FC Tokyo 2-0 Cerezo Osaka

J1 Matchday 15

The return of The Scorpion. Love it.

Photo from FC Tokyo Official Website

A decent crowd of just under 23,000 rolled up to Aji Sta on Saturday evening, and the majority went home happy after FC Tokyo atoned for their dreadful display away at Yokohama with a 2-0 win over Cerezo Osaka. Well-taken goals from Aria Hasegawa and Lucas saw The Gasmen move up to fifth in the table, as we held our ground despite a mounting injury toll.

All those injuries meant we were still without Naohiro Ishikawa, and reserve goalkeeper Hitoshi Shiota joined him in the treatment room after damaging his ankle at training, which meant Ryotaro Hironaga came into the squad, but there were two pieces of positive news, with Kenichi Kaga starting at centre back and Sotan Tanabe coming in on the left side of midfield, their first starts in over two months. Tanabe replaced Kazuma Watanabe, whose credit from his hat trick against Tosu ran out, with Lucas starting up front.

Cerezo had the better chances in the first half, but the usually efficient Kim Bo Kyung fluffed his lines when played clean through on the right on two seperate ocassions from around the half hour mark: firstly he crossed just out of the reach of Yoichiro Kakitani's lunge when a goal seemed certain; and then he made a right hash of trying to chip Shuichi Gonda, which allowed Masato Morishige to clear.

Just before halftime Kakitani, who we know well from his time with Tokushima in J2, set up defender Daisuke Takahashi on the left side of the box, but Gonda got out well and deflected the ball away with his left boot. We had two notable chances, Lucas screwed across the face of goal from Yuhei Tokunaga's excellent cut-back, and in the 43rd minute Kaga advanced and lashed goalwards, forcing the Cerezo 'keeper to palm the ball out for a corner.

As the second half got going we continued to struggle to really open up the visitors. Hideto Takahashi seemed to be doing the work of two people as his midfield partner Hasegawa spent another game on the fringes of the play, and the two wide players, Tanabe and Tatsuya Yazawa, were unable to influence proceedings.

Yokohama 1-0 FC Tokyo

J1 Matchday 14

Start this man for crying out loud.

Photo from FC Tokyo Official Website

Well, that was an absolute shower, and I'm not referring to the drizzle that fell throughout the second half at the Nissan Stadium on Saturday night. FC Tokyo turned in a totally shambolic 'performance' and were outclassed for the entire ninety minutes, losing for the first time in five league games and slipping a spot in the table to seventh.

After the three week break it felt a bit strange rolling up to the stadium to be honest, it almost seemed like the season was starting again from scratch, but the large contingent of Tokyo supporters trusted that Mr. Popovic had used the hiatus to prepare the players thoroughly for what was sure to be a stern test against Yokohama, who were on a six match unbeaten run. More on that later.

With Naohiro Ishikawa not making the squad presumably due to injury and Naotake Hanyu still out, we were at least able to recall Kosuke Ota at left back, after he finally shook off the illness that caused him to miss the last five games (3 league, 2 A.C.L.). That saw Kenta Mukuhara switch flanks to the right, while Yuhei Tokunaga continued at centre back with the fit again Kenichi Kaga forced to cool his heels on the bench (but not for long as it turned out!).

And then the game started...only we never got started. Yokohama were all over us from the off, passing the ball at will through gaping holes in our midfield, switching the ball from side to side under far too little pressure, and creating chance after chance as we were unable to stem the tide. The final corner count was 14-3, and I reckon they must've had ten in the first half hour as they poured forward in waves, not only on the counter from our sloppy turnovers but also moving the ball out impressively from the back.

We were simply unable to build play through midfield, and Yokohama played a high line with confidence, safe in the knowledge that with Ishikawa out there was very little pace in our forward six. Lucas and Tatsuya Yazawa were dreadful on the flanks, Kazuma Watanabe was isolated up front, and Hideto Takahashi and Aria Hasegawa could find no space to play into.

Football, eh?

Here we go with another FC Tokyo update, I couldn't be arsed writing about our ACL defeat yesterday, but it has to be done, so here we'll go through last Saturday's draw with Urawa and the ACL Round of 16 game against Guangzhou on Wednesday.

#Unpopular opinion alert! I'm going to have a few goes at Mr. Popovic in here, too.

FC Tokyo 1-1 Urawa

J1 Matchday 13

HAVE THAT!

Both photos from FC Tokyo Official Website

The biggest home crowd of the season, just under 34,000, rolled up to Aji Sta to see us take on the hated Red Cubics, and despite the fact we'd beaten them last December on our way to becoming Emperor's Cup Champions history was well and truly against us, as we hadn't beaten them in the league since September 2004, and we'd only drawn once in the 12 meetings since then.

Hat-trick hero Kazuma Watanabe started, as did the man who set up two of his goals against Tosu, Naohiro Ishikawa, which meant Takuji Yonemoto and Tatsuya Yazawa were dropped to the bench, with Lucas shifting out to the left of midfield.

The first half was full of incident, Watanabe was just unable to connect with a couple of teasing Lucas crosses and Ishikawa clattered the post with a left-footed shot in the 32nd minute, but we went in level thanks to Shuichi Gonda, who made two outstanding saves to deny Tsukasa Umezaki and then Marcio Richardes, the latter an astonishing reflex shot from the Brazilian's volley.

We had two outstanding chances just past the hour mark, first Yohei Kajiyama volleyed inches past the post from Kenta Mukuhara's cut back, then the overlapping Yuhei Tokunaga blazed across the face of goal after a pass from the captain found him in space on the right side of the box.