Saturday 14 February 2009

Davi Bags Hat-trick in Grampus Pre-season Warm-up

New signings Davi and Hayuma Tanaka made their presence felt in the team's final day of spring camp. Davi scored three goals in the first half, one from an assist by Hayuma, as the team coasted to a 6-1 victory over J2 outfit Roasso Kumamoto in a practice game in Kagoshima.

First Half Lineup:
GK: Nishimura
DF: Tanaka, Bajalica, Masukawa, Hiraki
MF: Ogawa, Nakamura, Yoshimura, Magnum
FW: Sugimoto, Davi
Scorers: Davi 25, 28, 40

Second Half Lineup:
GK: Nishimura (Hirono 74)
DF: Tanaka, Bajalica, Masukawa, Hiraki
MF: Ogawa (Hashimoto 58), Hanai, Yoshimura, Magnum (Tsuda 58)
FW: Sugimoto (a trainee 68), Maki
Scorers: Hanai, Tsuda, Hashimoto

Monday 9 February 2009

Grampus Off to Winning Start...

OK, so Sunday's game was only a practice match, but Nagoya got off to a 3-0 win against the National Institute of Fitness and Sports in Kanoya.

This saw Hayuma Tanaka and Davi make their first appearances in a Grampus shirt, although both only played for the opening 45 minutes.

First Half Lineup:
GK: Nishimura
DF: Tanaka, Bajalica, Yoshida, Abe
MF: Tsuda, Yamaguchi, Yoshimura, Magnum
FW: Sugimoto, Davi
Scorers: Sugimoto, Yoshida

Second Half Lineup:
GK: Hirono
DF: Takeuchi, Masukawa, Yoshida, Sato
MF: Ogawa, Hanai, Yata (U-18), Niigawa
FW: Maki, a trainee
Scorer: The trainee :-(
Rookies Matsuo and Hashimoto also saw playing time in the second half when they replaced Yoshida and Yata.

This gives us a clue as to how the team will use some of the players. In particular, it is good to see that Sato may have developed enough to be considered as a sub for Abe.

Wednesday 4 February 2009

Grampus to Host Gifu at Toyota Stadium, 22 Feb

Nagoya are to host FC Gifu at Toyota Stadium on February 22nd. This will be one the few pre-season matches that will be open to the public. (Although, it will not be free.)
Official Grampus Press release (Japanese)

This is likely to be our best chance to judge how the team will do this year, before the season starts. Since Grampus will be playing two ACL games in March, in addition to two Nabisco Cup games and a handful of league games, I do not expect the team to have an arduous pre-season, so we are unlikely to see many other warm-up games.