Takehiro Tomiyasu belied his 20 years as he towered above the Saudi Arabia defence to nod home the only goal of the game as Japan edged into the Asian Cup quarter-finals.
The centre-back, who plays with Sint-Truiden in Belgium’s top-flight, was winning only his sixth cap in the pressure cooker environment of Asia’s premier competition, but seemed at ease in the heart of an at times under siege Samurai Blue backline, alongside Southampton stalwart Maya Yoshida.
Here we take a look at a supremely mature performance from the rising young defender.
30-second report
After a flying start from the Green Falcons, the vociferous Saudi support was stunned into silence in the 20th minute when Tomiyasu rose unopposed to nod Gaku Shibasaki’s corner back across goal and into the bottom left corner of the net.
Saudi stopper Mohammed Al Owais watched helplessly as a bright start by the Gulf giants was undone. After that, Saudi’s surging start subsided and they resorted to hitting it long, which only played into Japan’s hands.
Most of the chances fell to men in white shirts but they could not capitalise on their sights of goal as the four-time Asian Cup champions defended heroically, setting up a last eight clash with Vietnam.
Excluding penalty shootout advancements, #Japan have won each of their first four games at an #AsianCup tournament for the first time in their history 🎌👏 pic.twitter.com/f6hbI4jtfc
— #AsianCup2019 (@afcasiancup) 21 January 2019
Got right – Fearlessness
Tomiyasu only left his teens behind two months ago, but against one of the favourites for the trophy in the UAE, in the high-pressure environment of a knockout game, he was unflappable.
He had Samurai Blue stalwart Yoshida – who is closing in on a century of caps – beside him, and the pair were commanding as they withstood a barrage of Saudi crosses and long balls. If you aren’t a regular watcher of international or Asian football, you might have had trouble pointing out which of the centre-backs was the green rookie and who was the seasoned veteran as Tomiyasu looked like he had been playing at this level for years.
In a back four containing Yoshida, 28-year-old Hiroki Sakai and Yuto Nagatomo, Japan’s sixth-most capped player of all time, Tomiyasu truly looked like he belonged.
Got wrong – Wasteful in possession
Japan saw precious little of the ball during the 90 minutes – just a paltry 27 per cent to be precise. When they did have possession it was more often than not hacked clear in search of their rapid forwards, who fed largely off scraps.
They completed just 39 passes in the second half of this game; 275 fewer than Saudi’s 314. Tomiyasu recorded the second most passes in a blue shirt (25, only goalkeeper Shuichi Gonda made more). But the young centre-back’s woeful pass accuracy of 52 per cent was the fourth worst of his team.
Yes, Japan were happy to keep Saudi at arm’s length and they never seriously looked like conceding, but he will need to improve his distribution if he to thrive at the top level.
Takehiro Tomiyasu scored the all-important goal in Sharjah.
Verdict 8/10
You’d forgive Tomiyasu for being a little overawed on this big stage, but he was bold and brave. At one stage of the second half he pilloried a team-mate for not tracking a Saudi player from a free-kick which led to a chance.
As Saudi resorted to pumping long balls up to Salem Al Dawsari or for Fahad Al Muwallad to chase, it was bread and butter for Tomiyasu and his experienced captain Yoshida.
This was a performance of maturity beyond his years. And at just 20 he could have a long future at the elite level ahead of him.
