…) as a lone centre back. I don’t have anything amusing to write here, so dull was this game. Ok, hmmm, let’s introduce a new section to pad this out a bit.
The wind -
Certainly the wind played a significant part in this match. In the first half we were kicking into it and seemed incapable of dealing with it. I was willing the first half to end as the number of times we were skewing clearances out of defence into the wind and somehow conceding a corner was starting to get a bit worrying. So bring on the second half I thought, when we could really feel the benefit. Sadly we struggled with it just as much, any apparent benefits that Verdy had got from it, deserting us when we were playing with it at our backs. I guess you could probably blame the wind for the general shitness on display from both teams.
Ref -
Ikeuchi was back again and as reliably useless as ever. On this occasion his signature move seemed to be him flapping his hand towards himself to encourage someone to take a goal kick or a throw in quickly. The rest of the match he seemed to be wandering around looking as if he were on work experience and was waiting for his mentor to tell him what to do. At one stage I was worried we might get stuck in an infinitely long match when the ball went out of play and clearly neither the ref or linesman had a clue whose throw it should be, and both waited for the other to do something. There were some truly bizarre decisions Ikeuchi made in this match, but to be honest, that’s probably exactly what we’d expect from him. Hopefully we won’t have him again for a while. It really says something that the less well known refs seem to be doing a much better job recently. Normally I’d expect them to be equally useless, but this year it seems that the less familiar names seem to know what they’re doing a bit more. Anyway, Ikeuchi was the perfect ref for this match, as we were awful and Verdy were awful, so it made sense that we had an awful ref too.
So, a terrible game that had no redeeming features as far as I’m concerned. When I checked into the game on Futbology it reminded me that exactly one year before I had been in the same seat watching us play Tokyo Verdy in a terrible game that finished 0-0. I guess some things never change! Both teams in this match seemed to want to try and play football but were incapable of doing so. It was a bit like watching your friend show you how they’re learning to juggle and instead of starting with two balls, they’ve instead jumped straight to the five chainsaws stage. There was no way it was going to end well. At the same time it felt a bit like being told that someone was going to cook you a delicious meal, but that person kept repeatedly dropping both the ingredients and the cooking utensils, the only thing they were able to keep hold of being the thought that they were a good cook. Or maybe (why not make it a trio of not quite right comparisons…) watching a 110m hurdle race between two athletes who plough into every hurdle and fall over repeatedly. It should be easy for their opponent to win, but each one seems to outdo the other when it comes to lack of ability. Funnily enough, the most entertaining and exiting part of this match was the half time relay race which was very close and did end up with someone falling just before the line as it looked like they were about to win, and smashing their face on the track. Why did I bother coming up with all those comparisons when the half time show perfectly reflected the match? Well actually, I guess the half time show did have a winner and some drama and excitement, so maybe the comparison doesn’t work so well.
Next up, our ACL quarter final against Al-Sadd of Qatar. Their recent form is five wins in a row. Our recent form is… well you don’t need reminding about that. I don’t know anything about them or their players, but that clearly is down to me rather than a reflection on them. We can be hopeful that it will be a good game and a good performance from us, but I guess it doesn’t look like that is very likely right now. I have a horrible feeling though that we’ll end up getting knocked out of this competition by our despicable neighbours YFM. Of course that would require a few things to happen before though. When you look back on the last few games, you’ve got to think that the only way is up, so let’s end on some positivity and cling to the hope that we’ve been taking it easy till now in 2025 and are about to start playing to the best of our abilities. Big fingers crossed for that.
Team
GK 98. YAMAGUCHI Louis
DF 5. SASAKI Asahi
DF 2. TAKAI Kota
DF 35. MARUYAMA Yuichi
DF 13. MIURA Sota
MF 19. KAWAHARA So
MF 6. YAMAMOTO Yuki
MF 41. IENAGA Akihiro
MF 14. WAKIZAKA Yasuto
MF 23. MARCINHO
FW 20. YAMADA Shin
Subs
GK 1. JUNG Sung-Ryong
FW 9. ERISON (on for YAMADA 68')
FW 11. KOBAYASHI Yu
MF 16. OZEKI Yuto (on for WAKIZAKA 80')
MF 17. ITO Tatsuya (on for IENAGA 80')
FW 26. YAMAUCHI Hinata
DF 31. VAN WERMESKERKEN Sai
DF 5. SASAKI Asahi
DF 2. TAKAI Kota
DF 35. MARUYAMA Yuichi
DF 13. MIURA Sota
MF 19. KAWAHARA So
MF 6. YAMAMOTO Yuki
MF 41. IENAGA Akihiro
MF 14. WAKIZAKA Yasuto
MF 23. MARCINHO
FW 20. YAMADA Shin
Subs
GK 1. JUNG Sung-Ryong
FW 9. ERISON (on for YAMADA 68')
FW 11. KOBAYASHI Yu
MF 16. OZEKI Yuto (on for WAKIZAKA 80')
MF 17. ITO Tatsuya (on for IENAGA 80')
FW 26. YAMAUCHI Hinata
DF 31. VAN WERMESKERKEN Sai
FW 38. KANDA Soma (on for MARCINHO 89')
DF 44. CESAR HAYDAR
My Frontale Man Of The Match
DF 44. CESAR HAYDAR
My Frontale Man Of The Match
In the stadium this usually goes to a goal scorer or to someone for some kind of sentimental reason. Perhaps it was with the latter in mind that their man of the match on this occasion was ‘ALL OF THE PLAYERS’. Whilst I understand what they were thinking, I think this is a little inaccurate and it should go to…
NONE OF THE PLAYERS - come on, this was just rubbish, wasn’t it? Not get-really-angry rubbish though, more like what’s-the-point rubbish. Congratulations no-one, you truly deserved the award.
Goals
None
Highlights
NONE OF THE PLAYERS - come on, this was just rubbish, wasn’t it? Not get-really-angry rubbish though, more like what’s-the-point rubbish. Congratulations no-one, you truly deserved the award.
Goals
None
Highlights
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