Here is the first of my end of season posts. This year, I'm starting with the player stats. As I went through compiling these I spotted a few errors in my match posts, so I'm not going to vouch for them being 100% accurate, but I've done my best! I'm particularly lacking in confidence with the assist figures as I don't record them myself (maybe I should next year), and the official website's figures are a little confusing. I think they count assists as being something a bit different from what I do. Also, I don't award man of the match for games I haven't attended and as I missed a few matches in the second half of the season there aren't many of these awards. I think I often couldn't be bothered and sometimes forgot too. Anyway, here are a few comments on the various ‘winners’ mentioned in the charts at the bottom.
It will come as no surprise to see Kobayashi at the top of the scorer charts as he’s been our main striker for most of the season. Unbelievably, he scored more goals this year than last year. Definitely doesn’t feel like it! The slightly surprising thing for me is that Leandro Damiao managed to run him quite close which is a miracle as he had 50% less starts and most of his sub appearances probably clocked in at less than 5 minutes. Sadly for Damiao, his goals seemed to come in games that we either lost or drew, whereas Kobayashi scored more in wins. (At least that’s how it felt to me). I think both of them played better coming off the bench which is weird and probably sums up one of the problems about this season. We never seemed to really be able to get going at the start of games when it mattered. It’s great to see Wakizaka up there with Abe in joint third. Thankfully they were around to score goals when the forwards weren’t firing. Chinen’s stats possibly could have been better if he’d had a chance in the second half of the season. He only scored once, but only started two games. Hmmmm.
As mentioned above, the assist figures are possibly not the most accurate. They are a little confusing, as there doesn’t seem to be many assists at all, which is weird when you consider we’re a team that likes to try to pass the ball all the way to the goal. Hasegawa and Damiao lead the way and neither of them started many games. Maybe that’s why we didn’t do so well!
It will come as no surprise to see Taniguchi at the top of the starts stats. However, it did come as quite a surprise to see him starting games towards the end of the season as he lost form steadily game by game. I guess he might be tired as he’s a long way ahead of any other outfield player in this chart. Outside of the top five the figures dropped off quite quickly which I guess is due to the numerous starting line-ups Oniki tried. (Big reveal on this coming in another post soon). Maybe he’ll find one he likes soon.
The limitations of my man of the match figures are many, and are influenced by factors including moodiness, pettiness and forgetfulness. I think though at the end of the season it has come out pretty much right though as far as I’m concerned. Ao finished at the top as he well deserved to. No one else came close in my opinion. Wakizaka’s goals and attacking mindset offset his rawness and he fully deserves to be in second place. I was unsure about him when he first started playing for us, but I think he’s a really important player in the future and also in the present. Maybe sometime he’ll get to stay on the pitch after the 60th minute! Hasegawa is a game changer. I’m not sure how many of his man of the matches came after he came on as a sub, but I’d imagine at least a couple. He never seems to make as much of an impact when he starts, but coming off the bench, he definitely adds something. Aside from these three, it was pretty widely spread.
On to the cards, Ienaga is the runaway winner, mainly thanks to him getting a bit grumpy at the end of the season. He was booked in five of the last six games. I understand this totally! They were a bit frustrating. I like him a lot for his moodiness actually. Kurumaya is a bit of a surprise in there as I don’t remember him getting booked that often. Guess he sometimes takes one for the team as he’s not that kind of player really. Of course there are a couple of Brazilians in there too. Our Brazilian players always seem to pick up cards more regularly than the Japanese players. I guess that’s just a J League thing. The real bad boy was Taniguchi, being booked in five games, getting two yellows in one and a straight red in another. I guess he’s played more often than everyone else, but perhaps his card count also hints at his lack of form. He’s probably had to take a yellow on a few occasions after getting caught napping. The red in the Levain final was probably a necessary one to take so I’ve got no complaints about that. It’s just a shame that they scored from the free kick. Hopefully he can get some rest in the off season and perhaps we might even find some defensive stability next year!
Stats by player
ST = games started
SB = used as substitute
US = unused sub
Y = yellow card
R = red card
G = goals
A = assists
MM = man of the match (according to me)
1. Sung-Ryong JUNG (GK)
1st half ST 25 SB 0 US 0 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 2
2nd half ST 10 SB 0 US 12 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
Total ST 35 SB 0 US 12 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 2
2. Kyohei NOBORIZATO (DF)
1st half ST 18 SB 5 US 3 Y 1 R 0 G 0 A 2 MM 0
2nd half ST 12 SB 2 US 2 Y 1 R 0 G 0 A 1 MM 0
Total ST 30 SB 7 US 5 Y 2 R 0 G 0 A 3 MM 0
3. Tatsuki NARA (DF)
1st half ST 12 SB 1 US 0 Y 1 R 0 G 0 A 1 MM 1
2nd half ST 1 SB 0 US 3 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
Total ST 13 SB 1 US 3 Y 1 R 0 G 0 A 1 MM 1
4. JESIEL (DF)
1st half ST 9 SB 0 US 2 Y 2 R 0 G 0 A 1 MM 2
2nd half ST 7 SB 0 US 4 Y 2 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
Total ST 16 SB 0 US 6 Y 4 R 0 G 0 A 1 MM 2
5. Shogo TANIGUCHI (MF)
1st half ST 23 SB 0 US 1 Y 3 R 0 G 1 A 0 MM 1
2nd half ST 21 SB 0 US 0 Y 2 R 2 G 0 A 0 MM 0
Total ST 44 SB 0 US 1 Y 5 R 2 G 1 A 0 MM 1
6. Hidemasa MORITA (MF)
1st half ST 15 SB 1 US 2 Y 1 R 0 G 0 A 1 MM 1
2nd half ST 17 SB 1 US 3 Y 1 R 0 G 1 A 2 MM 1
Total ST 32 SB 2 US 5 Y 2 R 0 G 1 A 3 MM 2
7. Shintaro KURUMAYA (DF)
1st half ST 14 SB 3 US 3 Y 4 R 0 G 0 A 1 MM 0
2nd half ST 20 SB 2 US 0 Y 2 R 0 G 1 A 1 MM 0
Total ST 34 SB 5 US 3 Y 6 R 0 G 1 A 2 MM 0
8. Hiroyuki ABE (MF)
1st half ST 7 SB 6 US 2 Y 1 R 0 G 3 A 0 MM 0
2nd half ST 17 SB 4 US 1 Y 1 R 0 G 6 A 1 MM 0
Total ST 24 SB 10 US 3 Y 2 R 0 G 9 A 1 MM 0
9. LEANDRO DAMIAO (FW)
1st half ST 13 SB 6 US 6 Y 3 R 0 G 8 A 3 MM 1
2nd half ST 8 SB 11 US 4 Y 1 R 0 G 6 A 2 MM 1
Total ST 21 SB 17 US 10 Y 4 R 0 G 14 A 5 MM 2
10. Ryota OSHIMA (MF)
1st half ST 16 SB 1 US 1 Y 1 R 0 G 1 A 1 MM 2
2nd half ST 6 SB 3 US 0 Y 0 R 0 G 1 A 1 MM 0
Total ST 22 SB 4 US 1 Y 1 R 0 G 2 A 2 MM 2
11. Yu KOBAYASHI (FW)
1st half ST 17 SB 5 US 0 Y 0 R 0 G 8 A 2 MM 0
2nd half ST 14 SB 6 US 2 Y 0 R 0 G 9 A 0 MM 0
Total ST 31 SB 11 US 2 Y 0 R 0 G 17 A 2 MM 0
14. Kengo NAKAMURA (MF)
1st half ST 11 SB 3 US 0 Y 1 R 0 G 1 A 0 MM 1
2nd half ST 11 SB 3 US 3 Y 0 R 0 G 1 A 4 MM 1
Total ST 22 SB 6 US 3 Y 1 R 0 G 2 A 4 MM 2
16. Tatsuya HASEGAWA (MF)
1st half ST 13 SB 6 US 3 Y 2 R 0 G 1 A 4 MM 3
2nd half ST 6 SB 11 US 3 Y 1 R 0 G 4 A 2 MM 0
Total ST 19 SB 17 US 6 Y 3 R 0 G 5 A 6 MM 3
17. Kazuaki MAWATARI (DF)
1st half ST 11 SB 2 US 0 Y 2 R 0 G 1 A 1 MM 1
2nd half ST 7 SB 2 US 4 Y 1 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
Total ST 18 SB 4 US 4 Y 3 R 0 G 1 A 1 MM 1
19. Manabu SAITO (MF)
1st half ST 8 SB 7 US 5 Y 0 R 0 G 2 A 2 MM 2
2nd half ST 5 SB 3 US 2 Y 0 R 0 G 1 A 0 MM 0
Total ST 13 SB 10 US 7 Y 0 R 0 G 3 A 2 MM 2
20. Kei CHINEN (FW)
1st half ST 10 SB 10 US 5 Y 1 R 0 G 6 A 0 MM 1
2nd half ST 2 SB 7 US 7 Y 0 R 0 G 1 A 1 MM 0
Total ST 12 SB 17 US 12 Y 1 R 0 G 7 A 1 MM 1
21. Shota ARAI
1st half ST 1 SB 0 US 25 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 2 MM 0
2nd half ST 13 SB 0 US 9 Y 1 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 1
Total ST 14 SB 0 US 34 Y 1 R 0 G 0 A 2 MM 1
22. Hokuto SHIMODA (MF)
1st half ST 3 SB 2 US 4 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 2 MM 2
2nd half ST 15 SB 2 US 5 Y 1 R 0 G 1 A 1 MM 0
Total ST 18 SB 4 US 9 Y 1 R 0 G 1 A 3 MM 2
23. Eisuke FUJISHIMA (GK)
1st half ST 0 SB 0 US 0 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
2nd half ST 0 SB 0 US 0 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
Total ST 0 SB 0 US 0 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
24. Shunsuke ANDO (GK)
1st half ST 0 SB 0 US 1 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
2nd half ST 0 SB 0 US 2 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
Total ST 0 SB 0 US 3 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
25. Ao TANAKA (MF)
1st half ST 16 SB 2 US 5 Y 0 R 0 G 1 A 1 MM 2
2nd half ST 12 SB 1 US 5 Y 0 R 0 G 1 A 0 MM 3
Total ST 28 SB 3 US 10 Y 0 R 0 G 2 A 1 MM 5
26. MAGUINHO (DF)
1st half ST 6 SB 1 US 2 Y 1 R 0 G 1 A 1 MM 0
2nd half ST 6 SB 1 US 4 Y 0 R 0 G 1 A 0 MM 0
Total ST 12 SB 2 US 6 Y 1 R 0 G 2 A 1 MM 0
27. Yuto SUZUKI (MF)
1st half ST 3 SB 5 US 6 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
2nd half ST 0 SB 0 US 0 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
Total ST 3 SB 5 US 6 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
28. Yasuto WAKIZAKA (MF)
1st half ST 6 SB 5 US 6 Y 0 R 0 G 4 A 2 MM 1
2nd half ST 13 SB 4 US 3 Y 0 R 0 G 5 A 1 MM 2
Total ST 19 SB 9 US 9 Y 0 R 0 G 9 A 3 MM 3
29. Michael James FITZGERALD (DF)
1st half ST 7 SB 0 US 3 Y 1 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
2nd half ST 0 SB 0 US 0 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
Total ST 7 SB 0 US 3 Y 1 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
30. Taisei MIYASHIRO (FW)
1st half ST 0 SB 0 US 3 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
2nd half ST 0 SB 0 US 0 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
Total ST 0 SB 0 US 3 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
31. Koki HARADA (MF)
1st half ST 0 SB 0 US 0 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
2nd half ST 0 SB 0 US 0 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
Total ST 0 SB 0 US 0 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
32. Kaoru MITOMA (MF)
1st half ST 0 SB 0 US 0 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
2nd half ST 0 SB 1 US 1 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
Total ST 0 SB 1 US 1 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
33. Reo HATATE (FW)
1st half ST 0 SB 0 US 0 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
2nd half ST 0 SB 1 US 0 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
Total ST 0 SB 1 US 0 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
34. Kazuya YAMAMURA (MF)
1st half ST 3 SB 8 US 9 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 2 MM 0
2nd half ST 14 SB 3 US 6 Y 0 R 0 G 2 A 0 MM 1
Total ST 17 SB 11 US 15 Y 0 R 0 G 2 A 2 MM 1
35. Zain ISSAKA (MF)
1st half ST 0 SB 0 US 0 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
2nd half ST 0 SB 0 US 1 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
Total ST 0 SB 0 US 1 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
36. Hiroki MAWATARI (GK)
1st half ST 0 SB 0 US 0 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
2nd half ST 0 SB 0 US 0 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
Total ST 0 SB 0 US 0 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
41. Akihiro IENAGA (MF)
1st half ST 18 SB 0 US 1 Y 2 R 0 G 0 A 2 MM 0
2nd half ST 16 SB 3 US 2 Y 6 R 0 G 1 A 2 MM 2
Total ST 34 SB 3 US 3 Y 8 R 0 G 1 A 4 MM 2
44. CAIO CESAR (MF)
1st half ST 1 SB 1 US 3 Y 1 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
2nd half ST 0 SB 0 US 0 Y 0 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
Total ST 1 SB 1 US 3 Y 1 R 0 G 0 A 0 MM 0
Most Goals
1. KOBAYASHI Yu - 17
2. LEANDRO DAMIAO - 14
3. ABE Hiroyuki - 9
3. WAKIZAKA Yasuto - 9
4. CHINEN Kei - 7
Most Assists
1. HASEGAWA Tatsuya - 6
2. LEANDRO DAMIAO - 5
3. IENAGA Akihiro - 4
3. NAKAMURA Kengo - 4
4. SHIMODA Hokuto - 3
4. NOBORIZATO Kyohei - 3
4. WAKIZAKA Yasuto - 3
4. MORITA Hidemasa - 3
Most Starts
1. TANUGUCHI Shogo - 44
2. JUNG Sung-Ryong - 35
3. KURUMAYA Shintaro - 34
3. IENAGA Akihiro - 34
4. MORITA Hidemasa - 32
Most Man Of The Match awards
1. TANAKA Ao - 5
2. WAKIZAKA Yasuto -3
2. HASEGAWA Tatsuya - 3
3. OSHIMA Ryota - 2
2. SAITO Manabu - 2
2. JUNG Sung-Ryong - 2
2. JESIEL - 2
2. SHIMODA Hokuto - 2
2. IENAGA Akihiro - 2
2. MORITA Hidemasa - 2
2. LEANDRO DAMIAO - 2
2. NAKAMURA Kengo - 2
Most Yellow Cards (Two yellows in one game not counted here but added to the red column)
1. IENAGA Akihiro - 8
2. KURUMAYA Shintaro - 6
3. TANIGUCHI Shogo - 5
4. LEANDRO DAMIAO - 4
4. JESIEL - 4
Most Red Cards
1. TANIGUCHI Shogo - 2
Thursday, 12 December 2019
Monday, 9 December 2019
Vs Consadole Sapporo (away) 7/12/19 - J League match 34
Consadole Sapporo 1 - 2 Kawasaki Frontale
The season is over. Let’s be thankful for small mercies. It might sound like an arrogant thing to say in a season where we won a cup, but this year has been pretty much a big old disappointment. And this game was the perfect one to reflect the season to be honest. A brief flurry of hope followed by grinding tedium, a bit of good fortune followed by a big old let-down. The only thing that could have made this game totally emblematic would have been a late equaliser for Consadole and therefore another 2-2 draw, again throwing away points from a winning position with a late goal conceded. But why is this post so gloomy? We won, after all. True, but the performance was so predictably bad. And thanks to plenty of other previous predictably bad performances, this game was close to pointless. We’ve ended up fourth in the league but have also ended up as the team who lost the least games. The story of the year has been draws. Draw after draw after draw. Our summer was particularly disheartening, with us drawing against the teams who finished in 11th, 12th, 14th and 15h and losing heavily to the team who finished in 13th. Of course we don’t have any divine right to do well and beat these teams, but this year is one string of missed opportunities given the talent we have in our squad. It seems that barely a game goes past recently without me irritating someone on twitter so I’m not going to go into much detail about this game. I also can’t be bothered to. I want to forget about it. It seems bizarre that I’m writing about an away win like this, but this wasn’t much fun to watch. Thankfully Sapporo is a fun place to visit. If we’d finished the season like this and then had to come back from Kashima on the bus I’d be even closer to despair, I think. It probably would also have taken longer to get back from there than it did from Hokkaido. Anyway, let’s get this over with.
Same team = same old rubbish, unsurprisingly -
Same team = same old rubbish, unsurprisingly -
Another game with plenty of rotten performances from players. Kobayashi’s useful input finished after he tapped home after 45 seconds. The rest of the game he did his normal thing of missing chance after chance and irritated me particularly by moaning at Chinen after he came on. Kobayashi is perhaps something of a problem for us going forward. He’s in awful form, but is undroppable. He doesn’t want to play on the right but is basically a waste of time up front as the person who is supposed to be putting chances away. He can be a great player, but seems to be shorn of all confidence and not up to much right now. The same could be said about Taniguchi at the back. It’s a miracle he was nominated in the short list for the J League team of the season. Whoever picked that list clearly hasn’t watched any of the games he’s played in for the last few months. To be fair to him, he always seems to make one amazing tackle or block per game, but always fills up the rest of the 90 minutes with errors, gaffes and bad passes. I think I’d settle for playing a defender who doesn’t make the great block but doesn’t make all the mistakes. He’s another player whose form and perhaps confidence are at rock bottom. I’d mention Morita at right back again, but am aware that he’s being played out of position whilst we have available right backs who are being overlooked. Which leads us to the main problem I guess, and it will come as no surprise for you to hear that I think it’s Oniki. We lost our last game to our big local rivals 4-1 at home basically handing them the title. No changes for the next match. I just don’t get it and am fed up with trying to understand it. Sure we won this game, but aside from the first 15 minutes where we were quite efficient with chances, we were totally rotten ,and it seemed only a matter of time till we’d concede, with our toothless attacking preventing us from having any chance of scoring any more goals. Astonishingly, we apparently had 18 shots in this match, eight of which were on target. I can’t really remember their keeper having to make any saves so they were probably the usual powder-puff back pass like shots that we favour recently. Wakizaka was again withdrawn around 55 minutes, as I predicted he would be on Twitter. But there’s no glory in getting this prediction right as it always happens. Not sure what Oniki’s doing in that regard either. We had 43% possession. Exhilarating stuff! You could say the season has petered out. but that would suggest we ever really got any kind of momentum going. I can’t believe we finished 4th to be honest.
Potential exodus -
I don’t know if Oniki is staying next year. I’m pretty sure it’s obvious what I would like to happen. If he leaves, I fear he might leave quite some wreckage behind him. But if he stays he could cause even more damage. I think we are going to lose a lot of players in the off-season. I can’t imagine Leandro Damiao will stay. Why should he? He hasn’t been given a real chance. Maguinho likewise. Jesiel was being courted by some big names after the Chelsea game it seemed. Since he’s recover from injury he’s been on the bench or in the stand behind a defensive duo who were playing pretty badly. Gamba are once again trying to tempt Nara. I wouldn’t blame him for leaving for the same reason. (It seems today he’s confirmed he’s leaving...). Anyone who’s been watching us play recently would find it unbelievable that we had two good defenders like them who were unable to get on the pitch. At the end of the match Arai seemed very emotional, which suggests he’s leaving too. Which is weird as I thought Oniki preferred him and was going to get rid of Sung-Ryong, who I expect will also leave. So maybe we’ll lose both. It’s weird as Arai was clearly first choice for a while. I thought he must have been injured when he didn’t make the bench last game but I wonder now if it was some more great Oniki man management after Arai had perhaps suggested he might be looking elsewhere. Shimoda has been linked with a departure too. And Ao was also quite emotional. Whether that was because of Arai or because he too is going to leave I don’t know. It’s going to be a pretty different squad next year I think. I can’t blame anyone who leaves or is considering leaving. There seems little chance of Oniki improving anything as he seems out of ideas (if he ever had any). Perhaps the departure of Oniki might give some of these players thinking about going second thoughts. I keep hearing about how bright the future is for Frontale. And this could be true, as we saw another bright prospect get his first pitch time yesterday. Congratulations Hatate! But the truth is, if Oniki is the one in charge, these great young players might as well think of going elsewhere, unless they are looking to play football that is increasingly dull and less effective game by game.
Another hopeless ref -
I’ll quickly mention the ref, who I thought made some major mistakes, having more than decent reason to send of Anderson Lopes twice in this match but only gave him one yellow card. And Suzuki made a horrible tackle too. But apparently the officials did rule out a legitimate Consadole goal for offside. And some Consadole fans thought he gave us everything. I think it’s funny that rival fans can have such differing views on the same match. Apparently Consadole fans don’t think that’s quite so interesting. But given that arguing on the internet as about as pointless as writing this blog is, I’d rather step away from at least one of those activities and as I seem to be stuck doing this blog I guess I’ll continue with it. I think one thing we can all agree on is the fact that this was another rubbish ref, even if we disagree on the details.
So, good riddance 2019 league campaign. And 2019 Emperor’s Cup campaign. And 2019 ACL campaign. Hooray for the Levain Cup! A competition in which we played only five games, and won only two of them. I’ll do my usual end of season survey and round ups soon and then I can vent a bit more on this year. Right now, I’m glad we don’t have any more games and that I don’t have to think about the J League for a while. The less we say about the league champions the better too. I remember when we used to play attacking football. Now, we just have possession and grind out 2-2 draws. Toru Oniki, sucking the fun out of football and being a Frontale fan! Thank you for your services, but let’s hope we either have a new manager or at least some new ideas for next year.
So, good riddance 2019 league campaign. And 2019 Emperor’s Cup campaign. And 2019 ACL campaign. Hooray for the Levain Cup! A competition in which we played only five games, and won only two of them. I’ll do my usual end of season survey and round ups soon and then I can vent a bit more on this year. Right now, I’m glad we don’t have any more games and that I don’t have to think about the J League for a while. The less we say about the league champions the better too. I remember when we used to play attacking football. Now, we just have possession and grind out 2-2 draws. Toru Oniki, sucking the fun out of football and being a Frontale fan! Thank you for your services, but let’s hope we either have a new manager or at least some new ideas for next year.
Team
GK 1. Sung-Ryong JUNG
GK 1. Sung-Ryong JUNG
MF 6. MORITA Hidemasa
DF 5. TANIGUCHI Shogo
DF 34. YAMAMURA Kazuya
DF 7. KURUMAYA Shintaro
MF 25. TANAKA Ao
MF 10. OSHIMA Ryota
MF 41. IENAGA Akihiro
(Yellow card 90+3')
MF 28. WAKIZAKA Yasuto
MF 8. ABE Hiroyuki
FW 11. KOBAYASHI Yu
Subs
GK 21. ARAI Shota
DF 4. JESIEL
FW 9. LEANDRO DAMIAO (on for KOBAYASHI 90+1')
FW 20. CHINEN Kei (on for WAKIZAKA 59')
MF 22. SHIMODA Hokuto
DF 26. MAGUINHO
MF 22. SHIMODA Hokuto
DF 26. MAGUINHO
MF 33. HATATE Reo (on for HATATE 85')
My Frontale Man Of The Match
It was probably Ao again, but tell you what, just to be petty, let's give it to...
WAKIZAKA Yasuto - nice free kick goal. Naturally withdrawn by Oniki around 55 minutes as predicted. It's almost as if the decision had been made before the match. It probably had been.
Goals
KOBAYASHI (Frontale)1' 0-1
WAKIZAKA (Frontale) 13' 0-2
Highlights
Monday, 2 December 2019
Vs Yokohama F Marinos (home) 30/11/19 - J League match 33
Kawasaki Frontale 1 - 4 Yokohama F Marinos
Football is crap, isn’t it? Or rather, we’re crap, aren’t we? How far we’ve fallen over the course of the last 12 months. For a while it looked like we might end up agonisingly short in the league thanks to a truly awful run in the summer but instead we’re going to be well short at the end of the season and deservedly so. The only saving grace from this game was the fact that Yokohama weren’t able to actually lift the trophy in our stadium. Let’s be thankful for small mercies. As it was, we did our best to make it near impossible that they won’t lift the title next week by significantly contributing to their goal difference. The Levain cup win is something we can take away from this season, but to be honest, that victory is only papering over the huge cracks. Of course, you know I’m going to blame Oniki for this. But we’ve had plenty of terrible performances from players this year as well as the terrible decisions from our manager. I don’t think he’s signed the contact we offered him for next season yet. I wonder if he will do the honorable thing and leave us at the end of the year. It’s pretty clear that he doesn’t know where to go from here. Our system has been found out and there’s no sign of any other ideas. Losing 4-1 to your local rivals in your own stadium to practically hand them the title hurts me, so hopefully he realises quite how bad it was too. We’ll see, I guess. This blog post is going to be full of bitterness, so I’ll try to keep it brief. If you don’t want to wallow in misery better stop reading now. If you are a Yokohama fan looking to enjoy our misery, you’re probably only going to get irritated by my opinions on your ‘brave heroes’ so I’d stop reading here too. A lot of it is sour grapes, but I think there’s an element of truth. I’ve deliberately delayed writing this a little to try and tone down the sourness, but watching the goals has upped the acid level again. Here are my points about this travesty, and beware, everybody’s in for a slagging here.
Oniki out -
Come on, do the right thing and go. This was awful again. The game plan didn’t work, and we had no response to going behind. The back four were useless. Please never play Morita at right back again. It has never worked and it never will. Play him right wing maybe as he was alright going forward, but not right back. Three of their four goals came from that side and he was clearly being targeted. PLAY A RIGHT BACK AT RIGHT BACK!!! Taniguchi and Yamamura were a total mess. Sure they may be the most handsome center back pairing in the league, but they both had nightmare games. Taniguchi is clearly undroppable for Oniki but to be honest I think most of the people in the stadium could have done a better job in this game than he did. A while ago we were very short of centre backs but now we have Jesiel and Nara both sitting on the sidelines or in the stand and yet Taniguchi is able to continue blundering his way through game after game. Give him a rest. He’s not a bad player, but he’s playing incredibly badly right now. For two of our goals he was closer to taking out Sung-Ryong than getting anywhere near either the ball or a Yokohama player. Kobayashi had another game to forget. As soon as Leandro Damiao came on we looked a different team. I really can’t believe that Kobayashi is up there on the scoring charts. I don’t think he should play up front by himself but apparently he’s said he doesn’t want to play on the right. Fair enough, don’t play him there, but don’t play him up front alone either. Quite why Oniki always withdraws Wakizaka and ignores those players stinking it up even more around him I don’t know. But then I don’t really understand many things Oniki does. I don’t know who should replace him if he goes, but I know that whoever it is, it’s got to be a hell of a lot better than what we’re getting right now.
Terrible referees (the usual refrain) -
Nishimura - a referee announcement that always strikes fear into the hearts of everyone. Please retire! Thankfully he was changed at half time, apparently due to an injury, but I like to think of it as being the match commissioner hauling him off for the rotten display he was putting in. Seconds after kick off Oshima was fouled off the ball. No card. This pattern was repeated throughout the game. Yokohama hacked and dived and feigned injury all the way through the game. I can only guess that Nishimura was due to drive home in a lovely new luxury Nissan provided by Yokohama. I’ve never seen a more infuriatingly one sided refereeing display. Oh, actually, I probably have as the refs are always terrible but this one really stood out. His replacement in the second half was even worse, apparently unaware of what sport he was even officiating. Random decision after random decision. Stopping the play for an injury and then restarting with a goal kick instead of a drop ball. Sure he probably was only expecting to only be lifting up the substitute board and got thrown in at the deep end, but seriously, he was clueless. Quite why Nishimura and the 4th official got selected for a potentially title deciding game I don’t know. Surely it’s time that Nishimura got sent off to pasture. Leandro Damiao through on goal and hacked down by the last man on the edge of the box. Amazingly he got the award of a free kick rather than a penalty right, but no card? I think it could have been a red. Plenty of terrible fouls from Yokohama that weren’t even given as free kicks. Another clear penalty that wasn’t given when Daimao was shoved in the box. A handball in the box from a Yokohama defender that the ref also missed (well, I saw it!). Marinos players rolling around on the floor, kicking the ball away, anything to waste some time and getting away with it. I don’t even know why they were bothering as if they hadn’t they probably could have scored three or four more. Let’s not forget the fact that it wasn’t just the ref and we were rubbish too, but we definitely didn’t get the rub of the green in this game.
Dubious Yokahama -
I’ve been wavering on who I least disliked winning the league for the last month or so. First of all, I decided the least bad option was Kashima as at least it would be business as usual and would deny both of our neighbours. But Kashima were such a bunch of scumbags when we played them, (shout out to Bueno!), that I couldn’t possibly hope for that. So, down to Yokohama or FC Tokyo. I then moved on to Yokohama because at least they score a few goals and don’t just hoof the ball to the fast guy to dive and win a penalty so that the chubby guy can run up, stop jog on the spot, reverse, skip a bit and then finally kick it (all in one ‘seamless’ run up, right?) and then win 1-0. But after this game, they’re out too. I would have liked us to smack Yokohama by four or five goals and then would be happy for them to win the title. But that didn’t exactly happen, did it? So now I’m going for Tokyo, I guess. Yokohama apparently play beautiful attacking football, but all I saw yesterday was a bunch of cheating midgets diving, fouling, time wasting, feigning injury and most annoyingly of all, finishing off chances clinically. Nakagawa apparently said he wanted to thank Frontale for his time with us as a youth player by beating us. Interesting logic. Similarly interesting was his goal celebration, kneeling and praying with his hands aloft right in front of our main fan area. Presumably this was in thanks to us too. I don’t know if they’ve been doing this all season or they just save it for local derbies, but if they have, I think that any sense of them having the attacking football moral high-ground disintegrates on closer inspection. Perhaps we were aiming for the moral high-ground and were pursuing it at the expense of actually playing football. Funnily enough, we out possessed and out-passed them and were only one shot behind them too. And we if we avoid defeat next weekend we will end up as the team who lost the least games in the league this year. But these stats aren’t really much consolation as they beat us 4-1 at our place and will win the league comfortably ahead of us.
Foreign players -
One big difference between Yokohama and us was in the use of foreign players. They had four Brazilians, one Thai and one Korean player in the starting line up. We played Sung-Ryong, probably only because Arai was injured (I’m guessing) and that was it. I’ve often moaned about Oniki having a problem with foreigners and it seems like he’ll do anything to avoid playing them. The thing is, the reason they have a limit on foreign players is presumably to stop big money clubs fielding a whole team of foreign ringers, the implication being that there’s a much bigger pool of good foreign players to choose from. Most teams understandably use their foreign spots to boost their starting eleven. For some reason, we use our foreign spots to warm the bench or maybe just to keep the translators occupied. Damiao has been used sparingly and seemingly reluctantly. Oniki has never attempted to mould the team around him (our big money star player) and has instead put him in up front by himself with no thoughts on how he could get the best out of him. If Oniki is with us next year, there’s really no point us having any foreigners.
Four goals, all coming from mistakes from us, all put away by a superior if quite cheaty Yokohama team. Have a close look at the replay of the game please Oniki. Thankfully this season will soon be over and we won’t have to deal with any more of this rubbish for a few months. Next up, our final game, away at Consadole Sapporo, a team who probably really want to beat us after the Levain Cup final. We need to win to have any chance of an ACL place next year. Not sure we particularly deserve one, and we’d probably only mess it up again, but it could be useful for player retention and attraction. Least it’s a nice trip. Hopefully we’ll see some kind of reaction to this disaster. Fingers crossed.
Oniki out -
Come on, do the right thing and go. This was awful again. The game plan didn’t work, and we had no response to going behind. The back four were useless. Please never play Morita at right back again. It has never worked and it never will. Play him right wing maybe as he was alright going forward, but not right back. Three of their four goals came from that side and he was clearly being targeted. PLAY A RIGHT BACK AT RIGHT BACK!!! Taniguchi and Yamamura were a total mess. Sure they may be the most handsome center back pairing in the league, but they both had nightmare games. Taniguchi is clearly undroppable for Oniki but to be honest I think most of the people in the stadium could have done a better job in this game than he did. A while ago we were very short of centre backs but now we have Jesiel and Nara both sitting on the sidelines or in the stand and yet Taniguchi is able to continue blundering his way through game after game. Give him a rest. He’s not a bad player, but he’s playing incredibly badly right now. For two of our goals he was closer to taking out Sung-Ryong than getting anywhere near either the ball or a Yokohama player. Kobayashi had another game to forget. As soon as Leandro Damiao came on we looked a different team. I really can’t believe that Kobayashi is up there on the scoring charts. I don’t think he should play up front by himself but apparently he’s said he doesn’t want to play on the right. Fair enough, don’t play him there, but don’t play him up front alone either. Quite why Oniki always withdraws Wakizaka and ignores those players stinking it up even more around him I don’t know. But then I don’t really understand many things Oniki does. I don’t know who should replace him if he goes, but I know that whoever it is, it’s got to be a hell of a lot better than what we’re getting right now.
Terrible referees (the usual refrain) -
Nishimura - a referee announcement that always strikes fear into the hearts of everyone. Please retire! Thankfully he was changed at half time, apparently due to an injury, but I like to think of it as being the match commissioner hauling him off for the rotten display he was putting in. Seconds after kick off Oshima was fouled off the ball. No card. This pattern was repeated throughout the game. Yokohama hacked and dived and feigned injury all the way through the game. I can only guess that Nishimura was due to drive home in a lovely new luxury Nissan provided by Yokohama. I’ve never seen a more infuriatingly one sided refereeing display. Oh, actually, I probably have as the refs are always terrible but this one really stood out. His replacement in the second half was even worse, apparently unaware of what sport he was even officiating. Random decision after random decision. Stopping the play for an injury and then restarting with a goal kick instead of a drop ball. Sure he probably was only expecting to only be lifting up the substitute board and got thrown in at the deep end, but seriously, he was clueless. Quite why Nishimura and the 4th official got selected for a potentially title deciding game I don’t know. Surely it’s time that Nishimura got sent off to pasture. Leandro Damiao through on goal and hacked down by the last man on the edge of the box. Amazingly he got the award of a free kick rather than a penalty right, but no card? I think it could have been a red. Plenty of terrible fouls from Yokohama that weren’t even given as free kicks. Another clear penalty that wasn’t given when Daimao was shoved in the box. A handball in the box from a Yokohama defender that the ref also missed (well, I saw it!). Marinos players rolling around on the floor, kicking the ball away, anything to waste some time and getting away with it. I don’t even know why they were bothering as if they hadn’t they probably could have scored three or four more. Let’s not forget the fact that it wasn’t just the ref and we were rubbish too, but we definitely didn’t get the rub of the green in this game.
Dubious Yokahama -
I’ve been wavering on who I least disliked winning the league for the last month or so. First of all, I decided the least bad option was Kashima as at least it would be business as usual and would deny both of our neighbours. But Kashima were such a bunch of scumbags when we played them, (shout out to Bueno!), that I couldn’t possibly hope for that. So, down to Yokohama or FC Tokyo. I then moved on to Yokohama because at least they score a few goals and don’t just hoof the ball to the fast guy to dive and win a penalty so that the chubby guy can run up, stop jog on the spot, reverse, skip a bit and then finally kick it (all in one ‘seamless’ run up, right?) and then win 1-0. But after this game, they’re out too. I would have liked us to smack Yokohama by four or five goals and then would be happy for them to win the title. But that didn’t exactly happen, did it? So now I’m going for Tokyo, I guess. Yokohama apparently play beautiful attacking football, but all I saw yesterday was a bunch of cheating midgets diving, fouling, time wasting, feigning injury and most annoyingly of all, finishing off chances clinically. Nakagawa apparently said he wanted to thank Frontale for his time with us as a youth player by beating us. Interesting logic. Similarly interesting was his goal celebration, kneeling and praying with his hands aloft right in front of our main fan area. Presumably this was in thanks to us too. I don’t know if they’ve been doing this all season or they just save it for local derbies, but if they have, I think that any sense of them having the attacking football moral high-ground disintegrates on closer inspection. Perhaps we were aiming for the moral high-ground and were pursuing it at the expense of actually playing football. Funnily enough, we out possessed and out-passed them and were only one shot behind them too. And we if we avoid defeat next weekend we will end up as the team who lost the least games in the league this year. But these stats aren’t really much consolation as they beat us 4-1 at our place and will win the league comfortably ahead of us.
Foreign players -
One big difference between Yokohama and us was in the use of foreign players. They had four Brazilians, one Thai and one Korean player in the starting line up. We played Sung-Ryong, probably only because Arai was injured (I’m guessing) and that was it. I’ve often moaned about Oniki having a problem with foreigners and it seems like he’ll do anything to avoid playing them. The thing is, the reason they have a limit on foreign players is presumably to stop big money clubs fielding a whole team of foreign ringers, the implication being that there’s a much bigger pool of good foreign players to choose from. Most teams understandably use their foreign spots to boost their starting eleven. For some reason, we use our foreign spots to warm the bench or maybe just to keep the translators occupied. Damiao has been used sparingly and seemingly reluctantly. Oniki has never attempted to mould the team around him (our big money star player) and has instead put him in up front by himself with no thoughts on how he could get the best out of him. If Oniki is with us next year, there’s really no point us having any foreigners.
Four goals, all coming from mistakes from us, all put away by a superior if quite cheaty Yokohama team. Have a close look at the replay of the game please Oniki. Thankfully this season will soon be over and we won’t have to deal with any more of this rubbish for a few months. Next up, our final game, away at Consadole Sapporo, a team who probably really want to beat us after the Levain Cup final. We need to win to have any chance of an ACL place next year. Not sure we particularly deserve one, and we’d probably only mess it up again, but it could be useful for player retention and attraction. Least it’s a nice trip. Hopefully we’ll see some kind of reaction to this disaster. Fingers crossed.
Team
GK 1. Sung-Ryong JUNG
MF 6. MORITA Hidemasa
DF 5. TANIGUCHI Shogo
DF 34. YAMAMURA Kazuya
DF 7. KURUMAYA Shintaro
MF 25. TANAKA Ao
MF 10. OSHIMA Ryota
MF 41. IENAGA Akihiro
(Yellow card 90+5')
MF 28. WAKIZAKA Yasuto
MF 8. ABE Hiroyuki
FW 11. KOBAYASHI Yu
Subs
GK 24. ANDO Shunsuke
DF 2. NOBORIZATO Kyoehi
DF 4. JESIEL
DF 4. JESIEL
FW 9. LEANDRO DAMIAO (on for ABE 61')
MF 16. HASEGAWA Tatsuya (on for WAKIZAKA 54')
FW 20. CHINEN Kei (on for KOBAYASHI 79') MF 22. SHIMODA Hokuto
My Frontale Man Of The Match
A fair few terrible performances, a lot of average and ineffective ones. Normally in a game we lose heavily I sulk and don’t give anyone this, but one player at least tried to do something.
TANAKA Ao - wasn’t crap. But to be honest, wasn't as good as he normally is.
TANAKA Ao - wasn’t crap. But to be honest, wasn't as good as he normally is.
Goals
NAKAGAWA (Yokohama) 8' 0-1
ERIK (Yokohama) 49' 0-2
ERIK (Yokohama) 69' 0-3
LEANDRO DAMIAO (Frontale) 74' 1-3
ENDO (Yokohama) 89' 1-4
Highlights
Sunday, 1 December 2019
Interesting beer at J League stadiums
This is a bit of a weird blog post but I thought it could be of some
use to some people. It also nicely links this blog and another blog I
write called Tokyo Beer Drinker, about craft beer bars, shops,
restaurants and breweries in the greater Tokyo area (although
occasionally it goes much further afield). In the hugely unlikely case that you're considering going
to a J League game and are not really bothered about which team you see, but are
instead basing your decision on pre-game refreshment, this post might be of
some help. I'll update this as more options appear and as I visit more
stadiums. I'll also add some names of bars or breweries that are
particularly worth a visit in the vicinity. If a team is not on here,
that probably means that there's nothing to recommend it about it or I haven't been there yet. Somewhat amusingly I have lumped together teams that play fairly close to each other or in the same stadium and are almost certainly bitter rivals. Seemed like a fun thing to do. One
final thing worth bearing in mind is the fact that most grounds allow
you to take beer into the ground if you empty it into a paper cup before
entering. So if you want to take your own beer, your selection is vast,
as long as you don't mind drinking that whale from a plastic or paper
cup.
Akita Blaublitz - never visited the ground.
The Aqula brewery has a couple of locations in the city centre which are well worth a visit.
Albirex Niigata - macro only at the ground.
Lots of drinking options in the city centre though including a couple of breweries taprooms. Check out some of those options here. There is also a Niigata beer map available I think.
Fagiano Okayama - never been to the ground. Sorry.
Doppo has a taproom in the Aeon Mall near the main station.
FC Gifu - macro at the ground.
Y Market has a bar called Yell! Ale! Gifu! fairly near the station.
Kashima Antlers - macro only at the ground
There is a brewpub called Paradise Beer Factory near Kashima Jingu. Not the closest, but close enough considering nothing seems to be close or convenient in Kashima
Kawasaki Frontale - macro only at the ground (Suntory Premium Malts Kaoru Ale)
As this is my team and I also really like the brewery, I'll mention that there is TKBrewing a few stations away near Kawasaki station. It's great. There are also a few other bars in the area too. Check them here.
Kyoto Sanga - They now have Pilsner Urquell available at the stadium in real glasses in the food court area at the home end of the stadium, but before you enter.
Mito Hollyhock - macro only at the stadium as far as I can remember
Not particularly close to the ground, but at Mito station they have a Hitachino Nest taproom.
Nagoya Grampus Eight - macro only at the ground
If you're at the Toyota stadium you're miles from anywhere, but at the Mizuho stadium you're a few stops away from the Y Market brewpub.
Oita Trinita - macro only at the ground
As the ground is miles from the city, you'll almost certainly end up getting the bus back to the city centre where there are a couple of breweries. The strangely named Yell & Ale/Abe Bond is a brewpub and bar and Oita Funai/Monkey Mountain which can sell you beers to take away, or I think you can drink them out of a plastic cup by the front door of the brewery.
Omiya Ardija - can't remember what is served at the ground.
There is a brewpub called Hikawa en route to the stadium from the station. Bizarrely it was closed when we tried to visit it before a game last time, but maybe you'll have more luck.
SC Sagamihara - never visited the ground...
But Ebina beer has their brewery and taproom just a few stations away on the Sagami line.
Shimizu S Pulse - macro only at the ground.
If you head back to Shizuoka city which is one of the shuttle bus options there are quite a few places there including plenty of Aoi beer outlets and one really good Peruvian restaurant that serves great Japanese German-style beer. Bit of a mash up.
Urawa Reds - mostly macro at the ground but they do have some 'crafty' beers at one outlet in the away fan section. Have had Yona Yona and Brooklyn Lager there on various occasions, so basically stuff from breweries that have been taken over by Kirin.
Vegalta Sendai - macro at the ground.
But the city is a great place to drink with a few budget craft beer options (Craft Beer Market, Craftsman) and some other fun places too. There is a Sendai beer map available so it might be worth tracking one of them down.
Ventforet Kofu - macro at the ground.
But there are a few locations run by Outsider Brewing including their brewery and taproom called Hops & Herbs. It was a real bummer them being relegated to J2 as I enjoyed that away game a lot.
Vissel Kobe - macro only at the ground and beware, it's a cashless stadium too.
In the city centre there are a few outlets run by the Rokko brewery and an interestingly named brewery called In Tha Door.
Yokohama FC / YSCC Yokohama / Yokohama F Marinos - macro only at Nissan stadium
(Presumably lumping these three teams together will annoy three sets of fans at once). The city centre is fairly near to both the Nissan stadium and Mitsuzawa. In the city there are loads of beer places and quite a few brew pubs. Check out some of them here. Also, a few stops along the Yokohama line in the opposite direction there is the brewery and taproom for TDM 1874.
Grounds that actually have craft beer/Ji-biru at the stadium -
Giravanz Kitakyushu - serves Mojiko retro at the ground! Bravo!
And it's only a few stations away from the brewery in Mojiko too!
Matsumoto Yamaga - Aiwa beer available in the stadium in the main stand.
In the city centre there are two breweries, Matsumoto Brewing and Bacca along with some more bars that I haven't visited yet.
Montedio Yamagata - serves Gassan pils in the food court part
outside the ground. Went back a few times before the game and at half
time.
Shonan Bellmare - Sankt Gallen have a stand outside the
ground in the fan area with about five options I think.
Also, back in
Hiratsuka there is the Yggdrasil brewery and taproom which is very
welcoming for both home and away fans.
Cerezo Osaka - Now they have a little truck run by local bar chain Umineko outside the stadium at games with 10 taps of Craft Beer, some of which are theirs (Derailleur Brewery) and a couple of which are made exclusively for the football team.
Tokyo Verdy - Seem to usually have a little truck at the home end outside the stadium with beers by OGA Brewing, one of which is a beer made for the team, green and contains kale...
Avispa Fukuoka - Now have a beer called Avispa Ale made for them by Suginoya, a Fukuoka brewery that you can sometimes get in the area in front of the main entrance to the stadium.
Teams and stadiums with good beer nearby
Akita Blaublitz - never visited the ground.
The Aqula brewery has a couple of locations in the city centre which are well worth a visit.
Albirex Niigata - macro only at the ground.
Lots of drinking options in the city centre though including a couple of breweries taprooms. Check out some of those options here. There is also a Niigata beer map available I think.
Fagiano Okayama - never been to the ground. Sorry.
Doppo has a taproom in the Aeon Mall near the main station.
FC Gifu - macro at the ground.
Y Market has a bar called Yell! Ale! Gifu! fairly near the station.
Kashima Antlers - macro only at the ground
There is a brewpub called Paradise Beer Factory near Kashima Jingu. Not the closest, but close enough considering nothing seems to be close or convenient in Kashima
Kawasaki Frontale - macro only at the ground (Suntory Premium Malts Kaoru Ale)
As this is my team and I also really like the brewery, I'll mention that there is TKBrewing a few stations away near Kawasaki station. It's great. There are also a few other bars in the area too. Check them here.
Kyoto Sanga - They now have Pilsner Urquell available at the stadium in real glasses in the food court area at the home end of the stadium, but before you enter.
Mito Hollyhock - macro only at the stadium as far as I can remember
Not particularly close to the ground, but at Mito station they have a Hitachino Nest taproom.
Nagoya Grampus Eight - macro only at the ground
If you're at the Toyota stadium you're miles from anywhere, but at the Mizuho stadium you're a few stops away from the Y Market brewpub.
Oita Trinita - macro only at the ground
As the ground is miles from the city, you'll almost certainly end up getting the bus back to the city centre where there are a couple of breweries. The strangely named Yell & Ale/Abe Bond is a brewpub and bar and Oita Funai/Monkey Mountain which can sell you beers to take away, or I think you can drink them out of a plastic cup by the front door of the brewery.
Omiya Ardija - can't remember what is served at the ground.
There is a brewpub called Hikawa en route to the stadium from the station. Bizarrely it was closed when we tried to visit it before a game last time, but maybe you'll have more luck.
SC Sagamihara - never visited the ground...
But Ebina beer has their brewery and taproom just a few stations away on the Sagami line.
Shimizu S Pulse - macro only at the ground.
If you head back to Shizuoka city which is one of the shuttle bus options there are quite a few places there including plenty of Aoi beer outlets and one really good Peruvian restaurant that serves great Japanese German-style beer. Bit of a mash up.
Urawa Reds - mostly macro at the ground but they do have some 'crafty' beers at one outlet in the away fan section. Have had Yona Yona and Brooklyn Lager there on various occasions, so basically stuff from breweries that have been taken over by Kirin.
Vegalta Sendai - macro at the ground.
But the city is a great place to drink with a few budget craft beer options (Craft Beer Market, Craftsman) and some other fun places too. There is a Sendai beer map available so it might be worth tracking one of them down.
Ventforet Kofu - macro at the ground.
But there are a few locations run by Outsider Brewing including their brewery and taproom called Hops & Herbs. It was a real bummer them being relegated to J2 as I enjoyed that away game a lot.
Vissel Kobe - macro only at the ground and beware, it's a cashless stadium too.
In the city centre there are a few outlets run by the Rokko brewery and an interestingly named brewery called In Tha Door.
Yokohama FC / YSCC Yokohama / Yokohama F Marinos - macro only at Nissan stadium
(Presumably lumping these three teams together will annoy three sets of fans at once). The city centre is fairly near to both the Nissan stadium and Mitsuzawa. In the city there are loads of beer places and quite a few brew pubs. Check out some of them here. Also, a few stops along the Yokohama line in the opposite direction there is the brewery and taproom for TDM 1874.
Sunday, 10 November 2019
Vs Kashima Antlers (away) 9/11/19 - J League match 31
Kashima Antlers 0 - 2 Kawasaki Frontale
Hehehe. Well, that was fun. I think I said in a previous post that all we have to look forward to for the rest of this season is ruining other teams’ title challenges. Today we’ve probably done that for Kashima, and let’s be honest, it couldn’t have happened to a nastier team. I’ll keep this all brief as it’s not long since I did a post moaning about Kashima and this time I’d probably only be saying the same things. If you’re not interested in me repeating myself feel free to stop reading after the next sentence which I feel will sum up the rest of what I’m going to say. It was a lot of fun to beat a horrible Kashima team at their own place, particularly when they desperately needed to win. Here are a few brief bullet points and then we can all have a drink or two to celebrate this probably inconsequential win. At least as far as we’re concerned anyway. There will probably be quite a few consequences for Kashima!
Dirty, dirty Kashima -
Have said it numerous times but I’ll say it again. Kashima are a horrible team full of hackers and divers and their fans aren’t much better. Their centre back pairing of Jung and Bueno must be the most irritating of all possible J League duos; two players who individually are pretty damn irritating, but together take it to another level. It’s a sign of how much of an arsehole that Bueno is that for most of this match Jung looked fairly respectable in comparison. Bueno is a total rotter but took it to new levels getting Ienaga booked by falling down clutching his face after no contact whatsoever. To be honest, not sure what the ref was doing with that decision. Serginho seems much less arseholeish, but at the same time seems to just be a massive elbow made into a football player. The amount of extremely dubious physical challenges he put in was unbelievable. No cards of course. Sometimes not even a free kick. Fair play to him though, he did apologise after each attempted shattering of bone. And those fans... ‘Amazing atmosphere...’ if you’re really into booing of any opposition possession. I don’t know why they and Urawa bother to be honest. Can’t imagine that an away team passing the ball around would be so affected by the boos that they’d have a crisis of confidence and give the ball away. Add to this some big booing for Kashima old boy Yamamura before the game and you have quite an unlikeable set of fans. It was lovely that Yamamura scored. It was pretty good of him to not celebrate the goal. Can’t imagine I would have been able to do the same after being booed before the game. Karma, eh?
High on excitement, low on quality, but I'll take that! -
In some ways this was a bit of a smash and grab from us. In the first half we had plenty of possession and pretty much no shots whilst Kashima had little possession and plenty of shots, and missed some pretty good chances. Though, to be honest, most of those chances were gifted to them by us. The second half was a bit more even but there was still not much high quality play going on in front of goal. Kashima fluffed some more, and the one time they didn’t fluff, Kurumaya was on hand to clear off the line. We didn’t look great up front but were getting a bit closer the more Kashima tried to score. It’s weird for us to score with a header from a set piece recently so that was nice. This really forced Kashima to commit men forward and consequently gave us lots of space. We probably should have scored more. Ienaga put a first time shot pretty much out of the stadium it was so high over the bar. Chinen had a chance to hoof the ball into an empty net from near the centre circle at the end of the game but almost put it out for a throw. The game is probably best summed up by our second goal; Kobayashi has a great chance, doesn’t take it (although this time he at least managed to shoot, even if it did hit the post and Hasegawa bundled the ball into the net at the second time of asking with some help from a defender. It definitely wasn’t beautiful, and it was definitely comical and sloppy. But they all count, and when it’s your team scoring these kind of goals, sometimes they are even more fun than fantastic pieces of skill.
Title race trundles on -
Still got no idea what’s going to happen. Still mathematically have a chance ourselves, but you’ve got to think that chance will be extinguished when the other teams catch up the extra game we’ve played. But if they happen to lose all those games...
That’ll do, I won’t mention dodgy performances from some players, I won’t mention a ref with some interesting thoughts on both yellow card offences and playing the advantage. I will mention again that this was fun!! Next up Yokohama at home. Perhaps we’ll spoil their party too. We’ll see, I guess. It’s nice to be able to enjoy the end of what has been a bit of a frustrating season. Let’s keep it going for the last couple of games. Go Frontale!
Team
GK 21. ARAI Shota
GK 21. ARAI Shota
MF 6. MORITA Hidemasa (Yellow card 42')
DF 5. TANIGUCHI Shogo (Yellow card 69')
DF 34. YAMAMURA Kazuya
DF 7. KURUMAYA Shintaro
MF 25. TANAKA Ao
MF 10. OSHIMA Ryota
MF 41. IENAGA Akihiro
(Yellow card 77')
MF 28. WAKIZAKA Yasuto
MF 8. ABE Hiroyuki
FW 11. KOBAYASHI Yu
Subs
GK 1. Sung-Ryong JUNG
DF 2. NOBORIZATO Kyoehi (on for ABE 90+3')
DF 3. NARA Tatsuki
DF 3. NARA Tatsuki
FW 9. LEANDRO DAMIAO
MF 16. HASEGAWA Tatsuya (on for WAKIZAKA 56')
FW 20. CHINEN Kei (on for KOBAYASHI 81')
MF 22. SHIMODA Hokuto
I dunno, wasn't exactly the greatest match, but a few players looked good. Tanaka was great again, Arai made some important saves, Hasegawa and Kurumaya made fools of plenty of Kashima players later on in the game. But given that he hasn't really had a chance to play where he probably wants to, I'll give it to….
YAMAMURA Kazuya - scored a goal, kept a clean sheet, got the best possible revenge for his prematch booing and then trumped it by not even celebrating. Classy!
MF 22. SHIMODA Hokuto
My Frontale Man Of The Match
I dunno, wasn't exactly the greatest match, but a few players looked good. Tanaka was great again, Arai made some important saves, Hasegawa and Kurumaya made fools of plenty of Kashima players later on in the game. But given that he hasn't really had a chance to play where he probably wants to, I'll give it to….
YAMAMURA Kazuya - scored a goal, kept a clean sheet, got the best possible revenge for his prematch booing and then trumped it by not even celebrating. Classy!
Goals
YAMAMURA (Frontale) 62' 0-1
HASEGAWA (Frontale) 71' 0-2
Highlights
Wednesday, 6 November 2019
Vs Urawa Reds (away) 5/11/19 - J League match 32
Urawa Reds 0 - 2 Kawasaki Frontale
I couldn't go to this game due to work. It was moved to a Tuesday night with a 18:30 kick off to try to help Urawa win the ACL. We'll see how that works out. It's helped us pile the pressure on the top three. We're coming for you! Hmmmm... Yeah right. But it's always nice to beat Urawa and nice to get another win on the board. All I know about this game is what I have gleaned from looking at the match stats and the highlights videos, so I'm not going to bore on about it. But I wanted to get this post done as soon as possible as I won't really be gaining any more insight as the days pass. Next up, Kashima away on Saturday. The bus journey is almost certainly going to be a nightmare. This is the first opportunity that we have to ruin someone's title chase. I'm still torn as to who I would prefer to win the league. Actually, completely bewildered would be more accurate. We'll see, I guess. Let's hope we can keep the wins coming. Go Frontale!
Team
GK 21. ARAI Shota
GK 21. ARAI Shota
DF 26. MAGUINHO
DF 5. TANIGUCHI Shogo
DF 34. YAMAMURA Kazuya
DF 7. KURUMAYA Shintaro
MF 25. TANAKA Ao
MF 6. MORITA Hidemasa
MF 41. IENAGA Akihiro
MF 28. WAKIZAKA Yasuto
MF 19. SAITO Manabu
FW 9. LEANDRO DAMIAO (Yellow card 67')
Subs
GK 1. Sung-Ryong JUNG
DF 3. NARA Tatsuki
MF 10. OSHIMA Ryota (on for MAGUINHO 46')
FW 11. KOBAYASHI Yu (on for LEANDRO DAMIAO 67')
MF 16. HASEGAWA Tatsuya
MF 22. SHIMODA Hokuto
WAKIZAKA (Frontale) 35' 0-1
KOBAYASHI (Frontale) 78' 0-2
Highlights
Monday, 4 November 2019
Vs Sanfrecce Hiroshima (home) 2/11/19 - J League match 30
Kawasaki Frontale 2 - 1 Sanfrecce Hiroshima
As the season nears an end, and with our Levain Cup victory still fresh in our minds, we were back at home and playing again in the league. Mathematically, we still have a chance of taking a third league title, but giving that this was another match day where Kashima, FC Tokyo and Yokohama all won, it is only the maths that we have to hang on to. But we’ve still got to play out these last few games and perhaps mess up some teams’ title chances. It was nice to win a game in the league though as that is something of a rarity recently. I’ve said it before and I’m sure I’ll say it again, but it’s a bit of a miracle, given our recent form, that we’re anywhere close to the title race this year. This blog post is going to be more useless than these normally are, as I was lucky enough to get some VIP tickets to this game. Consequently, I very much enjoyed the free food and alcohol before the game and watched from the side of the pitch near the centre line in the main stand. Very nice seats, fantastic view, pretty lousy atmosphere as you’d probably expect. These things combined with the general pointlessness of the match meant that I didn’t put much effort into writing notes. So, I’ll do my best, but it’s going to be a bit shabby, I think.
Suspensions and now injuries -
This game saw us without Taniguchi (suspended for the red in the Levain final), Kurumaya and Ienaga (suspended for picking up five yellow cards). We narrowly averted a defensive disaster through Nara’s return and he looked well up for the game after missing a lot of games. Jesiel also made it back to the bench so we should be spoilt for choice in that department soon. Wonder who will get picked. The combination of Nara and Yamamura looked pretty solid I thought and the goal we conceded only came from a bit of an unfortunate blunder from Maguinho. Arai did have to make a few saves though and some of them were pretty good so I can’t see us seeing Sung-Ryong again this season if Arai continues like that. Up front we once again seem to be struck by the curse that if a player scores as a sub, they start the next game and then fail to do anything too exciting. Can we start our future games with no strikers and use Kobayashi, Leandro Damiao and Chinen all as super subs please? Although to be fair to Kobayashi, he did have a legitimate goal ruled out for offside in the first half. (Some abuse for the officials further down in this post). Thankfully we have midfielders who want to shoot and it was nice to see Ao get another goal. Whether he is allowed to claim it is another matter as it is clearly an own goal, the ball bouncing off the post onto the keeper and back into the net. I suspect that Ao would like it and the keeper doesn’t want it though, so we’ll see. This was not the only thing Ao contributed though. I think he was pretty good all over the pitch to be honest. Wakizaka also had another good game I thought. I was delighted for Maguinho to get a goal on the day his kids were at the game. He really hasn’t had a decent crack of the whip this year and looked delighted when he smashed the ball home confidently. The fact that it came shortly after his mistake gave Hiroshima their goal will hopefully go some way to canceling out the mistake. I wouldn’t be surprised if we see him make way in the next match though as we’ll have bigger names available. It’s a shame for him though. Just as we get some players back from injury we lose another couple though. It will come as no surprise to hear that Oshima is one of the injuries, although he walked off the pitch so it’s hopefully not too serious. It’s not really worth risking him though as the remaining games are pretty pointless. The worrying injury came to Kengo and it was immediately apparent that it was a serious injury from the way he reacted. Apparently it’s an ACL injury so that will see him definitely out till the start of next season at the earliest. We just have to hope it’s not too bad as these injuries can sometimes be pretty nasty. Fingers crossed he’s back next year. Very classy of the Hiroshima fans to boo him as he lie injured…
The race for fourth -
Realistically, this is the best we can hope for. Eight points off top and second and seven points off third with four games to go. Two of these games will be against two of the teams above us, but even if we win them both we’ll still need more slip ups from those teams. Fourth place could get us into the ACL if Kashima win the Emperor’s Cup, (I think, but this could well be just my imagination). This could be somewhat useful for us when it comes to attracting and retaining players. Possibly… I don’t really know how much of a big thing the ACL is for J League players to be honest. It’s a shame we stunk the place up so badly in the middle of the season. We now have three wins in our last eleven league games. You could spin that a little differently though and say three wins a draw and a loss in our last five. Either way you look at it, it hasn’t been good enough. We’ll be scrapping for fourth with Sanfrecce and Cerezo as there’s only one point between the three of us. So it looks like a final league position of anywhere from 4th to 6th. I don’t know how this will be perceived by the board and the fans. Apparently Oniki has been offered a new contract but I haven’t heard that he’s accepted it yet. Mysterious… The Levain Cup win has taken the edge a little of a disappointing league campaign I guess, but as I’ve said numerous times, us not winning the league this year has to go down as a huge missed opportunity as the other contenders have been pretty rotten at times.
Oniki reconsidered -
On last week’s J Talk podcast I said that I have once again called a truce with Oniki, mainly as I’m tired of moaning about him, but also I have to give him some credit for getting us another trophy. I still have my doubts about a lot of his team selections and his tactics leave me cold at times. However, sitting just behind him in the fancy seats gave me a whole new impression of him. He was constantly giving the fourth official and the ref grief about some dodgy decisions, so I have a newfound respect for him. If there’s one thing we can all agree on, it’s the fact that the officials are often pretty useless. People bore on about Rugby and the respect that the players show the ref, but seriously, the way some of the J League officials officiate, I think it would be ridiculous to afford them any kind of respect. Yeah, it’s a tough job etc. but in the way that most people who want to be politicians are exactly the kind of people who shouldn’t be politicians, you could probably say the same about refs. If you are in any way religious, why not have a little pray for some new refs and linesmen who aren’t insane and can actually do the job for next season.
So, yeah, nice to beat Hiroshima. These little victories are probably all we have to take from this season now, so I suppose we should try to make the most of them. Next up, Urawa away on Tuesday with a ridiculous 18:30 kick off, perhaps arranged to ensure the smallest possible crowd. I won’t be able to go to this game and the crazy early kick off means that the game will be all but over by the time I finish work. Would be quite fun to add to their league worries, wouldn’t it? Guess the line up will be of some interest and to be honest, it’s a game we really should win. Therefore, we’ll probably lose. After that, it’s another hellish trip to Kashima next weekend. Or more accurately, a hellish bus trip back from Kashima. Pressure’s off so let’s just have some fun for the last few games. Go Frontale!
Team
GK 21. ARAI Shota
GK 21. ARAI Shota
DF 26. MAGUINHO
DF 3. NARA Tatsuki
DF 34. YAMAMURA Kazuya
DF 2. NOBORIZATO Kyohei (Yellow card 90')
MF 25. TANAKA Ao
MF 10. OSHIMA Ryota
MF 28. WAKIZAKA Yasuto
MF 14. NAKAMURA Kengo
MF 8. ABE Hiroyuki
FW 11. KOBAYASHI Yu
Subs
GK 1. Sung-Ryong JUNG
DF 4. JESIEL
FW 9. LEANDRO DAMIAO
FW 9. LEANDRO DAMIAO
FW 20. CHINEN Kei (on for KOBAYASHI 90+3')
MF 22. SHIMODA Hokuto (on for OSHIMA 60')
MF 35. ISSAKA Zain
My Frontale Man Of The Match
This was a reasonable performance, with not a great deal of possession and significantly fewer goal attempts than the opposition but it didn’t feel like a smash and grab. Perhaps it was a strangely efficient performance. All in all, quite average, but one player stood out and that was….
TANAKA Ao - all over the pitch, wearing a phantom of the opera mask, getting involved with a broken nose and even trolling their keeper by forcing him to score an own goal with his back. His star continues to rise, and deservedly so.
Goals
OWN GOAL (Sanfrecce) 21' 1-0
LEANDRO DAMIAO (Sanfrecce) 82' 1-1
MAGUINHO (Frontale) 84' 2-1
Highlights
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