Play-off round: FC Tokyo X Ceres–Negros 2-0 Kashima Antlers X Melbourne Victory 0-1 Japan with 3 Representatives in this year's ACL: FC Tokyo, Vissel Kobe, and Yokohama F Marinos. Good luck.
Match day 1: Ulsan Hyundai x FC Tokyo 1-1 Vissel Kobe x Johor Darul Takzim 5-1 Jeonbuk Hyundai x Yokohama F. Marinos 1-2 Good start for the Japanese representatives in this year's ACL campaign, 7 points out of possible 9. I'm more concerned of the rescheduling of Chinese teams matches as it makes other teams schedules more crowded. I wish the AFC had the balls to ban Chinese teams from participating in this year's tournament just like what the CONMEBOL did back in 2009 to the Mexican teams taking part in the Libertadores for health & safety reasons i.e. H1N1 flu outbreak, the Chinese could be compensated by having all their reps directly qualify to the group stage in next year's edition.
Yokohama F Marinos need to be less wasteful with their chances, they could easily score 10 goals in the match against Jeonbuk. A few instances, they hesitated a bit before shooting, they also need to be more willing to shoot for goal rather than passing the ball. Nevertheless, a win on away ground is a pretty good result
It was the other way around. As soon as they were 0-2 up, players like Nakagawa, Onaiwu, and Marcos Junior tried to take things by their own. Marcos Silva and Onaiwu were unfortunate at times, but Nakagawa was too clumsy and wasted many easy chances, especially the robound from Onaiwu’s shot with an empty net in front of him.
The Chinese teams will be the ones with the most crowded schedule, they will be the ones suffering more from this compared to their opponents from other countries.
You still can't count Jeonbuk out, after all they are 3 times winner. And, there are Al-Hilal and other teams as well. Plus, I think Vissel Kobe might be have decent chance as well. If Kashima didn't lose, I could see them also doing well this year again.
Both Yokohama F Marinos and Vissel Kobe won today. Vissel Kobe finally scored a goal on 90th min lol. Takuya Yasui seems a decent player, maybe he can be a dark horse for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics squad alongside players like Yuya Fukada, Daiki Matsuoka, Yuta Goke and Daiki Kaneko, etc.
Good week for Japanese teams. Vissel debut in the ACL is impressive so far and an away victory is always welcome. I've watched streams of those matches on youtube and out of all 3 Japanese teams matches, Vissel had the most viewers. I guess it's the Iniesta effect hahaha It still early to say this, but so far Saudi teams and Japanese teams are the most dominant and consistent in this tournament.
FC Tokyo lost today, thought they had the better chances overall imo. If they were utilizing crosses, should have had Hara in there so at least play Tagawa earlier so he can assist in holding up the ball in the middle with his physicality.
Both Vissel Kobe and Yokohama Marinos are qualified to the last 16 as the winners of their respective groupds.
I also see Marinos as a potential candidate of winning this tournament. Vissel might be helped by a glimpse of magic here & there from Iniesta but they need more than that to survive the next rounds.
Marinos is definitely one of the contenders, their one touch passing and willingness to go from goal from distance is something other J teams teams could learn instead of simply passing around the edge of the box and not willing to shoot. I like how the Marinos player would just pass to the player in front immediately rather than trying and slowly looking around to see whoever is there as by that time the other team's players would have caught up to him.
True but their adversary is going to be another Korean team and you know how Korean teams play against Japanese ones, they suddenly become Real Madrid or Bayern Munich hahaha. Anyways good luck to all J teams and yes Yokohama has the best chance of all three. Just realized that they all play on a neutral venue, all the way in Qatar! Man! football in 2020 is absolutely the worst. EDIT: And one J representative heads back home: Beijing Guoan x FC Tokyo 1-0.
Haiz lets hope Vissel Kobe and Yokohama F Marinos can go further than FC Tokyo. Kenta Hasegawa has not really performed that well in ACL in recent years since 2015 where he reach SF with Gamba imo.
Lol Yokohama F Marinos surprisingly lost and did not advance to QFs as expected. They wasted a lot of chances in the firt half. Powell Obinna Obi made a few mistakes with his judgement, i think the likes of Yuya Oki, Keisuke Osako and Kosei Tani, etc. might be bettr choices than him for thr youth NT imo. He is a little bit shaky compared to those right now. For Kobe, they advanced but Iniesta is injured and might not be able to play in the next game. Hence their chances of progressing is not really that high imo. Btw, i hope Ryuho Kikuchi do not play in the next games, he is a little bit reckless imo, his style of play can easily earn him a yellow cards or even red card. He likes to push down n the other team's player's head a lot when jumping for headers.
There goes the strongest J candidate in this tournament. Marinos could've put this to bed earlier if they had converted all of those chances. Oh well... if you can't score be prepared to be scored on. And yeah, I too am not hopeful Vissel could go far especially after Iniesta's injury but still everything is possible in Football.
The remaining Chinese and Korean teams are really pretty strong. Plus West Asia might win this year as well as was last year.
Vissel Kobe will face Suwon 2 days later. FC Suwon was pressuring Yokohama FM with their relentless pressing in the 2nd half and their forwards all seems willing to shoot from afar rather than passing until the ball reach their CFs. Hope Kobe can bring their A-game since if Iniesta is not able to make it for the match, the players will need to work extra hard to cover his absence. Hope that Kikuchi will not be playing, am afraid that he will give away a penalty or get carded unnecessarily with his reckless defending.