Is it a bad kick to score 2 goals by Vietnam? The Japanese team has set a new record and this is already the biggest victory!
On January 14, the Japanese team led by Mori Hoichi ushered in the first round of the 2023 Asian Cup, and the opponent was the Vietnamese team led by Troussier, who once coached the Japanese team. As a result, Japan opened the scoring 4-2 thanks to a brace from Takumi Minamino and goals from Keito Nakamura and Kiyo Ueda, and Mori extended his team's winning streak to 10 games. Japan, meanwhile, continue to write their 31-year unbeaten run in the group stage of the Asian Cup.
Japan played two warm-up matches before the Asian Cup, beating Thailand 5-0 at Tokyo National on New Year's Day and then arriving in Qatar with a 6-1 win over Jordan in a closed warm-up match. Despite successive big wins, the team's staffing has always been uneven. The call-up of the main left winger Kaoru Mikasa with an injury also caused dissatisfaction with his Brighton club, the three-goal king has resumed training before the game, but it has always been a training session alone rather than with the team, and Moriyasu said bluntly at the pre-match press conference that the three-goal king will definitely not play in the first game. Among the other players, central defender Kenhiro Tomiyasu, left-back Yuta Nakayama, two attacking forwards Ritsu Doan and Hisashi Hisashi, and striker Dairan Maeda have also had periods of training alone or adjusting in the dormitory and gym.
Therefore, after the announcement of the start of the game against Vietnam, it is obvious that the starting 11 selected by Mori Hoichi are basically players who are completely healthy after the team is concentrated. The goalkeeper is the mixed-race Saiyan Suzuki, the four defenders from left to right are Yoki Ito, Shogo Taniguchi, Itakura Kushi, and Sugawara Yusei, the two midfielders are Hidemasa Morita and the captain Nagato Hang, the three attacking forwards are the French trident Keito Nakamura, Takumi Minamino and Junya Ito, and the single striker is Madai Hosoya. Kaoru Mikasa, Kenhiro Tomiyasu and Yuta Nakayama did not make the list of 23 at all.
Japan's high pressing put Vietnam under a lot of pressure after the opening, but Vietnam were also able to use the ball and technical ability to defuse the Japanese team's siege, and neither side could threaten the opponent's goal in the first 10 minutes of the game. In the 10th minute, Shogo Taniguchi made a direct pass from the backfield, Nakamura Keito took the ball and turned diagonally to the left side, and Ito Hiroki inserted a cross from the bottom line to create a corner. Junya Ito took a corner kick from the left side, Vietnam goalkeeper Philip made a mistake, the ball was touched by Itakura and bounced to the right side of the penalty area, Sugawara Yusei followed up with a low shot and was blocked by the defender, Takumi Minamino pushed the goal in the middle of the penalty area, and the Japanese team led 1-0.
However, just four minutes later, Vietnam won a corner kick on the left side, Du Xiong Dung drove the ball to the front point, Nguyen Dinh North headed the ball into the back corner of the goal under the defense of Endo Hang, and the Vietnamese team equalized.
After conceding the goal, the Japanese team continued to attack, and in the 23rd minute, after the Japanese team stealed, Hidemasa Morita crossed, Takumi Minamino took the ball in front of the penalty area and turned around with a low left-footed shot that was slightly off. In the 30th minute, Nguyen Dinh North was brought down from behind by Sugawara Yusei in the Vietnamese team's counterattack, and Sugawara received the first yellow card of the game. Nguyen Tay let go of the set-piece in front, Bae Hoang Viet Anh nodded the ball and was saved by Suzuki Chaeyan, and Fan Junhai made a 2-1 shot in front of the goal.
This situation may not have been expected by anyone, but since then it has fully demonstrated the maturity of the Japanese team. If there were still a lot of 45-degree passes to find Madai Hosoya in the penalty area, then the Japanese team basically threatened the opponent's goal with a quick short pass. In the 44th minute, the Japanese team broke the ball in front of the counterattack again, Junya Ito sent a straight stopper, and Shindai Hosotani stopped the ball and shot was blocked by goalkeeper Philip. Then the Japanese team organized a second attack, Hidemasa Morita knocked on the middle, Endo Hang sent a straight plug again, Takumi Minamino stopped the ball in the penalty area and pushed the far corner to break the goal, and the score became 2-2.
In stoppage time of the first half, Yusei Sugawara played a cross from the bottom line after playing a combination with Junya Ito on the right side, Junya Ito inserted a burst shot that was saved by the goalkeeper, and Takumi Minamino's follow-up shot was also defused by the defender. In the 4th minute of stoppage time, the Japanese team was still attacking in the middle, Takumi Minamino was assigned to the left side of the penalty area, Nakamura Keito stopped the ball and got rid of the defense and turned the right-footed curling ball into the back corner, and the Japanese team ended the first half of the game 3-2.
Japan looked like they came back in the last four minutes of the first half, but in the last 15 minutes of the first half, it was almost difficult for Vietnam to catch their breath, and the number of shots on goal increased from 4 to 2 on target to 13 at the end of the half, while Vietnam did not have a shot or even entered the Japanese half in those 15 minutes.
Yibian fought again, and Moriyasu replaced the starting single striker Madai Hosoya with Ueda Kiyo. However, the pace of the two sides in the second half was not as fast as in the first half, and the main attack point of the Japanese team was also changed to the left side, and Nakamura Keito broke through with the ball several times on the left side, but did not create absolute chances, and the Japanese team did not shoot in the first 15 minutes of the second half.
In the 62nd minute, Mori Hoichi replaced Nakamura Keito with Ritsu Doyasu, who occupied the right side and Junya Ito came to the left. Ito, who had just switched to the left, was a threat, he broke through and crossed, and Hidemasa Morita stopped the ball in the box and his shot was blocked by the defender with his body, which was the first shot of the second half for Japan. In the 68th minute, the Vietnamese team's attack was cleared by the Japanese team, and Takumi Minamino stopped the ball to meet the incoming ball and was saved by Philip after the volley.
In the 76th minute, Mori Hoichi replaced Sugawara Yusei, and Sano Kaishu replaced Hidemasa Morita with Eiji. Seven minutes later, Hisashi replaced Takumi Minamino, who had 2 goals and 1 assist in this game. In the 85th minute, Hisashi Hisashi, who had just come on the field, received a cross after a straight plug from Doan Ritsu, and Ueda Kiyo led the ball in the penalty area with a low shot horizontally and hit the defender to break the line, and the Japanese team led 4-2.
In the last 1 minute of stoppage time, Shoya Kumama dribbled the ball from the right-back position to the middle and divided it to the left, and the penalty kick went out of the bottom line after the left side of the penalty area seemed to be crossed, and then the referee blew the final whistle, and the Japanese team won 4-2.
Japan's victory in this game also allowed Mori to lead his second phase of the national team to create a 10-game winning streak across the year (according to the information released by the Japanese Football Association, the closed match between Japan and Jordan is not counted, otherwise it is 11 consecutive wins), continuing to break the Japanese men's national team's international winning streak held by himself. At the same time, Japan also continued to maintain an unbeaten record of 25 games in the group stage of nine consecutive tournaments since the 1992 Asian Cup, with a record of 19 wins and 6 draws. After the game, coach Hoichi Mori also said that he would dedicate his victory to the victims of the earthquake on the Noto Peninsula, and he would try his best to lead the team to send victory and encouragement to the victims.
On the player side, Nakamura continues to break his own record, scoring six goals in six games for the national team from his debut to today, equalling the record set by Tadahiko Ueda 54 years ago in 1970. Takumi Minamino, who scored 2 goals and 1 assist in this game, maintained the glory of the top scorer of the national team, and he scored 20 goals in 53 games for the national team, all of which were scored during the tenure of Moriyasu Hoichi. In fact, I should really congratulate Minamino, who has experienced the downturn before and after the World Cup, from being excluded from the team and losing the No. 10 jersey to returning now, from scoring against Saudi Arabia in January 2022 to breaking the goal drought of as many as 14 games against Thailand in January 2024, from the main forward being squeezed to the left winger to the bench to now returning to the orthodox forward midfield, Nanno is really back.
After the game, I read some remarks, and many people said that the Japanese team performed poorly, probably because the Vietnamese team scored 2 goals. But I don't think so, football is a matter of attacking and defending, and the Vietnamese team has been considered a "little Japanese team" in recent years, and the coach is Troussier, who knows Japanese football very well. Before the game, the White Wizard said that he led the team to play against Japan 10 times and could lose 9 times, but he hoped that the only time he won was today's game, and it can be seen that he must have done enough homework. Therefore, it is actually expected that the Vietnamese team will be able to counter the Japanese team for a period of time, and even use small skills to have a certain amount of room for maneuver with the Japanese team. What's more, Vietnam has only lost 1 goal at most against the Japanese team over the years, such as the 0-1 loss in the 1/4 finals of the 2019 Asian Cup, such as 0-1 at home in the top 12 of the last World Preliminary Tournament, 1-1 away and even a draw with the Japanese team. So this time, the Japanese team was able to win by 2 goals, but it also "improved".
In fact, from the perspective of the whole game, the real threat of the Vietnamese team was the set-pieces of those two goals, these two set-pieces brushed up 3 shots and all of them were on target, and they were the only 3 shots on goal in the first half. In the second half, Vietnam also had three long-range shots that were completely out of tune, one of which was even stopped by Japanese goalkeeper Saiyan Suzuki with his feet. Japan, on the other hand, reversed the score with a stormy attack for 15 minutes after falling behind, and in the second half, they completely slowed down the tempo to ensure a victory, which was a mature style of play in the first game of the tournament when the three main players were not included in the squad due to injury.
If we have to dwell on the mistakes of the Japanese team, then first, why is the first point of the two set-piece contests the first point of Endo Hang, who has the least advantage in height on the field? Is this the coach's arrangement or is it determined by the players according to the situation on the field? Second, is the 22-year-old Suzuki really suitable to play the starting lineup now? In the case that the main goalkeeper Keisuke Osako was injured and missed the Asian Cup, three goalkeepers with no experience in the major tournament were selected. Note: Keisuke Osako played at least in the 2019 U23 Asian Cup, and both Suzuki and Osako were substitutes at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics] Is it really appropriate?
Of course, if you are not attached or not obsessed, then it is not Mori Hoichi.