Here's part three of my end of season individual player round up posts. Today it goes from Matsui to Kamifukumoto (and Oniki). Part one is here and part two here. All the end of season posts can be found here.
25. Renji MATSUI (MF)
AP 0 M 0 G 0 AS 0 Y 0 YY 0 R 0
After a successful loan spell at Machida last season Matsui came back and… went out on loan again a month or so later. Clearly he was never going to get to play in our massively overcrowded midfield so it made sense. And equally, I think it makes sense that he’s now signed for Vegalta Sendai permanently. As he didn’t even play a minute for us, there’s nothing else to write here.
26. Hinata YAMAUCHI (MF)
AP 21 M 630 G 0 AS 1 Y 0 YY 0 R 0
Interesting first season for him. It’s weird, as I thought I could remember him scoring but it seems he didn’t. Had bright moments but didn’t quite deliver in a kind of… erm… Miyagi Ten way. Neither of them were helped by Marcinho being a nailed on starter in their preferred position. But at the same time, neither of them took their chance when they filled in for him during one of his bans. Reasonable first season but needs to push on a bit next year I feel.
28. PATRICK VERHON (FW)
AP 3 M 87 G 0 AS 0 Y 0 YY 0 R 0
In the Super Cup he looked like he’d be a really exciting player in 2024. Even had TV pundits raving about what an effect he could have. And then totally disappeared. I guess this is often the case for players in their first season with us, but we’ll see whether anything actually changes next year. I hope so, as he seemed to bring something that we didn’t have in the brief cameos he had many months ago. But perhaps that something was something that Oniki didn’t want. Fingers crossed he gets a chance in 2025.
30. Yusuke SEGAWA (FW)
AP 47 M 2178 G 1 AS 1 Y 8 YY 0 R 0
Lots of appearances, but mainly from the bench. And plenty of cards. But this probably had something to do with being played at right back quite often. Surprised he only scored once and only got the one assist but that was probably because he didn’t get the chance to get near the opposition goal very often. Don’t know if he’s happy with his involvement and there have been some rumours about him leaving so we’ll see what happens.
31. Sai van WERMESKERKEN (DF)
AP 40 M 2903 G 4 AS 3 Y 4 YY 1 R 0
Another weird season. Arrived with a fanfare but didn’t go straight into the team. When he won the spot always seemed to be one of the first players to be subbed. Have no idea why that was. Perhaps it was fitness or more likely it was Oniki’s insistence on keeping Tachibanada on the pitch as long as possible and using as many central midfielders as possible. Scored some cracking goals and seems to be a very useful player. Has a long throw too but that seemed to get dumped quite quickly. Maybe we’ll get some more of them next year. Felt bad for him when he got sent off against Nagoya, but to be fair that possibly wasn’t the worst thing one of our players did in that game. I think he’s one of our better players so hope he can do even better next year.
32. Soma KANDA (FW)
AP 3 M 8 G 1 AS 1 Y 0 YY 0 R 0
Absolutely out of the picture for most of the year, apparently not good enough to play for us, but being hyped by everyone and scoring goals for fun for the Japanese under… something team. When Oniki finally relented and brought him on for a couple of minutes in the ACL he scored and got an assist. Eight minutes on the pitch in total in the season. Gomis says he’s going to be a star so I’m quite excited about that. Hopefully we get to see that before he leaves us.
34. Kota YUI (MF)
AP 0 M 0 G 0 AS 0 Y 0 YY 0 R 0
Not a minute on the pitch but made a few bench appearances in the ACL. When I say bench appearances, I mean he sat on the bench. Maybe he’ll have more chances next year on loan at Fukushima, hopefully doing as well as Ozeki did this year.
35. Yuichi MARUYAMA (DF)
AP 17 M 1184 G 0 AS 0 Y 0 YY 0 R 0
Slightly weird season for him. Perhaps slightly weird signing too, as presumably he was signed to sure up the defence but then didn’t get played much. Like many other defenders, also spent quite a bit of time injured. Towards the end of the season showed what he could do and looked like a steady member of a semi-decent defence. Probably should stop trying the long passes out of defence though as they didn’t work out very well. Obviously not one for the future, but imagine he’ll be a useful player next year.
41. Akihiro IENAGA (MF)
AP 54 M 3714 G 10 AS 7 Y 3 YY 1 R 0
38 years old and played 54 games. Don’t like to say it, but this season there probably has been a bit of a drop off for him. In the past used to hold opposition players off for fun but has been outmuscled on a few occasions this year. Drifts in and out of games a bit, but on the occasions where I’ve moaned about him looking like he can’t be arsed in the first half of games he’d then go on to have a great last 30 minutes of the game. Ten goals and seven assists is a very nice return. Not sure what the future holds for him. There has long been talk that he’ll leave us and return to Kansai. A new manager joining could be the right time for him to do that. But if he does stay and his pitch time is managed correctly, he’ll probably still be a very important player for us in 2025
44 CESAR HAYDAR
AP 6 M 459 G 0 AS 0 Y 1 YY 0 R 0
Felt like he was signed to stand in for Jesiel when he was injured. Bit difficult to judge him on only six appearances and 459 minutes after moving to a new club, a new league and a new country. I think he’s a better player than he’s shown so far, so fingers crossed for 2025.
77. Yuki YAMAMOTO (MF)
AP 34 M 1999 G 2 AS 3 Y 3 YY 0 R 0
Was another marquee signing at the start of the year and then ended up dropping out of contention after a little while. People have talked about how good he is when playing with Erison, which makes it all the stranger that even when we were doing badly we didn’t try that more often. Two goals and three assists seems decent from his minutes in his first season with us, but we’ll probably expect to see more from him in 2025. His free kick against Shandong was a beauty.
98 Louis YAMAGUCHI
AP 2 M 180 G 0 AS 0 Y 0 YY 0 R 0
Apparently now seems to be our confirmed second choice keeper after signing permanently after the end of the season. And seems to have settled in well with us. Only made a couple of appearances and one was a bit of a nightmare away against Niigata in the cup. But I didn’t see that game so can’t say for sure if the result was down to him, and I suspect that even if he was to blame, there were plenty of others equally responsible. Whether he challenges for the first choice spot next year remains to be seen. Personally I think he’s still second choice, but who knows what the new manager will think.
99. Naoto KAMIFUKUMOTO (GK)
AP 8 M 720 G 0 AS 0 Y 0 YY 0 R 0
Probably was the right decision for him to leave and join Shonan. Feel like it never really worked out for him with us, but I don’t think he’s to blame for that. We were always told that his skill on the ball was a crucial element to the way that we were going to attack, but as far as I could see, that seemed to be complete nonsense. Definitely was a lot more confident than he perhaps should have been and made just a few too many clangers compared to the limited times that his skills on the ball did something positive. Wish him all the best at Shonan where he seems to have done decently.
Toru ONIKI
I’ve probably written a lot about this already so there will be a lot of repetition here. Was pleased that he managed to get some decent results towards the end of his time with us and leave on something of a high. Clearly he was a great success for us, but given that this post is about 2024, I think it will sound significantly less positive. 2024 was pretty much a disaster for us. In most competitions we looked hopeless. And even when we were at out worst Oniki seemed to think that we should just keep on doing the same thing and eventually success would magically come back. Although it was said that he was a very popular manager, I feel a little like he lost the changing room a bit in the middle of the season, or at least, the changing room resigned themselves to the fact that we weren’t going to achieve anything which I guess is just as bad. I would say this is the right time for him to move on, but the truth is that he probably should have done it a few years ago. But to finish on a positive, unlike the previous incarnation of the competition, he has done a good job in the 2024/25 ACL so far. Kashima will be a real test for him as instead of tweaking a system, he might have to rebuild things from the bottom. Although the bottom for Kashima in 2024 was significantly higher than where we finished under Oniki in the same year.
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