The 11th International Youth Tournament (U-17) in Minsk 2015   2nd Place Play-Off League 1st Match
Fri. 23 January 2015    Kickoff 16:20    Playing Time 80min(40min halves)
Football Covered Arena Minsk(Minsk/Belarus)

U-17 Japan National Team   1-1(1st 1-1, 2nd 0-0, PSO4-3)   U-17 Belarus National Team

Scorers
11min   LISAKOVICH(Belarus)
37min　WATANABE Kouta(Japan)

Starters
GK: CHIDA Keito
DF: TANAKA Kosuke TOMIYASU Takehiro, SAKIMURA Yusuke, TSUNEMOTO Keigo
MF: SUGA Daiki, ITO Hiroki, WATANABE Kouta, TANAKA Riku
FW: KAJIYAMA Kanta, TAKAHASHI Toshiki

Substitutes
GK: WAKINO Atsushi
DF: ABE Masashi
MF: HATTORI Takehiro, SAITO Mitsuki
FW: IWASAKI Yuto, NAGASAWA Ryosuke

HT　 TSUNEMOTO Keigo→NAGASAWA Ryosuke
HT　 SUGA Daiki→IWASAKI Yuto
68min　 TAKAHASHI Toshiki→SAITO Mitsuki
76min　 KAJIYAMA Kanta→HATTORI Takehiro

Match Report

The first match in playoff tournament was against home team, Belarus. The game developed soon 10 mints after it opened. Belarus gained a corner kick from the left side and LISAKOVICH struck a looped shot directly into the far opposite corner of the net. Though Japan allowed the opponent to score an opening goal in an unexpected way, it kept to possess a ball calmly. It continued aggressively moving forward to try to make a breakthrough against the opponent which defended its goal completely by making solid defensive line. In 37th min, TANAKA Riku made a starting point of chance in the left side, passing a ball to TANAKA Kosuke. TANAKA Kosuke got the ball past the defender with a single touch, passing it to Watanabe in the middle of the pitch. Watanabe calmly threw it into a goal to equalize at last in the first half.

A head coach Moriyama gave a pep talk to players with a word that "Let's play more actively on the pitch and put more feeling into each play!" at halftime. Japan, from the beginning of the second half, sent aggressive players, IWASAKI and NAGASAWA to press on all at once. 5 players at the front lines exchanged their positions with each other so rapidly, being determined to pursue a goal, however, the team failed to take a lead within the second half and then entered into a penalty shootout, as about 20 shots they made were completely blocked by the goalpost, crossbar as well as the opposite goalkeeper like the last game against Russia. Japan won the shootout 4-3 thanks to GK Chida’s saves of three shots of six by the opponent, even though Japan's two shots were also blocked. After the game, the team ate out in the Minsk city for the first time in this tour in order to build up its energy for next game.

Japan will have a final match against Georgia national team sitting a second place in a group C on Jan 25 over the fourth place in this tournament.

Head Coach and Players Comments

MORIYAMA Yoshiro, Head Coach
We had a good experience to play in the away mood in the match with the host team. We successfully managed to get out of several pinches by physically blocking the opponents who were also physically tough to send a ball forward. When reviewing a whole game, players were likely to back away from the opponent who tried to fight with them. But they could battle with great effort in the second half after I gave them severe instructions in a halftime. However, I hope players to fully understand that they have come here to represent Japan and had strong feelings to make a breakthrough in the situation even without instructions from coaches.

We could score only a point, because our shots were inaccurate even though we had a lot of chances. Though we won a penalty shootout, this game made us feel strongly the necessity of trainings to improve our quality of plays and aggressiveness as a whole Youth Japan to bring finish to their plays. We are determined to fix our misplays in tomorrow's training and take our full power toward a next match with Georgia on the day after tomorrow
as a compilation of this tour.

SAKIMURA Yusuke(Avispa Fukuoka U-18)
We got into the game with a high motivation, as this was the game against the Belarus national team of host country. Although we were struggling to difficult game's development that the opponent scored an opening goal, it was good for us not to withdraw from the game and finally won a penalty shootout. I was careful about area behind me to avoid the opposite speedy FW breaking our defensive line, as I played as a center back today. We have tried to bring a breakthrough in front of the opponent's goal and show strong sense as a team.

KAJIYAMA Kanta(Nagoya Grampus U 18)
I was happy to win a penalty shootout after struggling to equalize the game against the home team, Belarus. On the other hand, I was frustrated for not taking a lead due to our lack of aggressiveness before goal and inaccurate plays even though we possessed a ball for a long time like past three games. Though we have only tomorrow to do trainings, I want to improve our plays to match the timing.

CHIDA Keito(Yokohama F. Marinos Youth)
We failed to deal with a ball behind us appropriately, as we kept our offensive line in low position. I again strongly believe we need to improve this point as the nation team as well as in a club team. I entered to a penalty shootout with a strong feeling that "I will bring the victory!", so I was happy to have a good result. Reviewing that we failed to keep focus in the first half of today's game, I want to show completely what we have done through this tour in the final game and conclude it with a victory.

Schedule

※The schedule may be subject to change due to the team condition, the weather, etc.