Official 2020 Nadeshiko Japan Thread [R] - なでしこジャパン（英語スレッド）

I am genuinely excited that such a key-player for our Senior NT future plans is given this opportunity to learn even more about international football and to further adance her skills.

She's no new to high levels, since she was the absolute star of U-20 WWC 2018, but I like the fact that she'll be exposed to the particular US brand of football: it will come handy when we're going to meet USWNT in the future (at the Olympics? ).

 

I assume you say that because you are a Cerezo Osaka Sakai Ladies' supporter?

 

Some interesting names here, some even from Division 2 (including GK Asano, if I am not wrong, who should be from Chifure: interesting that apparently there aren't enough good GKs in Division 1 to fill a Senior NT + Challenge roster).

Some of these names have more or less recently called to the A team, but they apparently fell from grace with time (Shiori Miyake, Rin Sumida... Hikaru Kitagawa and Sonoko Chiba were in NT earlier and for a shorter time, but they anyway had some calls). There are promising players from the recent youth cycles who never really had a breakthrough at senior level so far (Mamiko Matsumoto, Fuka Nagano, Fuka Kono...) and then there are eternal up-and-coming promises (Yui Narumiya! Pretty pleease... give her a chance! ).

The FW section is very peculiar: Arisa Minamino manages to find a place at least in Challenge roster, but Ami Otaki doesn't! Given Otaki's performance this season I have to wonder if it isn't maybe her choice: she could possibly have made it clear that she retired from NT football?
I don't know much about Hikaru Yuumura, except that she's from Division 2 too and that she scored 8 goals for Saitama this season (placing at third place in top-scorers' ranking): I don't know what exactly is special about her, but I hope I can discover that soon.

Finally, Maika Hamano gets a call at just 16: I wonder if she's a predestined player: it sure isn't usual to get any serious consideration for Senior NT at this age!

 

I know, I know.

Very busy with work these days, and re-watching all of these goals to put them in order needs some amount of quiet time. Hopefully, I'll find that amount of time at the beginning of next week, when there will be a short holyday for the patron saint of my town.

 

Thanks: the auto-translation was surprisingly mostly clear (translations from Japanese sound often quite odd) so I guess I understood most of what she said (including how she was taunted in the past as the "unmovable giant").

It doesn't seem to me that she mentions the last training camp where she was called by Takakura, but I assume that, although her decision to retire seems to be have been thought for a longtime, she most likely hadn't actually finalized it when she received that call.

 

There is a thread that's been recently opened on the international boards where people wonder about the women's players who have reached the maximum speed on the pitch: does anyone have data about Nahomi Kawasumi or remembers what kind of speed she could reach? I seem to remember that some years ago she was considered the fastest Japanese NT player, but I don't remember if we had any exact numbers (apart maybe from her record in that test with the "beep" whose name I never remember ).

 

Wow, many wins by clubs from Division 1 or Division 2 (Chifure, Mynavi, Jef, Cerezo) were closer than I expected!

It looks like Kunoichis just had fun instead! Almost a brace for everyone!

 

Interesting that Mistuki Horie and Asami Hirano were both playing in Shizuoka until a pair seasons ago and now they battle for opposing teams, scoring against each other!

 

Congratulations for the two exact predictions, @unepommekun. You even guessed right that Sakuyo was going to score one goal to Ehime: what you didn't predict well was the 4 goal the orange-girls would have scored back to Sakuyo.

Jokes apart, I hadn't seen Sakuyo play this year, so I basically didn't know anything about them: what you had seen that made you think that they could have potentially upset a team that, despite ending at last-place in Division 1, had shown to be competent enough to battle the big guns in a convincing way? (After all Ehime had wins vs Cerezo and Albirex, this year, and there are some very good players in their ranks).