Here it is anyway. "News" in bold GK KAWASHIMA Eiji (Football Club de Metz/France) HIGASHIGUCHI Masaaki (Gamba Osaka) NISHIKAWA Shusaku (Urawa Red Diamonds) DF NAGATOMO Yuto (FC Internazionale Milano/Italy) MAKINO Tomoaki (Urawa Red Diamonds) MORISHIGE Masato (F.C. Tokyo) OTA Kosuke (SBV Vitesse/Netherlands) YOSHIDA Maya (Southampton FC/England) MARUYAMA Yuichi (F.C. Tokyo) SAKAI Hiroki (Olympique de Marseille/France) SAKAI Gotoku (Hamburger Sport-Verein/Germany) UEDA Naomichi (Kashima Antlers) MF HASEBE Makoto (Eintracht Frankfurt/Germany) KASHIWAGI Yosuke (Urawa Red Diamonds) NAGAKI Ryota (Kashima Antlers) KAGAWA Shinji (Borussia Dortmund/Germany) KIYOTAKE Hiroshi (Sevilla FC/Spain) YAMAGUCHI Hotaru (Cerezo Osaka) OHSHIMA Ryota (Kawasaki Frontale) FW OKAZAKI Shinji (Leicester City Football Club/England) HONDA Keisuke (AC Milan/Italy) KOBAYASHI Yu (Kawasaki Frontale) HARAGUCHI Genki (Hertha BSC Berlin/Germany) USAMI Takashi (FC Augsburg/Germany) MUTO Yoshinori (1.FSV Mainz 05/Germany) ASANO Takuma (VfB Stuttgart/Germany)
Nice to see Saito's form finally being rewarded but I expect him to warm the bench with Nagaki for 180 minutes.
I have a strange feeling that this will end in a disaster... Anyway if Vahid is not able to get 4 points from the next 2 games then he should be sacked.
As I said if we don't win our next 2 match the wc qualification will be compromised with Vahid sacked or not.
that's just not true. However, I reckon that not beating Iraq would be a disaster. Australia is an away match. It's not easy 3 points at all and I'd be okay with a draw.
If Japan manages to get four points out of these two matches. That's good result for now, still plenty of games to play for and you also hope that UAE stumble a little bit also on their games against Thailand and Saudi. Iraq is a tricky opponent, but beatable at home in Japan. But for Australia, beating them should be very tough. Outside of our team beating them in 2015 Asian cup group stage, I don't think they lost to any Asian team at home in quite sometime. But I think Japan will gladly take a draw in Australia. So again, collect four points and see where Japan's at after the two games.
Would be brilliant if we took four points. Currently JNT is experiencing what the Socceroos went through a few years ago before 2014 WC. They look damn impressive right now.
BTW here is the Iraqi roster: http://www.jfa.jp/attachment/57f47398-8c10-4835-8869-23bfd3093d95/20161004_iraq_member.pdf Justin Meram got injured over the weekend, which is a big blow to the attack. Both teams are going through a rough patch, let's see who comes up with the goods. I don't think Japan has been as bad as has been portrayed, but this is a game they should win.
Not yet. If we lose against Iraq and Australia with the "no problem we have time enough" mood we probably lose the second legs too. Let's face all the incoming match as a ********ing serious affair cuz we are simply not the best in Asia since years.
Special GK training camp next week with Nishikawa, Higashiguchi, Akihiro Hayashi, Masatoshi Kushibiki, Kosuke Nakamura and Daniel Schmidt.
lol this is pretty good "Honda 1-Top" 1. [Okada watching the Australia match on TV] TV: It appears that Japan will go with Honda playing as a lone striker at Australia! Okada: wut? 2. Okada: Honda 1-top is the tactic I developed right before WC2010! The scheme widely known as the Okada System! [No, no one calls it that] 3. Okada: It happened with Zac too, everyone copies me when the going gets tough! [pats self on back] I wonder why every coach wants to copy me, lol! 4. Random guy: Ummm isn't it because it's a tactic you deployed out of desperation? Okada: How dare you
There's been an unusual preponderance of negative press surrounding the NT coach lately, extending to dubious pieces claiming that the JFA will meet to determine whether to sack Vahid. Rather than being a pure consequence of the results on the field, this seems to be motivated by the general deterioration in the relationship between Vahid and certain factions of the local press. As a consequence of Yahoo! Japan's outsized influence in news aggregation, both sports tabloids and more specialized soccer sites are under pressure to drive up engagement metrics, pageview rankings and revenue. In short, writers need clickbait material. Not only does Vahid's unusual candor (as a French speaker, and his personality) expose a large surface area for clickbait-hunting writers to attack, he doesn't have a professional interpreter to soften and modulate the expressions for consumption in the Japanese cultural context. While Gun Hiwatashi's extensive experience as a professional coach confers obvious advantages for training and match situations, he transmits Vahid's blunt pronouncements almost too faithfully than would be convenient. Vahid has wanted to reduce the amount of media availability time during NT camps. After some wrangling the JFA arranged a compromise solution, but the net effect is still that reporters have access to fewer players on each training day, meaning fewer opportunities to dredge for headline-grabbing soundbites. The tabloid press in particular seems frustrated by this and has it out for Vahid.
I think you're reading a bit too much into it tbh. "Clickbaiting" has always been a thing, and literally same thing happened under Zac, especially from less-known sport websites (the usual "JFA is deciding about sacking" while actually having zero info is a constant). Not that it isn't shitty, but thankfully (most) of the JFA doesn't actually give a damn. Back then, I suggested here on BS that users shouldn't give a damn about those reports too. So while I completely agree that there is no justification for these stupid articles, it's no news that with a little negative moment the press likes to pile on, imho. But I wouldn't depict all the members of the press to a bunch of starving for headlines guys now...
He's not reading too much into it, everything he points is factually right and confirmed by both my japanese and french sources. There's more behind it than simply the press going for the clicks, it's a bit more targeted than that.
What I wrote sounds a bit too black-and-white, it's not like all of the media is out to get him - just a certain segment which relies more on player access and juicy quotes to sustain their business model. Most of the analysis above (if you can call it that) is lifted from comments by other journalists covering the team, in any case - here (paywall) is one piece where a few of the more "highbrow" columnists in the scene discuss why there appears to be more pressure on Vahid than might be warranted by the current results, and attributes much of it to the unfiltered media relations.
Things like #1 are hardly "factual", come on. I can side with your last sentence though, but I have the feeling that with a foreign coach it's always prone to happen. I can stand behind this, yes, especially because he doesn't deserve it anyway. I just recall something very similar happening already, albeit possibly for different reasons. btw http://www.nikkansports.com/soccer/world/news/1440770.html lmao
Yeah 1# is looking pretty real, it would explain why Popovic and Zach were announced as potential emergency coaches even though we took 4 points out of 6. I see more shit articles than usual.
I think you don't remember well that there were a lot of equally stupid articles even years ago, but pointless discussion all right. Just hope Vahid doesn't get too distracted
sure as hell remember, I was sharing them with great joy. But Vahid gets criticized even when the team performs adequately. That said, the media and the fans are also getting restless, it's been a while since they've had something to be proud of.