The Urawa Reds Thread

Re: Urawa Reds Controversy Thread

I hadn't heard these comments. Hopefully Finke isn't actually encouraging simulation, and that what he actually meant to say was that he was angry about it not being a penalty, purely because Escudero didn't fall (so the referee didn't notice/call it).

If he really is encouraging diving, then I agree with Inukai (and I wouldn't say that too often); Finke would need to go.
Simulation should be stamped out of the game, and perhaps the J. League board should take a note out of the A-League's book, and create a review panel to determine whether penalties are simulation, and hand out match bans/fines to the guilty players.

Problem is, I think we've already had a lot of managers, and we desperately need some managerial stability. Having a new manager every season (or not even for a full season, in many of our cases) doesn't help the players.

 

Re: Urawa Reds Controversy Thread

Wow. I would have been pretty upset about that to say the least if he had dived, especially given his performances every time a decision was given against him

http://img175.imageshack.us/img175/2023/escudero.jpg

(I can't upload to my blog from work so it had to be imageshack)

 

Re: Urawa Reds Controversy Thread

http://www.nikkansports.com/soccer/news/p-sc-tp0-20090826-535522.html

I guess this clears it up. Sorta...

Apparently they are misleading statements.

 

Re: Urawa Reds Controversy Thread

You mean relatively speaking, right? As a European myself I couldn't disagree more with his attitude. That way Maradona and Ronaldo and Drogba et cetera lie.

It seemed to me that in France it is a more accepting attitude though, if not in the penalty area, so maybe in Germany also. In one of my earlier matches as a referee in a youth game, there was some (fair, I thought, as an Englishman maybe) contact and a boy (18 years old) lost the ball. The coach took a look at me and then suggested to his player that he should go down in future if he feels he's been fouled. It was almost as if he thought he was helping me out by making the "foul" more obvious. Football can be a funny game.

 

Re: Urawa Reds Controversy Thread

Therein lies the problem though. He says foul, referee and other side say fair tackle. Therefore if the player does go down deliberately with the intention of "helping" the referee with his decision, then it's a dive. He may not see it that way, but that is in effect what is happening, and FIFA agrees. I don't have the quote, but their guidelines for Simulation (included in the Additional Instructions for Referees I think) include something about exaggerating minimal or fair contact. That translates to diving in a situation that is marginal but the player decides to go down, which as far as FIFA are concerned makes it a dive, but it is very hard to a referee to make that out. We don't need that kind of problem in football.

And as for an unlucky steak, you are only unlucky if you are the better team but lose. They weren't the better team at the Big Arch.

 

Re: Urawa Reds Controversy Thread

I don't know if he was encouraging simulation of any kind, as I said.

If a player's balance is good enough to stay upright after a challenge in a box, it should be the referee's job to pay attention to the challenge. If the challenge is off the ball/does not connect with the ball/with the studs showing and connects with the player, it is a clear penalty, regardless of whether the player goes down.

I haven't seen the challenge, myself, but I am inclined to believe (putting bias aside) that Finke was trying to argue, in his frustration (and thus perhaps not using the best wording), that it was a clear penalty, but because Escudero didn't go down, the referee didn't see it as such.

Something like, "The foul on Escudero would have brought many other players down, but because he didn't fall, the referee was blind to the challenge, but should have seen it was a penalty."


Again, I haven't actually seen the challenge, so I'm basing my interpretation entirely on what has been written and quoted. I might come to a different conclusion, if I actually see it. Finke may have even seen what he believed was a penalty foul, even if it actually wasn't, thus bringing him to say what he has said.

Until he actually clears it up, himself, the entire thing can only be speculation.

 

Re: Urawa Reds Controversy Thread

Something I hadn't noticed, until now:

http://www.urawa-reds.co.jp/tools_en/page_store/news_2161.html

So it turns out that he wasn't promoting simulation, but it still doesn't quite clear up what he meant... I going to assume it was something similar to what I said (because I can't think of any other interpretations, at the moment).

 

Re: Urawa Reds Controversy Thread

Another interpretation is that it is another rebuke of Finke. It's a very Japanese way of saving face, basically. Not that I disagree with it, just that the "I can confirm that these comments, while appearing to be the opposite, are actually just a confirmation that this person actually feels this way, which is to say that he is in complete agreement with his superiors" is a very Japanese way of handling this mess. "While he may have said this, he was actually misleading you and meant to say this." He doesn't say that he was misinterpreted, he says that Finke was misleading people on his true feelings, which in itself is quite a bizarre concept if you haven't been turned slightly peculiar by this country already. Reminds me of Hillary misspeaking, it's a similar concept. If they trusted Finke they would let him speak rather than releasing a statement through his boss, and it's a sign of the embarrassment Finke has caused that they have chosen to do that.

As for clearing things up, I was going to speculate that if he did issue a statement it would be something similar to this. I guess they just decided to cut out the middle man and publish it under the President's name, since Plan A would have been to release this from Finke's POV, which would have just sounded bizarre ("I apologise for misleading the public over my true feelings on the matter ... ")

 

Re: Urawa Reds Controversy Thread

So what you're saying is the latest release is a Japanese way of stating "We've handled this in-house and it's been taken care of. Everyone get back to work." ??

 

Re: Urawa Reds Controversy Thread

He probably had very little say in the matter. Home to Yamagata on the 13th, this is Urawa's chance to end their eight game losing streak, and they're not about to lose one of their better players for it!

 

Re: Urawa Reds Controversy Thread

I see they've got the derby coming up. It's a shame that the Omiya fans are probably too nice to greet them with a chorus of "F**k all! You're gonna win f**k all!"

 

Re: Urawa Reds Controversy Thread

I'm sick of seeing new coaches in the revolving door of the Urawa management system, but I have no doubts that it will happen.

The Matsumoto game had only two real problems... finding away around the 'keeper (who looked like he was having a great game, along with some luck), and Yamagishi. I already don't rate him very much, and he's not helping his case.
Apart from that, they seemed fairly controlling of the game (from what I saw).

The only thing we can aim for, now, in reality, is a top 3 spot on the table. And that's still a fair ask.

 

Re: Urawa Reds Controversy Thread

I do not think that Finke will get fired. I think Mitsubishi knew that they were in for a tough year. They brought him in to develop the youth and that is what he has done pretty well so far. Urawa lost a pretty big sponsor early on in FUSO and cannot buy whoever they want. I think they are also preparing for the eventual exits of Tsuboi, Tulio, Abe, Ponte, and Suzuki/Yamada.

The loss to Matsumoto was embarassing but it was not outrageous. Matsumoto were one of the few lower league teams playing a home game against a squad who had the spine of their team off doing other things.

They will bring in Marcio Richardes who had a great tandem with Edmilson, they will get a couple guys who can play in the back and they will be competitive next year. For the most part this is still the Osieck squad.

I think Abe and Tulio are gone. Finke stays.

 

Re: Urawa Reds Controversy Thread

I think we should wait until we finish above 10th before we start taunting other teams on their successes.

 

Re: Urawa Reds Controversy Thread

And that is what I mean by being too nice! The great thing about being a football fan is no matter bad your team may be, you can always reserve the right to rip on your biggest rivals whenever they deserve it.

Being a Brighton fan, this is a right I've been invoking a lot over the last 15 years, despite our rivals being way better than us...

 

Re: Urawa Reds Controversy Thread

I just worry about Karma. Right now at this time of the season I stop thinking about who we can steal from teams near the bottom and start thinking about who we are gonna lose if we get dropped.

Urawa might have been the first to drop a game to a 4th division squad but I doubt that more than a handful of those games were played this early in the campaign at the home of the lower division squads home. If a 4th division squad has managed to survive to the 4th round, like in past years, it was either at a neutral site far away from where they live or at the home of the first division team. Most likely 1 or 2 key players for the squad were sitting on yellow card accumulations.

 

Re: Urawa Reds Controversy Thread

Could we change that to Takaharas salary... I keep reading Tulio... but it gives them a loophole "yeah but Tulio wasn't available"
Maybe I'm too picky afterall