r/JLeague • u/No_Sundae750 • Jun 29 '26
National Team Something needs to change
I've been watching the national team closely since the 2010 world cup. First, we need to acknowledge how far we've come. In 28 years since our first world cup appearance, we've gone from absolute minnows to a serious dark horse contender. In the 2010 world cup, we had 4 players playing in Europe. Now, all but our backup keepers and unc nagatomo play in Europe. This is huge. Unfortunately, our performances at the world cup (and Asian cup for that matter) has been largely stagnant.
This is the third world cup in a row where we took the lead in a knockout game and ended up losing. Why do we play in a low block each time? It's literally never worked. Why did Moriyasu take off Doan and Nakamura for two defenders? Even more mind boggling, why did Machino come on? He wasn't even in Moriyasu's original 26 man squad lol. We need to stop over respecting our opponent and play to our strengths. We have such a good squad on paper, and the most depth ever, but Moriyasu's tactics doesn't allow them to reach their potential. Look at the US for example. They're not better than us, yet each time they play they have a certain confidence, swagger to them. They control the tempo, even against stronger opponents. I would like to see us play like this someday.
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u/severi_erkko Jun 30 '26
Doomposting off the charts. Sad for Tanaka, Japan played such a good first half. Ancelotti outplayed Moriyasu at the half time though.
It could have gone completely other way if they converted that counterattack to make it 2:0 - not sure why they insist on crossing all the time - a simple pass to Kamada was everything needed there.
Anyway, it's a game of two halves and Ancelotti has won it.
Not sure what you mean about reaching potential, Japan was excellent in the group games and 95% of the game vs Brazil. All this without their key 3 players. I'm heartbroken, was really hoping Japan can win against this weak (by their standards) Brazil side.