Shimizu S-Pulse 1-0 Matsumoto Yamaga F.C.
IAI Stadium Nihondaira, Shizuoka

S-PULSE GOALS Douglas(18)
YELLOW CARDS Matsubara(25), Yoshimoto(32), Elsinho(72)
RED CARDS
ATTENDANCE 16017

LINE UP
GK Nishibe
DF Elsinho, Yoshimoto, Futami, Matsubara
MF Renato, Takeuchi, Kaneko, Nishizawa
FW Kawai, Douglas

SUBSTITUTIONS
Tatsuta on for Elsinho (84)
Dutra on for Kawai (89)
Musaka on for Kaneko (90+6)

REPORT
They finally broke it!　THE FORTRESS!

Matsumoto Yamaga had been an impregnable Fortress for the 7 games that S-Pulse played against them until that day!　Yamaga is a team almost solely based on its solid and aggressive defense. They are moreover crafty to the point of escaping from yellow cards all day and provoking their opponents into the same yellow cards mistakes. They had already frustrated top class teams in their own dens before coming to Shizuoka, so S-Pulse knew they faced a difficult task in spite of their opponents’ low position in the J 1 League.

But Matsumoto’s attack, however pressing it might be, is predictable and follows the same pattern all game long making the work easy for a tenacious defense.

On the other hand S-Pulse has the offense and individualities that can create the difference.Once again Douglas might have been the scorer of the day but S-Pulse could and should have scored a second and third goal as clearly pointed out by Head Coach Shinoda, who in spite of a consecutive clean sheet and happy with the result was still not completely satisfied with the team’s overall performance. On top of more goals going begging still too many basic mistakes were committed.

The first 10 minutes saw a heavy pressure form the visitors with no less than 6 consecutive corner kicks but all their efforts were cleared without much fuss.

Then S-Pulse starting applying a pressure of their own and were rewarded with a corner kick in the 18^th minute. Nishizawa intelligently floated the ball across and away from the goal mouth. The Yamaga keeper could only palm it away feebly under pressure. It was then that Douglas on the far side had the reflex to cycle-kick the ball over everybody’s head for a goal straight out of a sport cartoon.

For the rest of the game a pattern settled into a sterile and sometimes rough pressure from Matsumoto who were only allowed two shots on target for the whole game and S-Pulse conducted quick and sharp counters which could have resulted in for a heavier score with just a little more luck.

Nonetheless S-Pulse had their frights though and goalkeeper Nishibe justly became the Man of the Match throwing his body into opponent time and again regardless of physical danger. S-Pulse is steadily improving their defense and relies on deadly counters. There are still some midfield mistakes to erase but the coming of new midfielder Junior Dutra could well create a new dimension to their game.

The fans were ecstatic at the end of the game and more might be in store for them next Saturday at home against Consadole Sapporo!

NEXT GAME
Emperor's Cup JFA 99th Japan Football Championship 3rd round
AVISPA FUKUOKA vs SHIMIZU S-PULSE 
Wednesday August 14th, 7pm
LEVEL 5 STADIUM, Fukuoka