Intro
Time for the second of fifteen mid-week games for FC Ryukyu. This week Ryukyu welcome in Jubilo Iwata fresh off their 2-0 loss to Tokushima Vortis this past Saturday with FC Ryukyu returning to Okinawa after their 1-1 draw in Ehime.
Jubilo will be looking to climb back up the table at the expense of an FC Ryukyu team who are currently lacking confidence and wins. It is likely that we see many teams drop points during these mid-week fixtures as the season progresses and I hope that this is the week that FC Ryukyu exorcise their demons, and grab that first win of the year.
- Weather Forecast
- Match Day 7 Recap: FC Ryukyu
- Match Day 7 Recap: Jubilo Iwata
- Team Previews & Injury Report
- Keys to Victory
- Match Prediction
- Match Day 8 in J2
- Conclusion
1. Weather Forecast
Nice weather is finally in the forecast for a change.
2. Match Day 7 Recap: FC Ryukyu
A hard-fought draw that nearly was a win if we didn’t hit the woodwork, narrowly miss a FK and have the last shot on net just squeak wide after rolling across the mouth of goal.
3. Match Day 7 Recap: Jubilo Iwata
Ran into the Vortis buzzsaw and paid the price.
4. Team Previews & Injury Report
FC Ryukyu: The pain and frustration of not winning is written all over the faces of the team. Each missed shot, missed opportunity, and conceded goal feels like a millstone around the neck of a drowning team. It is certainly not from a lack of trying as all the players are giving maximum effort in search of that elusive first win. So why are they failing?
I would venture to guess that it is a mix of the current system and a bit of bad luck. In the two years under Higuchi, I have never seen him make any changes to the 4-2-3-1 formation. I am sympathetic to the fact that a change to the system is no easy undertaking, or a solution to your current problems. But I do not feel we are leveraging our greatest strength at FC Ryukyu; the quality and depth of our mid field players.
I wrote a piece on Sunday about switching over to a 3-4-3 so please check that out if you wish to read more details pertaining to the argument for a change in the current system. In the meantime, let’s see if FC Ryukyu can defeat a team that is looking quite average for just having come down from the J1.
FC Ryukyu Injuries & Suspensions: MF Shinji Ono is likely out for a while and we are waiting for the injury diagnosis for his right knee. Still no word on Shuto Kawai’s return.
Jubilo Iwata: I guess you could say that Jubilo lost to the teams you’d expect them to loose too; drew with a team that you’d expect them draw; and beat the teams you’d expect them to defeat. They have 2 wins, 1 draw, and 2 losses over their last five games with an even 5/5 goals scored, goals conceded record. In other words, average.
But that is still far better than what FC Ryukyu have achieved up to this point. The eye test sees a team that has the same type of struggles FC Ryukyu are experiencing when it comes to scoring and conceding and nothing in the past 5 Jubilo matches really jumps off the screen. They failed to score against Okayama when Fagiano went down to 10 men; they made a costly mistake against Fukuoka (ala Daisei Suzuki vs Renofa); they had a PK saved against Giravanz; and they had no answer for Vortis this past weekend.
If anything, FC Ryukyu need to be concerned with Lukian who is Jubilo’s leading goal scorer bagging 3 goals in his past 4 games. Since his brace against Renofa, Lukian looks to be getting into a nice rhythm and he definitely seems like the type of player that out central defenders will struggle to contain on Wednesday.
Jubilo Iwata Injuries & Suspensions: None to the incumbent starters though they reported an injury to one of their defenders, Kentaro Oi, this week. He hasn’t featured since the opening day in February so nothing really to report.
5. Keys to Victory for FC Ryukyu
The Scale: 5- An almost certainty it will occur 4-Fairly-Certain it will happen 3-Somewhat Certain it could happen 2-Very Unlikely it happens 1- Requires a Miracle to happen
1. Play relaxed: Likelihood 2. If Ryukyu press too hard without success, the pressure will mount and then mistakes will be made. I doubt we are going to stop Jubilo from scoring tomorrow so it is best to not place any additional pressure on the already slumped shoulders of this team. Few are expecting us to win, therefore, play with a little bit of reckless abandonment and enjoy yourselves.
6. Match Day 8 Prediction
This one feels like it could end in a 1-1 draw but i’ll err on the side of caution and say that Jubilo win 2-1.
7. Around J2 on Match Day 8
All the games kickoff at 1900 this week so some of you will have some tough choices as to which one(s) you are going to watch. The tasty ones seem to be (8) Kitakyushu vs (3) Tokushima; (11) Zelvia vs (13) Matsumoto and (8) Kanazawa vs (2) Omiya.
8. Conclusion
So many of the past entries displayed a negative tone with FC Ryukyu in the midst of a win less drought since the restart. If anything, the players need our support, a boost of confidence and to get the monkey off their back with a win. For a team like us, in places like this, we need all the hope we can get. Personally, “I still believe” in the potential of this team and hope that a change in their fortunes comes quickly.
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