In the second game of the day we saw Japan take down Germany 2-1 after being down 1-0 for most of the game. It was in the final minutes of the matchup that Japan was able to make the comeback. A lot of people wanted to compare this win with what we saw from Saudi Arabia yesterday. However, if you’re trying to make that comparison you’ve clearly not been paying attention to the evolution of Japanese football in the last few years.
At the same time there’s an argument to be made that Germany is living off of their reputation, and we clearly don’t want to accept the fact that this generation of German players is just not that good! When you’re crying over the fact that Timo Werner who failed spectacularly at Chelsea wasn’t able to make the roster due to an injury, and you don’t have a ton of replacement options we can’t really consider you a contender. And yet it seems that we can bring ourselves to bet against the Germans.
What Japan Did Well
One of the things that this version of Japan did very well was not get too down after conceding that goal. Of course, we could get lost in talking about the dynamic, and vertical team that Japan is. At this point they feature potentially more quality players than they ever have. As was mentioned before, people who hadn’t seen this were not necessarily paying attention. This is a young team that has been competing in the age limit categories, and has been doing so well, for generations. Now they’ve been able to field more players in medium tier teams. This has given them a sense of security that they have lacked in other generations. They’re not a team that’s going to get star struck like other generations of the Japanese national team seemed to.
Where Japan Is Going To Struggle
Shūichi Gonda was named the man of the match, and perhaps rightfully so because he made a couple of key saves. However, he looked really shaky at times. That penalty kick play is all on him. That’s usually a sign of a goalkeeper that’s not a stable presence back there. Japan shouldn’t take the saves and think they’ll be ok. He can be more of a liability than an asset moving forward.
They may not struggle, but the game against Spain is certainly going to be one of the most interesting matchups of the tournament. Both teams are extremely quick with Japan being a lot more vertical than Spain. They may be forced to play more off the ball in that game which could be a good thing, so they can show off how vertical they can be. Defensively though they’ll be up against an entirely different challenge than what they saw with Germany who looked rather sluggish even when they were able to create goal scoring chances.
Where Does Germany Go From Here?
Judging what we saw today from Costa Rica it seems likely that they’ll lose to Japan as well. That’s a major issue for Germany who has to turn around and face Spain. Simply put, they need to win that game. The positive thing for the Germans is that playing Spain is something that they’re going to be more used to. They’ll rely on physicality and experience to counter the highly active Spanish game. We can’t rule out the possibility that Germany will beat Spain, and throw the entire group into a tailspin!
If that happens there’s a chance that we’ll see 3 teams at 6 points a piece in one group. That battle would be decided by the number of goals, and Spain’s got a big lead in that department. The more logical outcome though is that they’ll tie or lose to Spain which means they could be out by the end of the second matchday!
