2 Goals Forward, 4 Goals Back...Sapporo 4 - 2 Verdy

Oooof!!! Livin` My Life Quarter Mile At A Time....

Defensive blunders were the name of the game tonight in a match Verdy had a good chance to win and claim three points to close in on 3rd place. Consadole will be relieved to take the points and keep the heat on FC Tokyo after spending much of the 90 minutes on the back foot.
The game was only 2 minutes old when Tomisawa and Tsuchiya let Hiroyuki Furuta burst through them to finish. Hiroki Kawano hit back just two minutes later with a devastating run through the middle holding off two defenders to fire home. The rest of the first half saw a lot of probing by Verdy with a few shots peppering the Sapporo goal but nothing really of note.
The second half started where the first finished with Verdy in the ascendancy going forward and looking to take the lead. Sapporo had a total of THREE chances in the second half and scored every single one. The second goal came on 61 minutes with Yusuke Kondo sending a perfect lob over Shibasaki after Tsuchiya and Tomisawa again hesitated and left Shibasaki trapped in no mans land.  Iio hit the post with a shot and turn in the box before Yuki Kobayashi let fly with a rocket into the roof of the net following good work by Yusuke Mori. Mori left his marker on his backside before slipping the ball to Kobayashi to fire an unstoppable effort home from just outside the box. At this point Verdy looked likely to go on and win it but were to be undone by some awful defending. Okamoto took the first of his goals in the 88th minute when Tsuchiya sent a looping header back towards his own goal, the ball came back off the base of the post and left an easy tap in. 13th Century Dung was rubbed in the wound just a minute later in order to bring out a puss when Okamoto again took advantage of Verdy`s generosity to fire home even after getting the ball caught under his feet and Verdy having plenty of chances to make a challenge and deciding to leave him be.....
So where does that leave us? In need of some solidity at the back. The forwards can score till the cows come home on occasion but while last year the defence was a rock, this year the defence has been the achilles heel. Finally, Maki and Hiramoto were on for the last ten minutes and looked ponderous, old, rusty and utterly done for the season. Hiramoto has struggled for fitness this year but when he has been on he has looked pedestrian and Maki hasn`t done a single thing in either of his cameo appearances. Ok, maybe he isn`t 100 per cent fit but I`ve seen nothing so far that indicates he is worth a seat on the bus. Verdy are fast running out of games to get up to that 3rd place, it`s not impossible but tonight`s game was the kind they had to win, had the chances to but ultimately didn`t.

Coach Kawakatsu on his way to the 2011Uncle Albert Lookalike Contest

Oh well, I`m now the proud owner of probably the fastest Skyline GTR on the planet so who cares? It cost millions but I`ve saved up in the last two weeks. Call it a midlife crisis but what`s wrong with racing round the streets of Tokyo at 320KMH?  Vroom!!!!!