24 Jul 2008(Thu)

July 23, 2008: We are always being told that football is the Beautiful Game -- but don't forget it's a Cruel Game, too.

Just ask any Kyoto Sanga fan who was at Nishikyogoku Stadium on Monday night for their home game with FC Tokyo.

What a cruel finish that was for the home team, who had played so well for 90 minutes and for the first two of three minutes injury time.

Then it all went so horribly wrong, as they conceded an equaliser and had to settle for a 1-1 draw.

As Kyoto manager Hisashi Kato said after the game, the atmosphere in the dressing room was more like a defeat.

"My players are all disappointed because we needed only one minute of patience," Kato sighed.

Lots can happen in one minute, and lots did at Nishikyogoku.

First, Kyoto right back Tatsuya Masushima was blown for a foul on Sota Hirayama. This was a surprise in itself, as Hirayama had been given nothing all night by referee Akio Okutani. On one occasion, in fact, I am sure the ref penalised Hirayama for breathing. It couldn't have been anything else.

So Tokyo had a free kick on the left, and the exhausted Kyoto players trotted back one last time for one last bit of defending.

As two of Tokyo's substitutes, Emerson (right foot) and Yohei Otake (left) stood over the ball, you knew the game was far from over. This situation had "late equaliser" written all over it. Emerson it was who curled the ball into the box, but like a lot of Tokyo set-pieces that night it looked over-hit.

Surely the Kyoto keeper, Yuichi Mizutani, would gobble this one up at the far post. I was so confident the game was over I had closed my notebook and was already thinking of the next big event in Kyoto that night -- okonomiyaki.

But Mizutani lost his bearings, missed the ball, and Tokyo's third sub, Shingo Akamine, said "maido okini" and headed it home.

Just as well, too, for the travelling fans behind that same goal had not been too impressed with their team. Akamine's equaliser and a 1-1 draw had, I am sure, saved them from a verbal battering by their own supporters.

As for the Kyoto fans, they were numbed into silence, but recovered to applaud their team off at the end. They deserved it, too, despite the late blunder.

Kato added: "The goalkeeper made a mistake, but every time he makes many saves for the team. I said to him 'it's football.'"

Football -- the beautiful game, the cruel game.

ends