Whatever it was, the US is still using the English measures. The world is thinking metric, they are stuck in the past. And the Post is not to be taken seriously anyways.
Dunno how that fits in this thread, but I will simply say that Alex Morgan is up there with some of the male players I hated the most over the last 21 years. And if I were allowed to call her under all names under the sun just as I did for those male players, it would sound ugly as hell.
And in such countries, you can buy your way into a spot at the university if you're "friendly" with the leaders.
http://www.jfa.jp/eng/news/00021800/ I might have missed this earlier if already posted. Some interesting words by Hasegawa...
I guess you refer to this: "I feel guilty for the older players on this team. Although people may say that you still have another chance, nothing is guaranteed, and this is certainly the final match with this current team". Frankly I would hope the core of this team goes on until Tokyo 2020: just one year seems too short to me for another "big revolution" in the roster. There will be three years, from 2020 to 2023, to implement a totally new team, but, if Japan wants to medal in Tokyo (and I guess they want!), we can't restart from scratch!
I like this kind of narrative. The guy managed to find a new perspective to present a well-known story, that was very compelling. Also, I could never get tired of reviewing those moments.
Looking at their website they look like they have acquired a few players this winter, so maybe they are more serious? I do not know if those players are any good. Their website and twitter feed still has nothing about Yoko though. I was hoping she would go to England, France or Germany, but we will see how it goes. If they play here alongside some fast players and let her sit in the middle of the pitch dictating the play and bringing her team mates into the game they should do a lot better. But it just depends on how they use her, if at all. But they should use her because she is class.
Sawa, in the group stage kept on talking about how their seemed to be no urgency to a lot of their play. She mentioned that it is a knockout tournament, though she was much happier with the performance against the Dutch. Given the way Takakura rolls, their might be significant changes. I hope they keep the starting eleven together that started against the Dutch together until the Olympics. Obviously try some different players, but just try and build some cohesion amongst the team.
Well, this is obviously not true, since they could still get eliminated on goal difference if all teams finish on 3 points. Sorry for that. The participation rules for the Universiade are very "lenient" anyway and many countries exploit that to get more medals. Countries like Brazil or Russia used to bring 27-28 y.o. (ex)professional football players. (at least, starting from this edition, the upper age limit changed from 28 to 25) The thing is, DPRK would have been competitive and probably among the favorites even without sending what looks like a WC squad (which, in my opinion, defeats the purpose of this competition). Perhaps they are taking this too seriously because of the recent senior NT's woes?
Today's games: Nadeshiko League Cup Group A Nagano vs Albi 17;00 Group B Jef vs Urawa 17:00 Nadeshiko League 2 Cup Group A Chifure vs Yamato 15:00 Group B Ehime vs Harima 15:00 Challenge League East Tsukuba vs NORD 12:00 Challenge League West Speranza vs Ange Violet 12:00 Cerezo Girls vs Nagoya 15:00 Universiade Japan vs USA 18:00 (local time)
Today's result: Nadeshiko League Cup Group A Nagano (Yokoyama 2) 2-2 Albi (Kamionobe, Nakamura) Group B Jef 0-1 Urawa (Kira) Nadeshiko League 2 Cup Group A Chifure (Nakamura Yushika) 1-0 Yamato Group B Ehime 0-2 Harima (Nakano, Honda) Challenge League East Tsukuba 0-1 NORD (Fukasawa) Challenge League West Speranza (Asano, Kuranuki) 2-0 Ange Violet Cerezo Girls (Kai, Marui) 2-5 Nagoya (Miura, Sekura, Kato, Miyake, Takebayashi)
Tomorrow's games: Nadeshiko League Cup Group A Nojima vs Nittaidai 17:00 Group B Mynavi vs Inac 13:00 Nadeshiko League 2 cup Group A Setagaya vs Orca 15:00 Group B Shizuoka vs Cerezo 15:00 Challenge League East Tokiwagi vs JFA 11:00 Niigata vs Jumonji 11:00 Challenge League West Kibi vs Belle 13:00
Kumi Yokoyama back to scoring with a brace. I somehow wish she had saved some goals for the WWC (although admittedly she didn't have much playing time, compared to Sugasawa). Megumi Kamionobe is one of 2011's veterans who score again (today it was from PK). Chinatsu Kira had a short stint in Senior NT: I can't remember if it was in Asian AFC Cup 2014 or at Asian Games the same year. Shouldn't this one actually be former Kibi's player Shiho Kurakazu?
Universiade (schedule) Japan 2 - 1 USA Nadeshiko top the group. QF (8th Mon) (14) 18:00 Russia - Korea Republic (15) 18:00 China - Ireland (13) 21:00 Korea DPR - Italy (16) 21:00 Canada - Japan SF (10th Wed) 17:00 Winner (13) - Winner (15) (free livestream) 21:00 Winner (14) - Winner (16) (free livestream) Finals (12th Fri) (free livestream) Bronze 17:00 Gold 21:00 there are also placement matches: (small SF) teams 9-12, 5-8 and after that 11-12, 9-10, 5-6, 7-8 free livestream on FISU TV (need to subscribe - no fee) - all universiade sport events are broadcasted in there.
If anyone was wondering why Rumi Utsugi has never been played at the WWC, it's very likely that she was injured. This week's NWSL's injury report lists her as "out" for this week-end's game, with the label: "Rumi Utsugi (Calf)". I guess it's very likely that she picked up this calf injury just before the World Cup or during it: this would explain why she hadn't any minute of playing time. So, basically, we played the World Cup with two unusable veterans (Utsugi and Sakaguchi) and a player who was available after group stage only (Momiki): it's part roster selection, part bad luck (also considering Ueki being injured just before the World Cup). For records, in this week-end Seattle Reign FC and Sky Blue FC both unexpectedly won their away matches (Seattle Reign in Portland by 0-1 and Sky Blue in Chicago by 1-2), but neither one had their Japanese player on the pitch (Utsugi was injured, while Kawasumi was probably technical choice). In the same Chicago-Sky Blue match, Nagasato was on the pitch instead. The WWC did strange things to NWSL's rankings: we left with Chicago on top and Seattle Reign trailing in the last positions: now Seattle are 1st ranked and Chicago Red Stars slipped in 6th position!
This is part of the reason why I did not want Sakaguchi there, because she was taking a position away from somebody who could have been used. Utsugi gets injured (probably happened at the world cup) and Sakaguchi can not play and now they only have two maybe three genuine midfielders (if you include Nakajima). It is not ideal. It was probably a blessing in disguise because Miura and Sugita got to play a lot together leading up to the tournament and at it, which was probably part of the reason why they played so well against the Dutch. The Dutch now could be world champions, but I doubt it. I think it goes to show that there really is not that much difference between Nadeshiko and Europe, despite what some people may have you believe.