Well than you might as well surrender now. Cause like I said winning twice will most likely be what Japan needs to advance and it may not even be enough and of course they are putting up a fight. They are playing for starters. Japan couldnt even play. It wasnt a super Ivorian side negating Japan's passing. It was Japan fracking it up
I hope Japan will win but they need not to afraid like they were in the first game. I think they need to be strong mentally to play to their true potential.
Please win Japan. First time i'm actually rooting for you guys can't afford to turn out to be a disaster.
2-0 I hope Japan has a chance against this Colombia team...Even if Japan wins all their remaining games, they have to pray that CIV don't beat Greece and goal difference works in their favor. 2-1 now, great game.
Yes but it`s unlikely that Ivory Coast score very much. When Japan wins today 2-0 then they have the better goal difference and when they beat Columbia then it would be very very hard for Ivory Coast. When Japan wins both they have the better chances so lets see.
If Kagawa played like he did last game and if Honda is as lazy as he was in the second half vs CIV, Japan is done. Kagawa really needs to come up big today because he is a big contribution to Japan's offence and Honda can't do everything by himself.
It's all over, should just go home now Anyway if they play like they did against CIV they should've just stayed home. Hope they show up to win today and go from there
I can't see CIV losing to Greece. CIV wants to move to the next stage so badly. These guys are currently out running every team they play against. THeir early exit in WC2010 has made these guys hungry. You guys might match up well against Colombia. You never know.
Good or bad... any team that entered the pitch during this World Cup, came to play football...to battle for every ball, at the very least. What we saw against the ivorians was a complete mental meltdown... truly pathetic display in any level of the game (coach included). All that chit-chat about fixing defense errors, anxiety, that they are better now, complete utter bull... We have seen this before so many times... WC 06... Osim era and so on. Zakeroni spent 4 years in Japan enjoying premium vacation.... now that the moment of truth has come, he proved himself useless. (nothing new here) At least i hope they can run and that "Kagawa chicken little" can pull his head out of his arse. Thanks (feeling much better now hahahaha)
Well, African teams had a bad record against Eastern European and Scandinavian teams + they also tend to shock in such critical matches.
Don't forget that Uchida had Boka on his side, Boka was nonexistent defensively as usual in both games. I dunno why the coaches of Ivory Coast keep playing him, he proved countless times he's liability along with that clown of a keeper. This aside, he shouldn't be replaced of course, I like the physicality and aerial skills of H. Sakai, but Uchida is still our best option for the RB position by a large margin.
Apart from putting a lot of goals in the net, which means the risk of getting counters and counters against a team that plays on counters, if we beat Greece they'll also be out of the world cup, so actually CIV is in a great position, unfortunately. Still, I hope that Japan somehow manages to beat Colombia too. Then if we'll have to get out due to GD heh, then so be it...
There were plenty examples in the past WC when the already qualified team lost badly the third match (Brazil vs Norway '98, Bruce Arena US vs Poland '02 etc) while already out team proudly won their last WC match (this happen even in UCL, ask Galatasaray and Juventus supporters), then everything can happen. I hope Japan will play as Japan can do this night and that we will not repent that first embarrassed match that could counts a lot at the end of the games.
Colombia did not qualify yet. If Japan manage to score more than two goals against Greece there still a fair chance that Colombia wouldn't make it out of the group.
even if 3 teams end on 6 points it'd take a lot of goals to supplant colombia's substantial goal difference
Last game Japan will be playing Colombia, so every goal Japan score will be directly deduct from Colombia goals difference. So if Japan managed to win more than 2 goals today there still a fair chance for Colombia to end up 3rd in the group
Japan would have to defeat both by 2 goals, and CIV beat Greece by 3. I dont know how you define "fair chance" but im not holding my breath
Greece won their last game in 2010 against and African side even though they were already out essentially