Sunday, September 24, 2006

Good news, Great news, bad news, and so-so news

Didn't get a chance to post the story on Montedio vs Verdy because of Sports Day at my junior high school (teacher not a student, just to clear it up). I ran in the staff vs. 1st grade girl class 600 meter relay. I had to run 50 meters, our team was in second when I started and 5th when I was done. Out of 5 teams. Afterwards, one of my students, who neeeeeeeeeeever speaks English made a point to tell me in english........DON'T RUN! DIET!

OK, I'm a big fatty......ON TO THE NEWS

MONTEDIO MINUS LEANDRO EQUALS BOOOOOOOORING!

Wow, talk about a team needing one guy. Montedio came in without El golazo's highest ranked J2 player and Yamagata scoring leader, Leandro. I have no idea why. Anyhow, Verdy went with a strange midfield of Ze Luis, Kanazawa, Kuba, and Ohashi to go along with forwards Silva and Hiroyama, DF Kaimoto, Togawa, Hagimura, and Ishikawa and big Takagi.

Verdy came out strong and had the lions share of possesion and shots. The most dangerous play came in the early minutes, when Kuba shot a bomb off the crossbar. It seemed like the forwards and mids were just missing on extra passes and half shot balls in the box. Montedio looked a bit shell shocked and had no real offensive push.

In the second half, the only goal of the game came off a stunning cross from Ishikawa to Nozomi Hiroyama, who put a clean header into the back of the net. The team seemed to lose a little something when Ramos subbed in Kina, Tomisawa, and Hiramoto. Kina was especially bad (surprise!). He started with a weak shot, lost possesion, fouled a player, lost possesion, got a yellow card, took a pass in the box, had the keeper out of position with 2 Verdy players wide open in the box and chose to take a weak shot through the keepers legs that was easily cleared away by a Montedio defender.

Good effort, bad execution, reasonable result. 1-0 Green.

Yokohama and Vegalta miss a chance to nail shut the coffin

It seems like both Vegalta and Yokohama FC are slipping a bit. Vegalta dropped a 1-0 result to Sagan Tosu in Tosu............the shocker of the day however was the match at National Stadium between Yokohama FC and bottom feeders Thespa Kusatsu. Kusatsu stunned Yokohama FC with a 2-0 result. Is Yokohama feeling the pressure? Have the rest of the league figured out the pale blue bombers? Why are teams from Shimizu and Yokohama playing home games in Tokyo? If I'm really so fat, shouldn't I run more? These questions are gonna keep me up all night!

Vissel gets a game in hand and Kashiwa gets another point

Vissel had the bye and Kashiwa got into a scoreless draw with the atrocious Tokushima Vortis, who feature not one, but two Verdy midfielders from loans.

So if you're keeping score at home

16 points behind Kashiwa
15 points and a game behind Vissel
14 points behind Yokohama FC
5 points behind Vegalta
1 point behind Sagan

I think a great goal for Verdy right now is to finish 4th. If they manage to get 4th in the final 10 games, that would be a great thing to build on.

If Machiavelli had his own league he'd probably call it this!

The Prince league is going on right now. Featuring 24 of the best U-18 teams in the country. Verdy youth is one of those teams. After finishing 1st in the group stages and dispatching of their round of 16 opponent.......young Verdy dropped a game to Hashimoto High school today in the round of 8. After Osama El Samni notched a last minute goal to force a shootout, Hashimoto was able to blank the boys 3-0 in shootouts. Congratulations to the lads for putting up a good fight.......good sign for the future!

That's all for tonight...........coming soon is a preview of the Emperors cup game against Tochigi SC........WHO?

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

When will play Verdy against Togichi??

Aaron said...

Any idea when the miserable orange lot from J1 start in The Emperor's Cup? Could a match against the incomparable Blackpecker Hakodate be a possibility?

SMB said...

verdy plays on the 8th of october

omiya plays on november 4th or 5th

blackpecker got eliminated in the regional qualifiers

Anonymous said...

On the 8th of october mmm Ok Steve! Thank you