“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Kashiwa Reysol, and it is not being withdrawn.
3 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Koki Kumasaka falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Kashiwa Reysol this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 1‑0, Genki Endo could afford to be generous.
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
In brief
The dugoutYuto Yamada knocks on the manager's door
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Kashiwa Reysol, and it is not being withdrawn.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Koki Kumasaka was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Hayato Tanaka and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Four weeks in which nobody in the division did his job better. The award goes on a shelf and the player goes back into the side, which is the order Kashiwa Reysol prefer.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Kashiwa Reysol, another week without a signature from Hayato Tanaka.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Kashiwa Reysol know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Koya Yuruki’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Kashiwa Reysol needing him to play as if none of it matters.
The fee was agreed and the flight was looked at — and then the phone stopped ringing. Gamba Osaka moved on, Sachiro Toshima reports back to Kashiwa Reysol, and everybody pretends Monday is just Monday.
Wataru Harada was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Hayato Tanaka was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
6 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 15 arrived, 7 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
The fee was agreed and the flight was looked at — and then the phone stopped ringing. Albirex Niigata moved on, Shun Nakajima reports back to Kashiwa Reysol, and everybody pretends Monday is just Monday.
Nobuteru Nakagawa and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Marked 8.41 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
The offer from Jubilo Iwata for Shumpei Naruse was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
The offer went to Kawasaki Frontale this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
Kashiwa Reysol asked and IFK Norrkoping said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Yusuke Segawa and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Jubilo Iwata paid $750.0K and Kashiwa Reysol took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Tatsuki Seko was the name on every phone-in, and the club has gone and signed him for $4.4M. For one week the board can do no wrong, which is a week most boards never get.
Ventforet Kofu will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Kashiwa Reysol were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Kashiwa Reysol and Stoke City have settled on $4.4M. The rest belongs to the player and his agent, and a supporter who has watched one of these before knows not to buy the shirt yet.
$1.5M on the table at Yokohama F. Marinos. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
The offer from Vissel Kobe for Tomoya Inukai was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Kashiwa Reysol hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $1.6M — a club that wants Taiki Watanabe enough to be asked twice.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Kashiwa Reysol this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
15 seasons and 278 appearances, all of them here. Careers like this are not designed; they happen to a certain kind of man at a certain kind of club, and this town has one.
Kashiwa Reysol have gone to Stoke City with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Yusuke Segawa was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Add another name to the list: Ventforet Kofu have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Yusei Yamanouchi. The answer from Kashiwa Reysol has not changed — yet.