Official 2015 Nadeshiko Japan Thread [R] - なでしこジャパン（英語スレッド）

Thanks very much, unepomme.

In fact, this article confirms what you translated for us, including the fact that Homare explicitly denied that her marriage had anything to do with her retirement.

Since it actually also confirms that she could receive offers to become a politician, can I ask (just for curiosity, since I don't know much about Japanies political parties) what kind of formation the Liberal Democratic Party is, what is its importance in Japan and where it sits in Japanese parliament?

 

Apparently, even our own website felt the need to say farewell to her!

 

Sasaki and some current and former team-mates' reactions to Sawa's retirement.

I repeat once again that no-one could ever persuade me to call her "Homare Tsujikami" after her marriage. For me, it will always be Homare Sawa (this reminds me of an interesting discussion we had here some years ago about family names and marriage in Japan).

 

This uses to be called a "sombrero". Kamionobe used that to pass nothing less that captain Sakuramoto, normally very good.

I've seen moves like this from the likes of Miyama (match vs Sweden at Algarve 2014) and they're normally reserved to world-class level players.
Megu is now officially part of the club.

I wonder if Albi can now reach the final, as that famus one vs INAC they lost at penalty shootout, with Tiffany McCarty scoring two goals.

INAC, Albirex, Beleza and Vegalta are in the semi-finals of Empress Cup: we're talking the first 4 teams in 2015 Nadeshiko League's rankings; this is a very high-level edition of the Cup and everyone of them can win it.
I obvioulsy root for Homare Sawa's last trophy in career. Everyone else can win it next time.

 

Classical Naomoto's tears scene... As much as she tries to hide under her hood to escape TV-cameras, we can see the repeat of something we saw too much often through these years...
Not only Hikaru missed the PK, but she should have scored, at the beginning of the match, with that shot she sent bouncing on the crossbar instead.

I wasn't aware that US GK Brittany Cameron was still at Vegalta. And she made it count! I guess we can agree that Arimachi and Nakano gave a definite boost to Lady Vega, this season, and their loss weakened Belle at the same time, on the border of relegation.
Ayaka Inoue slammed the winner PK in like a veteran: as it's been said earlier in this thread (I guess it was mumf noticing it) she's one of the few young players (outside Menina/Beleza's ones) who managed to earn a solid starting place and to make the difference on the pitch (maybe, now Narumiya with Speranza reached that status too, although in a minor team).

Am i right that Kawamura was asked something about Sawa in the post-match interview? And how exactly the teams will match in semi-finals?

 

I was quite sure about that.

And maybe that's indeed one of the reason why Sawa retired: she didn't feel that she could play another Olympic tournament at Top Level and the only way to decline a Sasaki's call was retiring for good...

Don't forget that, at Olympics, you can call way less players than at WWC, so, if Sawa had been called, Sasaki should have left home another important player.