Nabisco Cup vs Urawa

Worth taking a closer look at the team that beat the Reds 4-1. Soares may have just been resting the regulars but the players that came in did enough to suggest the manager might try something different for the game against Kashima Antlers today (No Kempes please!). Bando was a vast improvement on Kempes as Kurogi filled in for Ogihara. Kakitani also showed some glimpses of why he's held in high regard by staff and fans at Cerezo. As Kiyotake will be off to Nuremberg this summer we'll be looking to Kakitani for attacking inspiration.

Click to enlarge

Enjoy the goals!

Spurs in action and a J1 update, COYS!

Spurs fans were in good voice but much like the last game I went to the away fans were significantly more vociferous. Van Der Vaart scored the first and set up the second from a corner. Swansea did well at the lane and danger man Gylfi Sigurdsson was...dangerous and scored for the visitors as well as forcing an exceptional save from Brad Friedel. Gareth Bale had another sublime game and when Aaron Lennon returned from injury in the second half and we immediately looked a lot more balanced so things are looking up for our last few games. Lennon crossed superbly for Adebayor's second.  My hope for this year is that Spurs can finish above Arsenal and Cerezo above Gamba and a cup win would be nice too! Back in Japan Cerezo picked up three points against Frontale thanks to a Kim Bo-Kyung goal in Kawasaki. We lost our first home game in Kincho Stadium 1-2 as Vegalta Sendai look like having consecutive flying starts in J1, Bando scoring our only goal. Gamba sacked their manager after a poor start to the season. Next up for Spurs is a trip to Sunderland while Cerezo travel to Omiya Ardija.
                                                                                        

The High Road but it could be spring in Japan!

The White Hart Lane cockerel 

Swansea fans celebrate Sigurdsson's goal

Adebayor scores his first from a Van Der Vaart corner

                                                                                      

6 goals from 6 different players...Yamagata were poor

Earlier this year we drew with Montedio in Yamagata but this was a completely different set of teams. In terms of the players and confidence. Even though Cerezo were missing Kiyotake, injured in the Olympic qualifier, this game had the biggest gulf in class between two J-League teams I've ever seen. I hope for the Montedio supporters this was a one off display from them! That man Bando opened the scoring with his 9th goal in J1 this season. Fujimoto added the next with a header. Yamagata showed no resistance or fight in the 2nd half and we soon added two more within 5 minutes of the restart from Sakemoto and Ogihara, who came through the Japan Olympic qualifier unscathed. With the match won Culpi made some changes looking to rest some players before the ACL quarter final in Korea on Tuesday. The creative Fabio scored his first goal for us followed by our new number 7, Yohei Otake scoring a penalty to end a miserable night for Montedio. We face a much bigger challenge next in Korea to keep our 4-3 advantage from the first leg against Jeonbuk Hyundai Motors.

Spirits still high with the away fans

Now realising this won't be a good away trip?

Ogihara being congratulated

Creativity and now goals...looks a bit like Ronaldinho?

Otake's penalty

Asian Champions League Quarterfinal

We can't defend and three away goals wasn't ideal against a strong Jeonbuk side from Korea. But in another ridiculously open game we came out on top. Kiyotake scored the winner and his second, both from Sakemoto corners to make it 4-3 and adding goals from Bando and Bo-Kyung. Next we face a trip to Korea on the 27th, good luck chaps.





Incredible stuff as Hiroshima visit Osaka!

The first half ended with boos from the home fans. Things started badly when we lost our captian and most experienced defender Moniwa early on. Sanfrecce then knocked three past us before half time. There wasn't much choice for Culpi, only a Bando hat-trick could salvage anything so he came on along with Kim Bo-Kyung for the second half. Then all kinds of craziness after the restart. Kiyotake got things going with a great strike Bando got a couple to square the game then Bo-Kyung scored with another fine effort. Bando wrapped up his hat-trick, another riciculously clinical displat from him. Also worth noting was new forward Fabio Lopes who was a great creative force today with some incisive set-up play. Sanfrecce grabbed the last goal in what proved to be one of the craziest games of football you will ever witness.

3-0 up? Don't celebrate yet

Captain stretchered off

Bando reminding the ref he wants the match ball

The highs of being a Cerezo fan

No more boos

Bando hat-trick in Shimizu but only a point for Cerezo vs S-Pulse

Ryuji Bando came off the bench to secure a point away from home at the Outsourcing Stadium Nihondaira. Since Bando joined us he hasn't actually started under Culpi as far as I can remember. We started with Kenyu Sugimoto up top as Komatsu was injured and Fabio Lopes was given a first start too. Sugimoto missed a good headed chance whilst Lopes didn't do much to suggest he's significantly better than any other average Brazilian import in J1. But anyway the day belonged to Bando who got his first from the penalty spot and finished well for the other two goals in a crazy last 15 minutes which left both sets of supporters with sore throats after the match. As usual Cerezo tend to lose concentration just after scoring and frustration crept in as Bando's double was swiftly cancelled out within minutes, the same happened minutes after his hat-trick goal leaving us with a point from the game. Shimizu's goals came from Ono, Takagi and Takahara who looked like they had the game wrapped up until those unforgettable last few minutes.

Cheerleaders at football?

The screen was broken but the big
kit is always a crowd pleaser

The pink and navy army

Culpi: Right, Bando's coming on,
that'll show you!

Bando awaits his game-changing appearance

Prepares to score his first...

...does so with no problem, two more followed

Slightly tarnished Cerezo 5-0 home win against the league leaders Kashiwa

I would have been happier if we got a result against 11 men over the whole game but we were 2-0 up before Kashiwa's No.10 Leandro Domingues got his marching orders after 28 minutes. Before that Inui cooly finished a fine through ball from Kiyotake. A mix-up between the keeper and defender then allowed Pimpao to grab our second. Inui was in good form today taking on players and even beating them! At this point the game was was well poised and looked like serving up some good entertainment. Until Leandro's sending off. He picked up his first booking for a deliberate handball, wasn't in a dangerous position and it's debatable whether it was deliberate. Anyway Martinez waved the annoying imaginary card at the ref who booked Leandro. A couple of minutes later during a Cerezo counter Leandro appeared to take Martinez (who rolled around a lot before getting up) out after he had released the ball. The ref made a good decision and allowed an advantage which Pimpao wanted to take by playing the ball to Inui. Inui instead of continuing a promising attack let the ball go out preferring to wave an imaginary card at the ref who turned around and showed Leandro his second yellow. Cue protests from the Kashiwa players. This signalled the end of the game as a contest. It was a bit hard to enjoy the rest of the game, we did our best to get the guy sent off basically, even though we were doing well enough anyway. This ref was actually really good with playing advantages but a couple of times players refused to take them. Play to the whistle! Also waving an imaginary card should be a yellow card offence, it's not really in the spirit of the game. So we knocked in another three in the second half. Martinez, Kurata and the ever excitable Bando with a great turn and finish were the goalscorers but it all left a slightly sour taste in my mouth after the sending off. The victory would've meant so much more 11 vs 11 for 90 minutes. Perhaps I should be happier, it was after all our long-awaited first home victory in front of 13741 fans in Nagai Stadium most if not all of whom left in better spirits than I did! 

Inui looking on ominously below the Kashiwa support. Felt sorry for them in the end, there was a lone trumpeter in there somewhere who kept their spirits up.

Is Maruhashi holding his head in shame here? Martinez about to get up after Leandro got sent off.

Officials, players, coaches and subs all try to stop Bando going nuts after scoring so the game could actually finish!

Final score with a sad looking blank space where Leandro's name would still have been on another day.

Two wins in the J-League so far!

We played Ventforet Kofu without Kiyotake who was on Olympic qualifying duty (see you in London!) with Japan U22s and Inui becuase of his possible move to the Bundesliga. Read Culpi's thoughts about an Inui move here. Is Inui that good? He's been great in the ACL this year and previously in J2 but he must have a good agent I guess, he managed 4 goals in 33 matches in J1 last season. Despite that it only took a goal each from our subs Komatsu and Bando in the 85min and in injury time respectively to get us our second win this season. Tomorrow Nagoya visit Kincho with their legendary manager Dragan Stojkovic, Japanese international defender Tulio and the J-League's joint top goalscorer last season (they were champions by the way) Australian Joshua Kennedy.

Kiyotake scores the first against the mighty Kuwait 3-1 to Nippon 

A match made in Osaka

Something old...

Before we became Cerezo Osaka we were Yanmar Diesel and this was our kit

 Something new...

The J-League kicks off today!

Something borrowed...

Most of our new players this season are on loan. I was going to do a preview but instead here's a link to Ryuji Bando's thoughts on the new season from www.goal.com in English, great interview. Also 'borrowed' from the same site, here is an interesting atricle by Cesare Polenghi about the transer system in Japanese football and why it's bad for Japanese clubs. Will anything change in the near future? Finally some comments from Levir Culpi in the Japan Times following our ACL debut.

Something blue...

The Gamba kit, Endo really needs a haircut