Kawasaki Frontale v Omiya Ardija

Pre-season friendly: Tue, 17th February 2009

	0 - 4
		ICHIKAWA 21', 33' FUJIMOTO 44' LAVRIC 84'

Venue: Undo Koen, Miyazaki

Kengo and Shuhei Terada were welcomed back to the Frontale fold with a 4-0 spanking at the hands of Omiya Ardija on Tuesday afternoon.

Back in sunny Miyazaki, a near full-strength side conceded their first match of the 2009 pre-season - and with some style. Still, I'm a firm believer that if you're going to get embarrassed by J1 opponents, better to do it when it doesn't count.

The line-up looks a little strange on paper, with Mori and Yamagishi playing either side of Terada and Ito in a back four. Yusuke Tasaka up front with Chong Tese and Kurotsu is also something of a novelty. But the midfield of Kengo, Taniguchi and Vitor Junior is certainly what you'd expect to see starting against Kashiwa next month.

I suppose you could also point to Aizawa in goal instead of Kawashima as a weakness, but I'd hazard that it was the experimental defense that brought about the one-sided result.

A B-Team was also in action with two 45-minute games against J2's FC Gifu and Hoyo Atletico Elan of the Oita Prefectural League. The Gifu game was lost 1-0, but they managed to overcome the Oita amateurs 2-0 with Noborizato and Kimura getting their names on the scoresheet again. Yokoyama continues to feature in midfield...watch this space!

P.S. If you're in need of a good chuckle, check out the latest offering from the hilarious Agent Orange on 'Go! Go! Omiya Ardija'. Amidst all the vitriol there's even some words of praise for the Frontale faithful (well, the Japanese ones at least!).