Official 2019 Nadeshiko Japan Thread [R] - なでしこジャパン（英語スレッド）

Today's result:

Nadeshiko League Cup
Group A
Nojima (Minamino, Ohno) 2-2 Nittaidai (Shimada 2)

Group B
Mynavi (Yasumoto) 1-0 Inac

Nadeshiko League 2 Cup
Group A
Setagaya (Watanabe, Ohtake) 2-1 Orca (Muraoka)

Group B
Shizuoka (Hirano) 1-3 Cerezo (Takarada, Yakata, Hayashi)

Challenge League East
Tokiwagi 0-4 JFA (Matsubara, Ito, Kadowaki, Ishida)
Niigata 0-2 Jumonji (OG, Toriumi)

Challenge League West
Kibi (Nishimura Miri) 1-2 Belle (Adachi, Takenoya)

 

https://m.spiegel.de/sport/fussball...-pep-guardiola-die-wm-gepraegt-a-1275985.html

Here is an interesting article from the German online magazine spiegel online about the influence Guardiola and Klopp had on women’s soccer as seen during the world cup. Here the author talks about the change in tactics (4-4-2 vs. 4-3-3) and the tendency to possession dominated game compared to 2011. While 4-4-2 was played by 80% of the teams in 2011, this year it was down to 60%. The author noticed an increase in 4-3-3 and almost all teams that moved to the final eight used that system - except for Sweden. Notably when England switched from 4-4-3 to 4-2-3-1 against the US, they lost.

On possession and quick short pass game the article points out that in 2011 only Japan adopted this idea from Guardiola‘s playbook and came across as somewhat exotic. Now Spain has picked up on the idea, and even the US starts to adopt the concept.

Playing players on different positions also is adopted from the Spanish coach - Takakura might be onto something.

The article also talks about fast counterpressing and other tactical maneuvers the women are adopting from the two coaches mentioned above. But I wanted to point out formation and the focus on what we here enjoy about Nadeshiko.

 

Just confirms that Nadeshiko league is too weak.

 

Could it be that the current Nadeshiko is a prisoner of their own approach and its success 8 years ago? In WWC 2019, I read many Nadeshiko players said that they would fight with the possession-centered tactics. But their performance sometimes showed repeated passes without clear purposes or strategy. Possession became a baseline model, rather than a tactics to score a point?

 

I feel, Nadeshiko would've given a greater game to US in the final.
Still, VAR liked Americans a lot in this tournament, congrats.

 

Nadeshiko are the only one who defeat them in the WC since ages.
Netherlands were the lucky ones and they didn't deserve nothing apart the victory vs Italy.

 

Japan would've beaten Italy running on one leg, but yeah.

Seriously though, everybody point out how tired dutch players were, but so were Americans - Morgan could barely stand on her feet in the last 10 minutes. Nadeshiko playing more technical, energy-saving "collective" football could've better chance, had they survived first half, like Netherland did.

 

I agree. Considering that Barcelona and Manchester City (under Guardiola) have been soundly beaten in the Champions League by teams that use a lot of gegenpressing, we have all the supporting arguments for Nadeshiko Japan to make a radical change to their approach. I know that the U20s won the tournament playing the same possession game last year, but it may just not cut at senior level.

Football is consistently evolving, so one must be always ready to change on the tactical front as well. Takakura must be ready to play 4-3-3, to drill her players into gegenpressing, and do whatever it takes to bring more intensity out of her players out there.

Only a deluded person would think otherwise. You become the best by playing against the best on a very regular basis, not by remaining stuck into the same bubble.

 

It was embarrassing what the Dutch showed. Almost no real danger in front of the American goal whatsoever. Makes Japan's exit all the more painful.

 

Pretty much. If it wasn't for some Nadeshiko players, of whom I won't name, lacking killer instinct in front of goal, we could well be into the final 4 if not the final 2 again.

The Dutch didn't take shots in the final third at all, and I was raging against Miedema so many times for trying to do an Arjen Robben instead of making the right decision.

 

Indeed, playing with 11 instead of 12 is arguably more difficult.

Just kidding. Interesting post, thanks!

 

I was thinking about Japan in 2015.

 

Would have been a great rematch of 2011, 2012, and 2015

That was painful to watch, yeah. Or all those half-arsed passes when they had really good chances on the counter.

 

At least Japan actually SCORED!

 

Their performance before the final lacked inspiration and quality.

 

True, but their performance before the semifinal was inspiring and quality. In the last 3 WC that I have seen them they have always shined at least once. The goal now must be to bring in more consistency.

 

To the Dutch's credit, they got past Japan, Italy then a very hardy Sweden. I'm sorry to say that had Japan gone all the way through the final, a repeat of 2015 might have just happened. The kids are not ready yet to face peak USA.

 

Those kids outplayed finalist - Netherlands in 1/8 and are the only one team left that didn't lost with USA this year.

EDIT
As for USA - they could've stumble on Spain but no referees (main +VAR) would risk their career throwing out 20k USA fans from France at 1/8 on controversial penalty not given. Same case was in Japan match with Holland.

 

Meh. If the US had lost against Spain, the French people would have taken all the tickets because their team would have gone to the semis at least.

 

True. But 20k home fans has no need to pay big bucks for hotels, etc..

 

Weekly Asahi, which is like Times or Newsweek in Japan, openly criticizes Takakura and questions her (non)selection of players. Specifically, the article questions the exclusion of Tanaka, Nagasato as well as the minimum use of Momiki. I do not necessarily agree with the article. But it is just very rare that a major magazine like Weekly asahi, which is affiliated to the nation’s largest news paper, publicly criticizes a head coach of national team.

To be fair, other news outlets are friendly and sympathetic, if not complementing, to Nadeshiko.

https://dot.asahi.com/wa/2019070200064.html?page=2

 

What kind of tactics, quality and players are required to beat the CURRENT team of the U.S.A.?
What would be a most important factor in order to defeat them? Maybe speed and unpredictability?

 

They did not say that she is “available,’ but said that she is currently playing good.