First Preliminary Round (Jun/Jul 2016) Guam, Macau, North Mariana Islands Second Preliminary Round (Nov 2016) Korea Republic, Chinese Taipei, Hong Kong, Guam Final Competition (games at 4 and 7pm in Tokyo) 8th Dec China - Korea DPR Japan - Korea Republic 11th Dec Korea DPR - Korea Republic Japan - China 15th Dec Korea Republic - China Japan - Korea DPR Tournament site (VR experience is a nice touch) No FIFA official dates this month so international clubs are under no obligation to relese players. Korea Republic roster without Ji So-yun and Park Eun-sun but Jang Selgi and Cho So-hyun are there. Still South Korea without Ji is like Brazil without Marta - something amiss... China back with Tang Jiali, Ma Jun and Xu Yanlu on the roster. Wang Shuang, Yang Li and Wang Shan Shan also there. New coach with huge task (WWC qual) and only four months to achieve it (AFC Cup 2018). North Korea roster it's a mix of some experienced defenders and holding mids with rising stars from youth teams. In place of Ho Un-byol and Ra Un-sim there are now Ri Hae Yon and Sung Hyang-sim. Nadeshiko Japan roster without Saki Kumagai and Kumi Yokoyama although Rumi Utsugi is there. One and a half year ago Asako Takakura started on the job after setback for Japan which was loosing ticket for Rio and in tourney played in Japan none the less. After more than a year of tinkering with the new team the time has come for her and her players to finally deliver.
Oh, so Bruno Bini has been fired after the less-than-impressive results of the last year? I wasn't aware!
Yup, Sigurdur Ragnar Ejolfsson from Iceland is now Steel Roses coach. He started on the job with 2 loses vs Australia last week but was obviously trying new players in those matches. The player pool he selected looks promising but I don't expect China to be a huge threat in this tourney - they still need certain amount time to work properly. The good thing is that he was working in Jiangsu Suning in Chinese Super League so he knows the players well and he did call many of them developed under former coach Hao Wei (still don't get why CFA fired him (or he resigned?) - he got bunch of 21-23y. to WWC quarters) so fingers crossed that he will not make the same mistake as Bini did - trying to produce some kind of new euro-asian football ethic.
I was surprised in the 2nd friendly on just how much better China looked than the Matildas in terms of playing a co-efficient game of excellent teamwork in terms of passing & finding the open player. They probably out shot the Australians as well. But all that playing 'the beautiful game' meant nothing when you look at the lopsided score, though. China needs to become way more physical if it wants to compete with the rest of the world. I would say at least the Japanese coach has tried to switch to a 'meaner' look. They certainly committing more fouls than they used to, which in the ever changing woso is unfortunately a good thing! btw........kinda surprised with the Bini firing since he did bring his team into the Olympic quarter finals, loosing to eventual champs, Germany, , 0-1, but only after going down to 10 players.
I would guess that China ambitions of late (pumped by huge amount of money) run far beyond quarters in major tourney...
there not going to get anywhere if they don't got the players or turn into a more physical/aggressive side. If they really have the money, then they should of hired either a top men's or women's one like Herdman or even Sampson(though got the feeling he's going to make a bundle of money from his lawsuit on the English Federation. They also should try and raid the US or anywhere else for anybody with Chinese heritage, anyways looks like the Japan vs South Korea game is on right now, soccerway site, has at least a chart that you can follow the game with http://us.women.soccerway.com/match...-east-asian-cup/japan/korea-republic/2589177/ surprised that the J coach isn't using Nakjima, she looked like their best players vs in the Swiss friendly
The game can be seen here: https://mov3.co/en/fujitv/ Nakajima has been subbed-in right now, at about 15'-20' of second half.
South Korea goes 2-2, but soon after Nakajima hits the crossbar with a middle-range shot and Iwabuchi taps-in the rebound. 3-2 for Japan at about 85'.
ditto, that's why they hired Ejolfsson now I guess(he was head coach of Iceland 2007-2013 guiding them to 2009 and 2013 EURO's)
China 0 - 2 Korea DPR (Kim Yun Mi 24' 78') Japan 3 - 2 Korea Rep. (Mina Tanaka 7', Emi Nakajima 71', Mana Iwabuchi 83' - Cho So-hyun 14' Han Chaerin 80' )
Yeah, looking at how she's playing right now, maybe Bayern München dismissed Mana Iwabuchi a little too much soon?
this vid has more highlights, in what looks like a game dominated by our hermit kingdom buddies click on to each individual player on the chart & it gives all the stats(though not for the subs), http://us.women.soccerway.com/match...ff-east-asian-cup/china-pr/korea-dpr/2589176/ but it looks the Korean coach did his homework & got his team to out tackle the Chinese, 25-10, as he obviously knew how susceptible they were to getting the ball clipped right from under them. Excellent performances from their mids, especially from their #11 & #13, as well as #8, who's not seen in the high lights but had a game high, 6 tackles. Not sure if I like the strategy of letting their #12 taking all their shots though. That could get rather predictable very fast, but then again, maybe it's just a ruse for opposing scouts[/QUOTE]
the Rocket Man strikes again as his squad beat South Korea. Their #12 looks like she's got a strong header game as well as she's the only that seems allowed to take shots, lol. They got a strong right FB in #5, DPR only needs a tie vs Japan to win the tourney in their last game. Since there was speculation that they were going to loose their top ten spot on FIFA's world rankings, wouldn't that means sayonara for Japan as well?(if DPR wins the tourney)
Well, for sure not winning the tournament would be harsh for Japan in terms of FIFA points, since they play this tournament at home. Anyway, they've not lost yet, did they? What if Japan wins the whole thing instead?
Korea DPR 1 - 0 Korea Republic (Kim Yun Mi 18') Revenge taken for lost WWC'19. It's 2nd easy win for NK but match against Japan wasn't be as easy. Especially if they stick to the same gameplan as most of their tactics in past 2 matches are drawn out of hosts playbook Still they may pull this off depending on Takaura's options for back four choice. Kim Yun Mi looks an intresting prospect, it's a shame that NK won't be playing in France.
[/QUOTE] Too bad Korea DPR can't have a shot to play in the World Cup beacuse an AFC silly seeded desicion. When they made the first draw , they considered the position of the teams of the last qualifiers than the FIFA ranking. And the final draw look so unbalanced as well. DPRK is one of the best team in Asia in the current times
WTF.... no... Absolutely not. Who becomes confederation champion means little to nothing about how other teams in the confederation are ranked. The FIFA ranking is mathematical, not subjective. You're working on the assumption that the rankings are largely based on placement in official tournaments as opposed cumulative results over all competitions, which is wrong. Winning a tournament probably means winning most of your games for that tournament, but that's not a necessity, and it ignores when upsets are actually upsets. The ranking of the confederation's champion doesn't condemn everyone else in the confederation to have lower rankings - that's stupid because it would imply that Cinderella runs would negate the otherwise good form of everyone who didn't (but maybe should have) won. The reason it was speculated that DPR might drop out of the top 10 was that they were #10 and had, up to the beginning of this tournament, had a much worse record than the #11 teams when looking at the three months since the last ranking came out. (That's likely out the window now anyway with their two wins here added in, and certainly will be if DPR don't lose to Japan in the final matchday.) Japan, on the other hand, was two slots above DPR and their previous results over the past three months were essentially holding steady - not to mention they've also won their first two games of the tournament. The chance of having three teams pass them at this point - even if DPR smashes them on the final matchday - is highly unlikely.
I agree with all that you said. My only doubt is: is Japan anyway slighly damaged by the fact that the tournament is played at their home, whatever the result will be?