The J-League did have a charity match between the Japanese National team and J-League All-Stars, which was a great success and even had the first superstar of the J-League, Kazu Miura score a goal at 44. I watched King Kazu as a student in 1993 and 1994 when he was at the absolute top of his game. He is no longer at that level and has not been there for many years. However, he always had a flair for the dramatic when it was needed and in that game he delivered. It may be his last goal in a highly competitive match, but his importance to soccer fans in Japan will never be forgotten with this goal.

Getting back to this weekend, every team in the J-League wore memorial bands on their sleeves and Vegalta Sendai played an away match against Kawasaki Frontale. Vegalta were nearly relegated last season, and were not expected to do much before the season. Throw in a catastrophic natural disaster and you would think that Vegalta would be relegated this year. However as we know in life, the future is never known and the heart of a person can only be seen when the tide is against you, as it has been for the people of Sendai and its surrounding areas on March 11th.

There was a video display before the match showing how the league had just started and the excitement of the day, and how soon the devastation took it away. The quick response in the charity work of the team (Kawasaki Frontale) and even J-League (which acted very quickly to be at the lead of sports charity work when compared to Pro Baseball in Japan). Former Frontale Goalkeeper Eiji Kawasahima even said, “The players wanted to bring the fans a little joy, and today together with the fans we’ll go forward one step at a time.” Even Kazunari Okayama, who had played for both teams asked the Kawasaki fans to sign Vegalta’s song to help everyone become one. At the end, the video goes on to talk about how the cherry blossoms are starting to fall, but they will continue to grow in the stadium through fine play, smiling faces and the fans love for their club. “Together we want to express brotherhood with Sendai on April 23rd. Kawasaki Frontale will fight with all of our heart for 3 points.” The pictographs finish with J (J-League) re-opening and the fourth kanji in pink for the cherry blossoms.

Even in this match Kawasaki got out to a 1-0 lead in the first half. But Vegalta came back with two goals in the final 20 minutes of the second half to claim the 2-1 and a moment of happiness in what has been a very trying month and half for the whole Northeast region of the country. Here are the highlights.

When the coach is crying in the post-game interview, you know that it meant a lot to the people of the region.

With this post, this will be my final post as the head writer for the J-League Offside blog. I want to let the readers know that I had not posted about the J-League for a while on this site because I had been busy due to getting a great job after looking for work for 1.5 years. This has caused me to not be as available to write articles about a league that is not the most popular in the world. It was a way for me to find a way to keep my sanity during that time. I hope that you learned something this league, which has grown in stature over the last 20 years and has helped the Japanese national team improve in play. I want to say that Aidan over at the Japan World Cup Blog, the sister site of the Offside, does a great job of covering the national team, the J-League and Japanese players in Europe. I am happy to have been able to take a small level blog (within the Offside site) and get it onto front page in the Daily Dose a few times and even on the front page alone. I will continue to watch the J-League and follow it. I studied in Japan for a year right at the beginning of the J-League so I have seen the league grow and send its players go overseas.

Otsukare sama deshita. (Cheers for good work)

There is a log-jam in 2nd at 36 points with, Cerezo Osaka, Kashima Antlers and Shimizu S-Pulse separated by goal differential. Kawasaki Frontale are a point behind in fifth and Albirex Niigata another point back in sixth. The top three teams make the Asian Champions League so this fight will be interesting to see if they can keep pace with Grampus. If the Whale slip up, it is an all-out battle for the title, similar to the 2005 season which had five teams battling on the final weekend of the season for the title.

At the bottom of the table, Sendai picked up 3 vital points (at 18 points now) to get within 2 points of getting out of the drop zone. FC Tokyo and Vissel Kobe are at 20 points and Omiya Ardija are at 21. Kyoto Sanga and Shonan Bellmare are getting farther away from the teams at 20 points and if they do not win matches in the next two weeks, they are all but guaranteed to go down.

Kashima Antlers drew with FC Tokyo 1-1, and what is worse is that they gave up a goal with 4 minutes left. This was a winnable game and they gave back 2 points. They are now 3 points behind Grampus.

Hottest teams in Last 5 Games:
Grampus (13 pts)
Gamba Osaka (12 pts)
Kawasaki Frontale (11 pts)

Coldest teams in Last 5 Games:
Kyoto Sanga (0 pts)
Vegalta Sendai (1 pt)
Shonan Bellmare (1 pt)
And is there a reason these three teams are in the relegation zone.

S-Pulse are the highest scoring team in the league, while the Antlers are tied for the stingiest. Grampus are the best road team (21 pts in 9 games), while S-Pulse are the best at home (22 pts in 9 games).

At the bottom of the table Kyoto Sanga FC are 7 pts (currently at 10 pts in 17 games) from getting out of the drop zone and with a -19 goal differential, I think that they are down. Shonan Bellmare are 5 pts away and with a -17 goal differential, I don’t see them making it either. Vegalta Sendai is only 3 pts away from getting out in 16th. They will be fighting with Jubilo Iwata, Omiya Ardija, Vissel Kobe and FC Tokyo for the final spot. I think that Omiya will go down, they have been close to dropping the last couple of years, but they won’t stay this year.

Currently the Japanese season starts in March and ends in December and then completely finishes on January 1st of the following year with the Emperor’s Cup (FA Cup) in Tokyo. This is how the J-League’s schedule has been for 15 years.

Here are the biggest problems that the league has with this schedule.

If the J-League switches to a European schedule, August to May here is how the schedule would change.

Do not discount the snow, with only Consadole Sapporo and Oita Trinita playing in domed stadiums, you are forcing teams to play in cold weather. Niigata, Sendai, Kofu get lots of snow and if matches are postponed that will backlog the schedule. Right now the backlog is mainly due to typhoons in the fall.

I prefer the current schedule but by forcing the league to adopt a European schedule will be a big shift in the way the league is organized.

I was surprised to find that the All-Star Game had actually been played since the beginning of the J-League through last year without the World Cup year breaks. From 1993-2007 the All-Star Game featured East vs. West teams that were predominantly due to fan voting. Kodak Film was the original sponsor of the event and they stayed on through the 1998 game. 1999-2001 featured Tarami, a fruit dessert manufacturer, as the sponsor. Japan Energy’s gasoline brand JOMO would sponsor the game from 2002-2007.

With the 2008 edition, it was a cooperative event with South Korea’s K-League to have a game between the K-League All-Stars and the J-League All-Stars. This game was then renamed the JOMO Cup. In 2009 the game was played in Inchon, marking the first time it had been played outside Japan. The K-League All-Stars won the 2008 and 2009 games.

With Japan Energy merging with Nippon Oil to come under the Nippon Mining Holdings and then completely changing the holding company name to JX Holdings in 2009, the J-League had been told that they would have to find sponsorship for the game. Given the world economy, many Japanese businesses probably said, it is not worth the cost given it being an Olympic year (winter) and the World Cup. Plus with the game featuring both Japanese and Korean teams, it would be hard to find a company that had a presence in both countries other than Lotte.

For one of the most successful leagues in Asia it is a wake up call to focus on their business.

Reysol have been dominant with 13 wins in 19 matches, and more amazingly no loses. They are 15 points ahead (45 points) of 4th right now and are almost certain to go up. With the stingiest defense, and 2nd most goals scored, you’ll win many games.

Ventforet Kofu are second with 40 points and are 10 points over the 4th place Avispa Fukuoka. Pretty good chance of advancing for Kofu.

JEF United Chiba are third with 35 points and are 5 points ahead of Avispa who have a game in hand. Other teams are very close to Avispa, but the goal differential of Avispa and JEF are more than 6 better at this point of the season. Avispa and JEF United will be fighting for the final spot in my opinion.

The Kashima Antlers returned from the break with a 1-0 win against Shonan Bellmare mid week and then a 2-1 win Saturday over Kawasaki Frontale. Frontale drew 0-0 with Omiya Ardija on Wednesday. Frontale are going to have a hard time getting back into the title race, even though they are 6 points back. With Jong Tae-se leaving for Europe, they are going to have to get scoring from others and after 13 games they have a goal difference of +1, that is a problem.

Nagoya Grampus have kept pace with a 1-0 win over Omiya Ardija on Saturday, while Shimizu S-Pulse drew with their Shizuoka prefectural rivals Jubilo Iwata. Kashima, Shimizu and Nagoya are separated by 2 points.

Gamba Osaka scored the second goal of injury time to defeat Urawa Reds 3-2. The Red had scored 3 minutes into injury time to tie, but Yasuhito Endo scores the winner (1 minute in).

The league of last minute drama continues…

A good reminder to the bandwagon fan, go out and watch these guys before they go overseas.