Sorimachi always wanted to call up him. But Morimoto plays in Italy and he is also injury prone. That's why he had never played for the Olympic team. Let's see what he can do against France and Chile.
In my opinion, yes. I think he is a very interesting striker for the future of the japanese national team. And, what a match by Morishige Masato .
There is NO good strikers who shined in the qualifying round. Lee was the top scorer with 2 goals (against Vietnam), though. lol The team is decent at defense. But their offense is tootheless. I only hope for newcomers (Morimoto, Escudero and of course Okubo). By the way, Mizuno was horrible. He needs playing time at club. Just go back to Chiba.
I know! I knew he was good but he was an absolute rock in defense in the Holland match, I think he was a defensive midfielder but got converted to centre-back.
I think he means the final qualifiers, in which Hirayama barely played and Japan rarely scored. Hirayama scored 5 goals against the minnows in the previous round.
Today's line-up http://www.festival-foot-espoirs.co...atch-festival-foot.php?menu=festival&match=05 GK - Shusaku Nishikawa (Oita) DF - Hokuto Nakamura (Fukuoka) DF - Naoaki Aoyama (Shimizu) DF - Maya Yoshida (Nagoya) DF - Masahiko Inoha (Kashima) MF - Toshihiro Aoyama (Hiroshima) MF - Takuya Honda (Shimizu) MF - Kota Ueda (Iwata) MF - Tsukasa Umesaki (Urawa) FW - Shinji Okazaki (Shimizu) FW - Takayuki Morimoto (Catania)
Japan-France 2-1 Tough game today also. This is looking pretty good. Although Morimoto scored he wasn't impressive. I think Taniguchi and Tadanari played better in their game. And Okazakis injury didn't look to good. Todays best player was the keeper Nishikawa.
Yeah that goalie is such a hero. He made some key saves and decisions to force France to stall. To be fair to France they had a several moments which you would say was "unlucky" in the footballing world. This could've been 3-2 to France, depending on how you look at it. But then again, as the cliche goes when you get a chance you have to put it away to win. Japan did exactly that while France didn't. It's a pleasant (?) surprise though, I thought we were the best at fizzling out when best chances come A bit of a gritty match up especially in the 2nd half, but on the whole I was happy to see that this Japan side could at least force a win by making the most of given chances. Successful footballing sides, be it a club or nation, have to be good in that department, and previously we tend to be bad at it.
I think U23 squad has been playing well in friendlies. Of top of my head, I cannot recall the last game, this team has lost to.
Hokuto played well today ... it was good that Sorimachi took Umesaki from the field, he seemed really aggressive (in the bad way) later and was close to red. His kick against the french should send him off earlier
Getting the results, yes. I think that has been the strength of this squad. For me the gritty play to force a win is a far cry from the typical mind game Japan had shown previously, in general terms. So much so that the whole mentality of the nation was questioned at one point. Yanagisawa's failure to finish an easy tap in was a primal example in the last WC. It's good to see this squad doing well. Obviously they have a lot to learn, but it's a good start. (I'm talking abut mindset more than anything else)
They did lose to Qatar away not too long ago actually. And we were all wondering if anybody in the team had any balls. This is definitely a very positive change for the team. Hopefully they'll keep this kind of attitude towards games when they eventually move into the full NT.
Toulon Tournament 2008 France1:2Japan 1/2 http://youtube.com/watch?v=vqhJn5KoxGU Toulon Tournament 2008 France1:2Japan 2/2 http://youtube.com/watch?v=CrYoZl5WC8w
Today's line-up against U-23 Chile http://www.festival-foot-espoirs.co...atch-festival-foot.php?menu=festival&match=09 GK - Kaito Yamamoto (Shimizu) DF - Masato Morishige (Oita) DF - Naoaki Aoyama (Shimizu) DF - Hiroki Mizumoto (G. Osaka) DF - Yusuke Tanaka (Yokohama FM) MF - Koki Mizuno (Celtic) MF - Hajime Hosogai (Urawa) MF - Keisuke Honda (VVV Venlo) MF - Kota Ueda (Iwata) FW - Tadanari Lee (Kashiwa) FW - Sergio Escudero (Urawa)