If we weren't having a drought in full-/wing-backs, a passage to a 3-CBs formation should be considered.
We have good fullbacks like Sugawara for AZ and Sakai is still solid and has a few years but Moriyasu hasn’t got a clue. Consistently playing Osako who offers nothing over Furuhashi etc...
We live in a time where Japan has countless numbers of talented defenders. Imagine if they were present in WC 18, there's no way they could've fallen that easy to Belgium. Even with all the negativity that surrounds JNT in the WCQ, the defense is doing a pretty solid job so far by only allowing 3 goals in in 6 matches played. Sad that Gen Shoji fell out of favor despite showing some promise in his early days.
To be fair this happened in the last two months and before that nobody was seriously expecting that to happen so smoothly (especially all during the precarious situation Stuttgart is in right now). So give it time.
He was supposed to be playing Regionalliga (4th division) right now so everyone is quite pleasantly surprised.
From being a Japanese 2nd division player to being named in the team of the week in Bundesliga. https://www.kicker.de/bundesliga/elf-des-tages
YEES💪Hiroki #Ito named #BLRookie rookie of the month! Congrats, Hiroki🙌⚪️🔴#VfB #BLRookie pic.twitter.com/HaHJp8t1rv— VfB Stuttgart_int (@VfB_int) December 10, 2021
Pleasant surprise to see him doing well in BL. Remembered seeing him briefly while in J league and recalled him being bit slow to change direction while facing off against speedy attackers/wingers who can change direction fast and getting nutmegged at times.
I hope he could transfer to a Serie A club soon to improve more on his defending skills, but he's been doing great so far in the Bundesliga. Take note, Moriyasu!
Hopefully he gets ignored until Moriyasu is finished. Last thing Ito (and Itakura) needs is to fly halfway across the world to sit on the bench for JNT for two games and come back to Stuttgart jet lagged.
Despite the expected thrashing against Bayern (which team hasn't, though? lol), he was one of their decent performers in the match.
Antoine Coupland (18, OM) könnte demnächst unsere U21 verstärken.Transfer von Anrie Chase (17, IV) rückt näher, entweder jetzt im Winter oder im Sommer.#VfB (STN/MeinVfB)— Ron1893 | Europa wir kommen (@VfBrustring) January 16, 2022 Rumor that Chase Anrie will be joining either winter or summer.
No chance Stuttgart is letting him leave this winter. Maybe at the end of the season, though he'll be hard to replace. And having dropped to the second last place Stuttgart can use any help they can get right now.
They need a strikers and players to finish-off chances, not a player playing in defensive midfielde. Even if Endo is the new Kante he cannot save the team from relegation without any proper finisher up front. So, if they sell Endo, the can use the money to buy a striker.
With Kalajdzic they already have one, who scored 16 times last season but was injured this season, being back for only three matches now. Stuttgart has been hit by plenty injuries affecting results which is also the reason why the club so far had been calm and confident of finding its groove again.
https://news.yahoo.co.jp/articles/288b67d3d274318a8413e3aefb423395a7da1103 Chase Anrie will be joining
Having 3 countrymen (Endo, Ito, and the American coach Matarazzo) will hopefully make it easy for Chase to adapt.