Former Kawasaki Frontale manager Naoki Soma, who was dismissed on 11 April after a poor start to the season and leading Frontale to eleventh place in the 2011 campaign (Image courtesy of The Japan Times)
Manager Naoki Soma has been dismissed by Kawasaki Frontale following their poor start to the season, reports the Asahi Shimbun. Soma, the former Japanese international full-back and Kawasaki Frontale player, was appointed to the position for the start of the 2011 season in which he led his team to a disappointing eleventh place. Current Japan Under-23 manager Takashi Sekizuka and his assistant Tsutomu Takahata were always going to prove a difficult act to follow given their five consecutive top five finishes, of which three were runners-up, but while he was given the opportunity to rectify the previous season’s failures a dismal return of just seven points from five games in the 2012 J.League campaign to date was insufficient to avoid dismissal. Assistant coach Tatsuya Mochizuki will take over immediately as manager on an interim basis while Frontale complete the search for Soma’s replacement. Soma becomes the second J.League Division 1 manager to be sacked this season following the firing of Jose Carlos Serrao at Gamba Osaka, and in a statement issued by the club he said “It is a shame I leave the team without having been able to fulfill my ambition …I felt like we were making steps in the right direction and I thought things would take off from here on.”
The Asahi Shimbun also noted the presence of Samurai Blue manager Alberto Zaccheroni at Wednesday’s Bundesliga match between FC Augsburg and VfB Stuttgart, in which Die Roten ran out 3-1 winners. Zaccheroni was there to run his eye over prospective team and squad members for June’s Group B 2014 FIFA World Cup qualification matches, with Japan due to play three matches in the space of only ten day, and saw midfielder Hajime Hosogai play the full 90 minutes for the losing side, while right-back Gotoku Sakai featured throughout for the victors, Shinji Okazaki once again an unused substitute for Stuttgart. All three players met the national team manager after the fixture.
Japan has risen to 30th place in the latest FIFA World Ranking, adds the Sankei Shimbun. The move up the table puts Japan one place ahead of AFC rivals South Korea, but comes too late to affect their seeding for the 2014 FIFA World Cup qualifiers.
And finally, the Yomiuri Shimbun confirms that Keisuke Honda is expected to return from injury next week. The 25 year-old playmaker has been plagued by a knee injury he suffered in September 2011, and he has encountered repeated setbacks in finding a route back to full fitness, is in line to feature in the Moscow derby against Dinamo on 21 April.
With more than a dozen current national team players choosing to leave the confines of the J.League for more challenging opportunities overseas, and with many competing in what are typically regarded as the elite competitions, the regard in which Japanese footballers and the Samurai Blue are held has never been higher. This was underlined by Real Madrid’s Christiano Ronaldo prior to their 2011-12 UEFA Champions League fixture with CSKA Moscow, when he pointed to winger Keisuke Honda as the most dangerous player the Army Men had to offer.
The 27 year-old, whose versatility is greatly admired in the football world and whose proposed move to SS Lazio from Russia collapsed in January, is allegedly the subject of renewed attempts by CSKA Moscow to extend his contract beyond the 2012-13 season, when his current deal expires. The Corriere dello Sport reports that CSKA are willing to offer improved terms including a 50% increase in pay to keep the Samurai Blue star at the Khimki Arena. Honda, who continues to deliver for CSKA having scored 7 goals in just 21 appearances this season, and who is according to some press the subject of longstanding interest from Arsenal, Liverpool, Manchester United and Arsenal, did not feature in Wednesday’s 4-1 defeat by Real Madrid at the Santiago Bernabéu owing to a thigh injury, with CSKA exiting the 2011/12 UEFA Champions League 5-2 on aggregate.
Borussia Dortmund’s Shinji Kagawa has been the subject of recent rumours regarding a prospective move away from Germany to another European club. With reports suggesting that the 22 year-old attacking midfielder is being tracked by Premier League giants Manchester United and Liverpool, whose eye-catching performances for Die Schwarzgelben have seen him net ten times and provide 6 assists, and whose consistency was a major factor in Dortmund’s Bundesliga winning season, Kagawa was keen to downplay any news linking him with an exit from the Westfalenstadion. In an interview with German newspaper RevierSport the ex-Cerezo Osaka star said:
We are now negotiating over the renewal of my contract. [Staying is] what interests me right now although I know that foreign clubs have asked about me. But I don’t think it is the right time for me to leave this club
Compatriate Hajime Hosogai, currently on-loan from Bayer 04 Leverkusen at FC Augsburg, stifled Kagawa’s movement and ability to create chances with a very attentive and disciplined marking display in their 0-0 draw, which not only saw Kagawa substituted after 70 minutes but ended Dortmund’s eight match winning streak. Bayern Munich’s 7-1 victory over TSG Hoffenheim reduced Borussia’s advantage at the top of the table to five points.
Yuto Nagatomo, the 25 year-old left-back at Italy’s Internazionale continues the impressive form which convinced the Nerrazzuri to make his loan deal from Cessena permanent. The highly mobile left-back has made 26 appearances in the 2011-12 season, and two goals and two assists can be credited to an attacking ability which few other defenders in his position possess.
National team goalkeeper Eiji Kawashima’s Lierse SK, however, continue to struggle. De Pallieters finished the 2010-11 season in 14th place and show little sign of improvement, languishing in 1th place, and Kawashima’s spot as regular stopper for the Samurai Blue may come under threat not only from Vegalta Sendai’s Takuto Hayashi, but from Shuichi Gonda, who captained the U-23 side to victory over Bahrain and secured a place at the forthcoming 2012 Olympic games for Japan.
Like Kawashima, centre-back Maya Yoshida finds himself at a team beset by difficulties, his VVV Venlo side currently in a relegation play-off spot in the Eredivisie. Major defensive frailties explain conceding a division-high 39 goals away from the Seacon Stadium De Koel, and despite an impressive showing of five goals in 24 matches, a major squad revamp is likely for the The Gold Old at the end of the current campaign.
Attacking midfielder Shinji Okazaki’s reputation in Germany was enhanced following a spectacular bicycle kick for VfB Stuggart against Hannover 96, which received February’s Goal of the Month award and made Oksazaki only the second Japanese recipient of the honour in Bundesliga history. Okazaki has had a fine season thus far for Die Roten, scoring 7 goals in 22 games and helping VfB to eighth in the table, four places higher than where they ended the previous campaign.
Tadanari Lee’s Southampton career has begun slowly since joining from Sanfrecce Hiroshima on a free transfer in January, but he recently made his first starting appearance in a 3-0 win away to Watford on 25 February, earning a penalty for the Saints after missing two earlier chances. The start came as reward for his efforts in a 4-0 victory over Derby County in which he scored with an effort from the edge of the penalty area, dispatching a fiercely struck shot into the far corner of the Derby goal. Further reward for Lee was forthcoming on 3 March, when he repaid the faith of manager Nigel Adkins by providing the headed assist for Rickie Lambert’s finish in a 1-0 victory away to Leeds United.
FC Schalke 04′s Atsuto Uchida, who signed from Kashima Antlers two years ago, found his opening weeks of the Bundesliga campaign curtailed following an injury he sustained against Maccabi Haifa in the UEFA Europa League. Uchida would have been gratefully welcomed back by Die Knappen, with his highly competent displays helping his team to a DFB Pokal victory and a place in the UEFA Champions League semi-finals in the 2010-11 season.
Finally, Ryo Miyaichi, the potential player of a generation for the Japan national team, is making waves at Bolton Wanderers following his loan from Arsenal. Current Trotters manager Owen Coyle is keen to extend his spell at the Reebok Stadium until the end of the 2012-13 season despite the 19 year-old forward having only been at the club for a month, Miyaichi sparkling in the 2-0 FA Cup win over Milwall in which he scored a goal, and Coyle praised the player recently called up to the Samurai Blue senior squad in adding:
I would love to have got [Roy] permanently but Arsène [Wenger] looks after his young players and feels that he will go on to have a fantastic career at Arsenal. He can go as far as he wants in the game.
(Shinji Okazaki scores with a stunning bicycle kick for VfB Stuttgart. Okazaki’s goal came too late for his team, as they crashed to a 4-2 defeat away to Hannover 96 on 19 February 2012)
The Asahi Shimbun leads with the story that one of the leading players in Japanese women’s football, Mizuho Sakaguchi, will be transferring from Albirex Niigata Ladies to their L.League rivals NTV Beleza. The 24 year-old midfielder, who was an indispensable part of the national team which lifted the 2011 FIFA Women’s World Cup, will aim to continue the dominance of Beleza, who have claimed the title a record eleven times, with seven championships coming in the last eleven seasons.
The newspaper also confirms that the three trophies collected at the 2011 FIFA Ballon d’Or Gala will be on display in the Japan Football Association Museum. The FIFA Women’s World Player of the Year, FIFA Women’s Coach of the Year and the FIFA Fair Play Award trophies will be available for public viewing until 29 May.
As reported yesterday, Keisuke Honda’s mooted transfer to SS Lazio is still to be resolved, according to The Daily Yomiuri. The report, using the Russian sports daily Sport Express as a source, confirms that the negotiations are ongoing but an agreement is yet to be reached.
And finally, news on Japan’s overseas players is the order of the day for The Daily Mainichi, starting with Samurai Blue Shinji Okazaki’s VfB Stuttgart side falling to a 3-1 defeat away to Atsuto Uchida’s FC Schalke 04. The Schalke right-back played for the full 90 minutes, while Okazaji made an appearance as a 73rd minute substitute, netting a consolation goal for Stuttgart in the 87th minute and bringing his total to four for the season. Gotoku Sakai was an unused substitute for Stuttgart.
Elsewhere, the midfielder Makoto Hasebe was left on the bench as his VfL Wolsburg side scored a late winner to take all three points against FC Cologne in a 1-0 victory, while Hajime Hosogai was named in the FC Augsburg team which fell to a 1-0 defeat away to SC Freiburg following an 88th minute winner scored by Matthias Ginter.
The Asahi Shimbun runs a small feature on the newly promoted J.League Division Two side Matsumoto Yamaga, focusing on the training camp being run under the auspices of the new manager Yasuharu Sorimachi. Sorimachi was hired for the position owing to his predecessor Yoshiyuki Kato not having the requisite coaching credentials for a professional team. Sorimachi led the session, which was opened up to supporters of the Ptarmigans, with his squad of 30 focusing on light exercise and technical drills. The Nagoya Prefecture side begin their league campaign away to Shonan Bellmare on 4 March, following by their first professional home fixture at the Matsumotodaira Football Stadium against Montedio Yamagata a week later.
The power of Japanese women through the ages, including the evolution of language through the invention of kana, to the present time and the boom of women’s football owing to the exploits of the modern day heroine Homare Sawa occupies the thoughts of Ryuzo Morioka in The Daily Mainichi. Morioka, the former Japanese international defender capped thirty-eight times by the Samurai Blue, and now a coach at Kyoto Sanga, talks about “Pink Power”, and that young boys should surely be impressed and inspired by the achievements of the Nadeshiko, self-mockingly suggesting that he is perfectly aware of female strength owing to the number within the Morioka household.
And finally, Nippon Sports takes on the increasingly protracted and convoluted negotiations which could see Keisuke Honda leave PFC CSKA Moscow for Italian giants SS Lazio. The 25 year-old attacking midfielder has been linked with a host of clubs across Europe in recent years, and the Corriere Dello Sport reported that there is some distance between the fee Lazio are willing to pay, with an EUR 2 million loan fee followed by a full transfer fee of EUR 10m being proffered six months later, compared to an EUR 16m fee being demanded by the Russian club. A further complication is that Lazio has a full complement of foreign players, and will need to loan or sell one of its current overseas contingent to allow Honda to play. With the transfer window closing in Italy at midnight on 2 February, and a significant gap in the valuations of the two clubs, there is little optimism that a deal will be concluded this winter.
(Keisuke Honda opens the scoring with a free-kick for Japan against Denmark in the 2010 FIFA World Cup Group E game. Japan would go on to win the match 3-1 with goals from Yasuhito Endo and Shinji Okazaki)
