Official 2016 J2 thread

Great comeback for JEF today, 2 goals in injury time to turn it around! Cerezo won as well, while Thespa impressed the most winning 4-0 with a completely new team! (8 regulars are gone since last year ).

 

Cerezo up against Montedio away this weekend. Could be a tough game, but Cerezo have looked very impressive so far both in defence and offence ( should have scored more goals than just 3).

Strange to see Renofa being a rather big favorite away against Yokohama FC. Apparently a big move on the away-side here, but even though Yokohama have been poor I wasn't exactly impressed by Renofa either last weekend when they lost 0-2 at home vs Machida. And Ibba will most likely get his first start for Yokohama, which should improve their offence a lot.

 

Nice goal Consadole!=) Very strong win, not impressed by them vs Tokyo Verdy and Ehime, but they are off to a good start nonetheless.

Gifu seems so far like a Dr Jekyll and Hyde kind of team: Their first 2 matches were absolutely horrible, but they have now 2 strong wins in a row. 3-0 away vs Ehime is impressive.

Cerezo with another 1-0 win, this time it was substitue Tashiro who saved them late in the game. Perfect start!

Mostly disappointed by Shimizu and Montedio so far, but to Montedio's defence they have had 3 matches away. Roasso on the other hand are the biggest positive surprise. Thought they were going to struggle near the relegation-zone this season, but still early so anything can happen.

 

Think it's a bit early to tell yet as they haven't met the best of teams so far. The only player they have brought in of any significance this season is Shingo Akamine. He is clearly needed, as last season they only scored 40 goals, and already it seems to be paying off as he is linking up well with Oshitani and Fagiano are actually the highest-scoring team so far in J2.

They got a talented squad for sure, and the backbone of the team is strong with Nakabayashi, Iwamasa, Kaji and Akamine up front. Players like Oshitani ,Yajima and Okamoto will just get better and better probably, but they finished only 11th last season so hard to say.

 

Did you actually see the match? Nobody was destroying eachother whatsoever, it was a game with lots of chances at both ends and at 2-1 up Cerezo were VERY close to killing the game and burying the Yamaguchis ( would you have used the word destroy in that case, if Cerezo had won 3-1?) . The 4-2 goal is 100% a result of Cerezo putting all their players up front ( the only played remotely near their own half at that counter were Sekiguchi, who is not even a defender!), and some nice counter-attacking play from Renofa. But destroying? No way.

And awful is another very strong word which again makes me wonder if you actually saw the matches? Did you see how dominant they were against Shimizu and JEF? How tight their defence were against Machida, Mito, Thespa and Montedio, barely letting any of the teams come to ANY chances at all?

They lost 0-1 away against a Consadole-side who is impressing more and more each round, and pretty much any team will have a hard time up in Sapporo this year. The 0-2 loss at home vs rivals Kyoto were a letdown, but even in that game they deserved points according to chances.

I do agree that Ricardo Santos is an awful striker with a horrible first touch and finishing qualities. Would love to see another player in his position, and even within the team there are far better options. The only thin he is good at is his post-play, and he creates space for the other players. Meneghel have not been that bad. Not saying he is a top class player, but he works his socks off every single game, and have made some decent contributions offensively too. We will continue to see him and Sekiguchi rotating / subbing which is ok imho.

Kakitani have been brilliant in many matches, and is a much more mature player now than what he were earlier. He holds a deeper position, so you can not expect him to score as many goals as before.

I'm more concerned about the FW position with Ricardo Santos being a bore, and our other striker Sugimoto ( although he plays more wide) probably couldnt even score in a brothel, but atleast we always create lots of chances.

 

I'm still confident they will finish on top of the table, or atleast clinch one of 2 direct spots.

 

Haven't you noticed that if a player has managed to get a pro-contract, even how badly he performs he will still be picked up by another club? This goes for managers as well, and not only in Japan.

I'm 100% sure that there are better strikers with sharper finishing skills etc in lower divisions / amateur clubs than for example players like Ryosuke Kijima ( or his brother Tetsuya, who is even worse) ( Around 20 goals in 200+ J2matches), Ryuichi Hirashige or Satoshi Kukino, to name a few. ( Sure, some of these players have some decent qualities, but not as a FW).

Yet, these players are constantly being picked up by new clubs when their contract expires. It's like a rich gentleman's club: Once you have managed to get a membership and a foot in the door, you have to do something extraordinarily bad to get kicked out.