Sunday, March 25, 2007

J2-Around the league

Well, today was a case of Verdy losing without taking the field as Mean Green dropped to second behind Vegalta. All was not so bad as you will soon see......

Vegalta VS Thespa- On paper, this game looked like it would be a blowout. Besides Verdy, Vegalta has been the most impressive team in the early going. Vegalta outplayed Thespa everywhere except the scoreboard, putting up 20 shots to 8. It looked like the game would finally break open after Lopes put a score in early in the second half, but the Kusatsu squad broke through late when (shockingly) Koji Maatsura put one in 10 minutes from the final whistle. With the point, Vegalta inches past Verdy in the standings but the Tokyo side has to feel good about today's result.

Montedio VS Consadole- MF Masaya Nishitani notched his second goal of the season as Consadole moved into 3rd place with a 1-0 win over Montedio Yamagata. Takahiro Takagi put up his fourth straight clean sheet for the Owls. Yamagata MF Masaru Akiba got run late in the game with his second yellow.

Avispa VS Mito- Pity poor Mito, who got blitzed by this year's candidate for league bullies. Lincoln had a brace and Alex and Takanori Nunobe also pitched in with scores to lead Avispa to a 4-1 drubbing of Hollyhock. Things looked a little brighter when MF Jun Muramatsu scored, but fellow mid Shohei Ogura picked up a second yellow to end all hopes for the little Ibaraki side.

Shonan VS Ehime- 5 games and 3 0-0 ties for Shonan Bellmare. Maybe you wanna rethink that strategy.

Sagan VS Tokushima- Baby steps for last year's 4th place squad as they finally get a victory over Tokushima Vortis 1-0. DF Keiji Takachi scored the only goal in a game that really wasn't close. Sagan outshot Vortis 16 to 1 but could not find the back of the net.

GAME OF THE DAY- A pair of Kansai relegation victims took the field in Osaka today as last place Cerezo Osaka battled with preseason favorites Kyoto Sanga FC. Sanga jumped out to a lead off of two goals by FW Andre, but Cerezo answered back with goals from Tatsuya Furuhashi and Ze Carlos. Finally with the closing whistle approaching, Cerezo defender Kazuya Maeda put the dagger into the heart of Kyoto. 3-2 Cerezo

So if the season were to end today Vegalta and Verdy would be in J1, Consadole would be playing Chiba in a Pro/Rel and my friend Furtho would have to be worrying about who Tokushima Vortis is starting against Ehime. That is something I would not wish on anyone.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Thanks for your comment! I replied to it.

Good luck to Verdy this year! Although I think Mito needs it more. :)

Unknown said...

I also forgot to mention that I feel your blog is well written and I think I will read it from now on. Until now I have only read the results on J's Goal since SkyPerfecTV's J2 Pack is proving to be incompatible with my long hours. :(

Would you consider exchanging links? Sorry it'd be for the straightest-laced blog in the world and for the weakest team in Japan outside of the JFL... :)