Kashiwa Reysol 3 - 1 Kawasaki Frontale (5 - 4 on agg.)
We came into this game with one foot in the final. When going ahead after four minutes we could have started making our plans for pre- and post-game activities around the National Stadium on final day. And maybe that’s what our team were doing as after we scored everything fell to pieces. It was a humiliating collapse, definitely helped along by the wanker of a referee. But when your plan after four minutes seems to be not to shut up shop, but something more like as frantically as possible try to hang on to an admittedly massive at the time lead against a team who love attacking, rather than try to score yourself, well, there’s a chance that things won’t work out your way. Thankfully Kashiwa’s shooting was absolutely shit in the first half. As it was in the previous leg actually. Sadly they managed to sort that out in style after half time, all helped along by their friend in the middle. Here are the usual headings in a slightly different order.
Us -
I’m not sure Hasebe’s changes after the red card worked. Actually, I’m being too diplomatic here. They clearly failed completely. Maybe it made sense at that stage to try to hang on to what we had by putting some more defenders on, leaving us a bit light up front. Not sure it was a good idea to put on two players who between them had exactly 113 minutes of experience playing for us either side of our best full back who’s most recently been our only permanent fixture in the middle of defence. But to be honest, I guess Hasebe didn’t have much choice as at least one of them had to come on. The big problem was that if we conceded, the game got back to a draw and we then had to actually try to score, we’d be in big trouble. This is exactly what happened. I don’t think there is a full replay of the game online for me to check the veracity of the things I thought at the time at the stadium and to be honest, even if there were, I’m not sure I’d be up for spending any more time thinking about this turd of a performance. We absolutely didn’t deserve to win. But we probably should have been able to hang on to a three goal lead, shouldn’t we? Our Jekyll and Hyde season continues. Now there truly is nothing to play for. Which is a bit of luck as we’re totally fucked with injuries and suspensions. Bring on the end of the season.
Ref -
I knew we were in trouble as soon as I saw the ref was Imamura. Sorry, I should give him his full title ‘that useless arsehole of a referee with an eternal burning passion for sending off Frontale players Imamura’. I think three of their goals came from ridiculous decisions he’d given against us. We had the play pulled back for a VAR long after the game had restarted. (Rule according to the IFAB - ‘If play has stopped and been restarted, the referee may not undertake a ‘review’ except for a case of mistaken identity or for a potential sending-off offence relating to violent conduct, spitting, biting or extremely offensive, insulting and/or abusive action(s).’). We also had VAR used to give a yellow card. (Rule - ‘Yellow cards and free-kicks cannot be awarded as a result of a VAR check’). Imamura always does things his own way but maybe he’d be less infuriating if he actually followed the fucking rules. Regardless of whether the decision was actually right or not, when you have a ref who doesn’t even know the protocol it’s pretty irritating. We had an official who seemed determined to book anyone on our team who was foreign. He presumably got slightly confused by Sai’s surname. He was less fond of giving out cards the other way. It’s apparently no problem if the whole Kashiwa team chase the ref around the pitch whining, almost pushing him over. (Rule - ‘The players and team officials must not surround the referee or attempt to influence if a decision is reviewed, the review process or the final decision.’). It worked though. He changed his decision after they did it. Also fine is the whole of the bench running into the pitch when they scored. Nothing to see here! I’ve noticed that Imamura is from Aichi which might explain why he apparently hates us so much as most people connected to football from that prefecture seem to. Irregardless of how you feel about the red card and the yellow for Sai, it was the never ending torrent of every fucking decision being given to them which put the nails in the coffin which we were doing our best to build for ourselves. The Romanic yellow was insane! But by that stage it was clear that every time I shouted out disgusted at a foul from Kashiwa it was inevitably going to end up with them being given a free kick. Kashiwa’s attacking and our chaotic defending were responsible for us conceding. But Imamura is a useless arsehole and it was his attitude and incompetence that got us in those positions. In a recent blog post about a game he was in charge of, I said that he wasn’t responsible for us not winning but ‘once again he made mistake after mistake in a game but presumably went home thinking he’d done a great job.’ I think that stands for this game too.
(I’ve now somewhat unwisely watched the highlights and my fury about that twat of a ref has gone into overdrive. Their first goal was down to him to being so close to Erison as he tried to clear it that he was practically tackling him. I wish Erison had just blasted the ball into the ref’s nether regions for the dual purposes of getting a drop ball and to cause as much discomfort to the ref as possible. It’s what he deserved. The highlights video is basically just an Imamura blooper reel. The red card looks ridiculous. Did the ref really think that Uremovic was intentionally rolling into the back of the player. His initial decision of a yellow was right as it clearly was a foul but thanks to the whinging of every member of the Kashiwa team apart from the keeper who were surrounding the ref to the point that he almost fell over, he thought he’d throw them a bone. The winner looks dubious too, with Hosoya absolutely yanking the shirt of Sasaki’s back before he ‘won’ the ball. No surprise Imamura or Okabe on VAR didn’t notice that. Imamura was probably worried about getting surrounded again. If it had gone to extra time it was only a matter of time before we lost anyway, but just fuck off Imamura).
Them -
Worthy winners, amply assisted by that twat Imamura. But blimey they are a bunch of divers. But you can’t blame them as almost every dive got them what they were after. Away fans are always treated like shit at their stadium, so recently we’ve done our best to get there as late as possible and leave as soon as possible afterwards, spending absolutely no money there. The music they play in their stadium is the absolute shittiest of shit heavy rock. Their fucking trumpets are really tacky and really annoying. Their tifo was somewhat amusingly made up by their fans holding up yellow bin bags. I can’t quite decide if their diving and play-acting or the referee’s absolute uselessness was more annoying. I think it’s probably the latter. If we’d won this match I would have wished them luck for the league, but in the immediate aftermath of this shit show, I think I somewhat pettily hope that their season ends up as successful as ours has been. But that means I’d be supporting Hiroshima in the final. Hmmmmmm.
Next up, who fucking cares! Actually, it’s Shimizu at home next weekend. As these games are absolutely meaningless now, maybe we can play some of the other players who haven’t had a look in. Although to be honest, it’s probably only a matter of time before everyone will have played due to us having absolutely no options due to injuries and suspensions. The good news is that we’re back to daytime games now, so I can get a decent amount of boozing in after the match and still go to bed at a reasonable time. There you go, I found something positive to finish on.
GK 1. JUNG Sung-Ryong
DF 31. VAN VERMESKERKEN Sai (Yellow card 45+3')
DF 15. TANABE Shuto
MF 19. KAWAHARA So
MF 6. YAMAMOTO Yuki
MF 14. WAKIZAKA Yasuto
FW 17. ITO Tatsuya
FW 9. ERISON
Subs
MF 8. TACHIBANADA Kento (on for YAMAMOTO 74')
FW 11. KOBAYASHI Yu
FW 24. MIYAGI Ten
DF 27. KAMIHASHI Ryota (on for MARCINHO 59')
DF 30. NODA Hiroto
DF 39. TSUCHIYA Kaito (on for ITO 59')
FW 41. IENAGA Akihiro (on for TANABE 83')
FW 91. Lazar ROMANIC (Yellow card 76') (on for ERISON 74')
Goals
WAKIZAKA (Frontale) 4' 0-1
KAKITA (Kashiwa) 26' 1-1
NAKAMA (Kashiwa) 73' 2-1
HOSOYA (Kashiwa) 77' 3-1
HOSOYA (Kashiwa) 90+2' 4-1
Highlights
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