This week’s Japanese hero is Maya Yoshida, who scored a stunning goal for VVV Venlo in their 3-3 draw with PSV. With his late winner against North Korea a couple of weeks ago, Yoshida is currently Japan’s hottest goalscorer. His Japanese teammate Robert Cullen played the full 90 minutes in the match as well.
Besides Yoshida, the Japanese contingency in Europe had another underwhelming week of fixtures. Shinji Kagawa played the entire 90 minutes of Dortmund’s 2-1 loss at Hertha Berlin, as the reigning German champions continued their poor start to the domestic season. In midweek, things were not as bad, as Dortmund earned a 1-1 draw at home to Arsenal. Kagawa played the first 85 minutes before being replaced by Mohamed Zidan. Ivan Perisic got Dortmund a valuable home point with an outrageous volley in the 88th minute.
Yuto Nagatomo made his first appearance of the season, playing 62 minutes of Inter’s 4-3 loss at Palermo before being subbed off. He also played the full 90 minutes of Inter’s 1-0 Champions League loss to Trabzonspor on Wednesday. Yes, a truly rotten week for Inter.
A potential clash of Japanese players was avoided when Atsuto Uchida was an unused substitute during Schalke’s 2-1 loss at Wolfsburg, for whom national team captain Makoto Hasebe played the entire 90 minutes. Uchida did play in Schalke’s 0-0 Europa League tie at Steaua Bucuresti on Thursday.
Shinji Okazaki scored the first goal of Stuttgart’s 3-0 win over Hannover.
Youngsters Takashi Usami and Yoshiaki Takagi were both unused subsitutes for Bayern and Utrecht’s respective wins over the weekend. Usami was also on the bench for Bayern’s 2-0 CL win at Valencia on Wednesday. Keisuke Honda continues to be hurt. However, in a nice bit of news, Ryo Miyaichi has recovered from his injury and played in a reserve match, apparently providing a pretty backheel assist.
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