This was played on the public holiday now known as Showa day (my previous post was wrong, apologies, Greenery Day is now May 4th) which encourages reflection on Emperor Hirohito's reign while also giving those on the extreme right an excuse to blast anything they like from the loudspeakers in their usually black vans in various places around Japan. So Omiya Ardija, despite the poor showing in their last home game, could have left with three points were it not for an injury time equaliser from Kenyu Sugimoto. Takeda started in place of Jin-Hyeon and he was given no help from his defense for the goal we conceded from a corner. An odd game, but again the type we should be winning to live up to our (unwarranted in my opinion) hype. It should have been a nice game to try something different, aside from the keeper change, but at least we got a point which is better than the same fixture last season. The superb Toyota Stadium in Nagoya awaits next, no predictions from me, and I have to mention for those in Japan once again J Sports has a feast of Premier League football on Saturday with Spurs vs West Ham first, followed by a chance to see Ryan Giggs as Shinji Kagawa's manager, and then the highest paid sports team in the world AKA Man City. Until then please watch the goals from yesterday as many times as you can. I think you can get to at least double figures if you are committed. I should have known better to be confident about the game yesterday as the squirrels usually seem to enjoy playing against us. The fact that some of our fans booed (again) at the end was mentioned in the Japanese media. Cheer up and enjoy the ride! Unless we get relegated...
