Would those following the Japanese team closely have an explanation why the Japan NT at the ConFed Cup last year and the one at the WC now performed so very differently?
Some points that might be relevant:
1. Physical condition
The players generally looked like they were not in good shape in the Ivory Coast game. They were generally looking sharper in the test matches. Camping at cool Itu in Brazil might have worn off the effort to acclimatize.
2. Frail Mentality
In the IC game Japan seemed generally uncourageous. ConFed, noone expects Japan to show any performace against Brazil or Italy, so we could go in with a complete challenger mentality, just give it all you've got, we've got nothing to lose.
On the other hand towards the WC we've been saying we have to win this, and the players were pressuring themselves more than they realize. And once they had the lead, they succumbed to the thought that perhaps they could just play defensively to maintain the lead; which is not what team is good at. (Like not having defense specialist Hosogai.) It just weakened the courage to attack.
3. Aftican teams
Brazil and Italy are certainly strong, but maybe Japan can cope to a certain extent. It might be the sheer physical abilities of an African team like IC that Japan actually struggles more against.
Pressure is faster, you think you've got past a defender but their legs reach you, a pass that you thought would complete gets cut off, etc. And we feel a great threat from the likes of Drogba, Yaya, Gervinho. On the other hand when I saw Colombia play against IC, the Colombian CB was nearly as big as Drogba and seemed generally to have stopped him.
4. Rainy condition
This is by no way an excuse, because obviously the conditions are equal to both teams, but the physical disadvantage seems to expand in rainy conditions. If your ball control gets a bit inaccurate it hurts us because we'll lose if we have to play catch up. Slippy conditions mean it might be hard to make agility an advantage. And with the heavy field, passing speed gets slower with resistance.
Again, these shouldn't be excuses, they ought to be able to play well regardless (look at Mexico) but it's reality.
5. Decline of key players
The Japan team was built upon some fixed key players; Honda, Kagawa, Endo, Hasebe, etc. Honda's general condition is declining. He might have some illness. Endo is no getting younger, and Hasebe was away on injury for a long time. Zacc had never seriously tried backups for these players when he still had time to test, except for Yamaguchi in CM last fall. So basically we don't have tested alternatives and in this WC were seeing some players used in positions we've rarely seen.
6. Serious contenders
In Confed I don't think opponents thought much about countering what's supposed to be Japan's strength or exploiting its weaknesses.
On the other hand I think IC's coach's tactics/formation were very clever to play against Japan (which I mentioned briefly in the African teams thread). I think they were definitely trying to use the defensive gap in Japan's left side (which BTW led to Zacc not starting Kagawa against Greece).
And when the opposing team do this, we sadly didn't really have any efffective plan B after four years of preparation. I mean high crosses and "power-play" against Greece? WTH...
So putting all this together, perhaps we need to conclude that the evaluation that Japan did fairly well in Confed and the test matches was a bit soft. We're finding that the toughness of the WC is at another level...
