2025J League YBC Lewan Cup Prime Round Quarterfinals Game 2 Kawasaki Frontale Comment after the game Trial

We wanted to press high at the beginning, but we lost control of the game after two or three minutes. It was not a good start. Then I made a trivial mistake in the build-up in zone 1 and gave away a penalty kick. After that, we tried to control the game by keeping possession in Zone 2, but it didn't go very well in the first half. I think we didn't have enough movement to get behind.

We made two substitutions at halftime. (Mateusz) Savio was a little bit sick, so I did that. I think (Shoya) Nakajima and Shibato (Umi) did a good job in the second half. I think the second half was much better than the first half. I think we were able to keep the ball while pushing in the zone 3 and were more dangerous to our opponents than in the first half.

Isaac (Kiese Thelin) scored his first goal for the Reds, which was one of the best news of the day. However, our midfielders Kai Shibato and Kaito Yasui started to have some physical problems. And Ito (Tatsuya) gave us a great shot. I think we had to get closer there, but we left some distance between us. But the players didn't give up and fought until the end of the second half, where Shoya scored a great goal.

In the extra period, with both teams depleted, we needed to maintain structure and keep the ball in play. However, we made another terrible mistake in zone 1, which led to a penalty kick and goal by Kawasaki.

With Shoya worn out, we took the long ball flow to take advantage of Danilo (Boza) and Isaac's length. I think there were actually some situations that led to chances, such as Taka's (Takahiro Sekine) shot at the end. We created some chances, but I wish we could have pushed the ball a little more calmly.

[Q&A
(You tied the game by putting Isaac Kiese-Terin and Hiiro Komori in the top two, but what did you think after that?)
(Q&A) "I was going to play the top two for as long as possible, but (Komori) Tobiyo, who had shown us a great fight from the first half, was beginning to show signs of fatigue. He was also very strong on the edge of the ball.

(When you had to replace a Kai Shibato player in the extra period, why did you choose Takahiro Sekine as a volante instead of Jumpei Hayakawa?)
The choice of Taka instead of (Hayakawa) Shunpei was based on Taka's experience. It was a difficult Trial, so I thought there might be some difficulty for Shunpei. And at the critical time, I decided that Taka had a better feel for the game than Shunpei. That was my thinking on the substitution."

(What was your plan for the two Trial games against Kawasaki, and what went well and what didn't?)
The first game was a home game, right after the league Albirex Niigata game, so I started with fresh players. We started with fresh players because it was a home game and right after the league game . And we started our main attacking players on the bench. In the second half, I think we created two or three chances to score, so I think the game plan worked out well. Unfortunately, a goal in added time changed things. So today Trial started from a more difficult situation.

Today, we decided to use (Yusuke) Matsuo and (Takuro) Kaneko, who have been starting in the league, since they are fresher. For medical reasons, Samuel (Gustafsson) was unable to participate in today's Trial, but that was one problem.

Kai Shibato was not in the starting lineup, as we tried to use him in the important time of the second half, with the assumption that he would be around 45 minutes today, 60 minutes at the most. In the first half, we had a lot of fresh players, so I thought we would have to press harder in the first half. I am not satisfied with today's first half.

And in the second half, again, we got better and were able to score two goals, but a simple mistake cost us an extra goal."

[Urawa Reds Official Media (URD:OM)]