Fukunishi leaves one final gift

Song of the day dedicated to Fukunishi http://jp.youtube.com/watch?v=P47oPw_lIPA&feature=related

(Special thanks to JC for turning me on to this)


This slipped through the cracks but Verdy got fined 150,000 for accumulating too many negative points during the season. Verdy led the league with 81 yellows and came third in red cards with 6 (behind Kashiwa and Consadole). The overwhelming leader in this category was Takashi Fukunishi with 13 yellows and 2 reds. VERY NICE!

THE CLOCK HAS STARTED

Opening day has been announced for March 7th........we should be seeing opening day opposition in January. God that is a short break, ain't it?

CLARIFICATION

Not really a clarification but an answer to a response about the 5 players. Jun Marques Davidson is one of my favorite players in the J League and I was very sad to see him go from Omiya. After 2005 his career kinda plateaud. The one real constant in his career has been Miura as his coach and to be fair I think part of his problem has been Miura. It also has been his only opportunity. Suzuki at Niigata didn't give him much of a chance and he was used sparingly but effectively at Vissel Kobe.

He's 25 so there is a chance to prove he can consistently produce in J1 but his window is starting to close. Ultimately he is the one that needs to adapt to systems and he has yet to. My dream is that he comes back to Omiya and helps them win a J1 crown. I would love to be proven wrong in my assessment of him.

FINALLY

Our friend Dokool has his second installment up of Verdy in crisis.

Article here http://www.japanesesoccer.net/wordpress/?p=545#respond

I gotta say he misses alot in this installment. Yeah too many old guys I agree but there were alot of other problems. The section on Hulk was just oversimplified. Hulk didn't leave at the start of the season because of his bad lockerroom behavior. As a matter of fact he never stopped trying and was one of the few guys consistently producing in 2007 when Verdy hit the huge slump. he carried them on his back up to J1 and nobody on the team wanted to get rid of him.

Kawasaki decided to play fantasy league soccer and put him with another big ego in Juninho who needed the ball to be effective. It was bad evaluation on the part of Kawasaki and really the reason why they didn't win this year.

A major problem was Leandro, who did nothing but disrupt the team since he got here. Leandro was also hoping to be transferred. During the summer break, Leandro and Hulk both returned late (2 days before the Omiya game) and Hashiratani did nothing to discipline them, causing arift between the Brazilian players and the Japanese players. Hashiratani handed out a punishment after the Japanese players demanded one and lost Hulk and Leandro in the process.

Another huge problem was the failure of Oguro to fill the void. It's popular to knock Takahara but Oguro came in on a huge transfer and did nothing. It was a huge failure on the part of the Verdy front office to evaluate the level of erosion in Oguro's game.

The third problem was a severe lack of on field discipline. 9 players served time on yellow card accumulation violations, leaving a team in relative upheaval constantly having to readjust it's lineup. Diego plays that game against Sapporo and your column is about the Jubilo crisis.

I'm hoping the third installment includes something new on the sponsor crisis and the mismanagement of funds by NTV and CyberAgent. Anyhow, we will post a link and Dokool is welcome to respond and I'll give him some space at the front. I'm sure Nick will have something to add as well.