The loss meant the Samurai Blue\u2019s bid for a record-extending fifth title continues, having last emerged champions in 2011.
\n\u201cFirstly, I would like to congratulate the Iranian players and staff for the victory,\u201d said Moriyasu. \u201cUnfortunately we have to leave the tournament now at the quarter-final stage. I feel sorry for our supporters and everyone involved in Japanese football. <\/p>\n
\u201cI feel responsible for the result as my staff and players gave their maximum towards this game and this tournament.\u201d<\/p>\n
It had all been going well for Japan, having taken the lead in the first half through a wonderful solo effort from Hidemasa Morita in the 28th minute but they could not sustain their dominance in the second period.<\/p>\n
The Iranians went on the attack in the second half, peppering the Japanese goal with 17 shots, and their persistence paid off as Mohammad Mohebbi leveled the tie with a cool Alireza Jahanbakhsh sending the Central Asia side into the semis with his stoppage time penalty.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs you saw we have to improve on many aspects. We played five matches and we conceded in every game. If we can\u2019t keep a clean sheet, we can\u2019t win. <\/p>\n
\u201cNot just from set-pieces but from open play, we suffered a lot. They put pressure on us and we couldn\u2019t resist it. We conceded because of their attacking qualities.. <\/p>\n
\u201cBut it\u2019s not just the defensive line. We should have scored our second goal which would have changed things. We couldn\u2019t win the second balls in the middle of the pitch,\u201d said Moriyasu, who took Japan to the final in the UAE 2019 edition. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The loss meant the Samurai Blue\u2019s bid for a record-extending fifth title continues, having last emerged champions in 2011. \u201cFirstly, I would like to congratulate the Iranian players and staff for the victory,\u201d said Moriyasu. \u201cUnfortunately we have to leave the tournament now at the quarter-final stage. I feel sorry for our supporters and everyone […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":937501,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20967],"tags":[3733,28042],"class_list":["post-937496","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-afc-news","tag-afc","tag-afc-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/937496","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=937496"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/937496\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/937501"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=937496"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=937496"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=937496"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}