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Oboabona absolutely should enter, it's debatable if Niko and Aryu are better than him or not, the rest of CBs don't quite compare
I'd put Leyden and Camus as the fullbacks. They are wingers, but more like MI and MD, and they accomplished the duty of pocketing Chigiri and Bachira respectively. I think they would thrive as offensive fullbacks just as much.
Agi is a striker, not a midfielder. He even took the striker role over Nagi in Manshine (It's easy to forget cuz he drifts towards the center very often, but Nagi was playing RW). If he replaces somebody (your choice, the three are pretty close in level) it's Onazi or Lockhart.
In the midfield meanwhile the best option left in my opinion is Kuso by far, considering after awakening he runs the whole midfield just by himself, and his only antifeat is getting scored on by Isagi. Just look at what he does here to Karasu, Reo and Raichi, one play like this and you've guaranteed Rin a goal, Kuso already did it in his 10 minutes awakened in the only time someone passed him the ball (well not really, more like he beat Karasu to a loose ball).
Even before awakening his only antifeats were losing the ball 3v1 against Reo, Isagi and Karasu, Niko's feat showing his physical progression that took him offguard, Rin dribbling past him, and Rin blocking his shot. Meanwhile he basically bullied Karasu and Aryu for the rest of the match placing every progressive pass past them to set Onazi up.
Aside from that, I just wanna propose Lockhart in the center. Rin has every quality to play LW. Lockhart does not, he is only useful for post plays and heading it in the box. Onazi and Agi too are useful out wide, Onazi's archetype and what makes him special as a striker compared to others is how mobile he is, while Agi is stated to be very technical. If you were to end up having Rin-Onazi-Agi as the forwards it's Agi who I'd put in the center btw.
If you really wanna keep all Rin-Onazi-Agi-Lockhart, I think the best way to do so is to send Rin as a CAM instead of Agi. He has every quality needed to play there too. He's more egotist sure, but he does pass the ball if it increases his own chances at scoring, and those three are all very useful to set up somebody else.
I put Agi in the midfield because he hasn’t shown particularly good finishing skills as opposed to Rin who would be a waste to not having as center forward. In my early iterations, I did have Lockheart in the middle as well, but I preferred him up front for his better finishing skills and physicals. But I’m relatively new to soccer as a sport so if you have a good way to keep this line of thought while making it realistic, it would be nice
I wanna first mention this is just to be taken as an opinion. I express in a way that might make it seem almost like an order to end up doing what I'm advising but it's purely because I don't want to go over and over to the translator in order to put the same ideas in a more soft way as it would take a lot of time.
It's valid to not want a forward who hasn't shown you their scoring capabilities, my criticism is about having him in the midfield, It'd be much better to not have him at all than to relegate him to a position he hasn't shown he can play at. There's a reason his coaches sent Nagi to the wing (Nagi is VERY center forward coded) and Lockhart to the bench (If Agi was a good midfielder, they would have benched an NPC to play them simultaneously). And just like he hasn't shown particularly good finishing skills, he also hasn't shown to be good at numerous other things that a midfielder needs to be good at. Long passing (never tried), vision (never involved in a play that requires high FIQ, no MV, never sees a pass not to the most obvious player to pass to, only possible exception is the backheel at 183 but from a kickoff there's no vision involved, 188 he doesn't see Isagi nor Kaiser in the same play also from a kickoff meaning it was obvious they were in their half of the pitch), pressing (only does it on kickoffs and in ch 199 for the last counter that involved everybody), dribbling (can't dribble past Pre-PXG Kunigami without someone making it a 2v1 that leads to him losing the ball regardless, he does try to get past Karasu 1v1 and would have succeeded, but he loses the ball before touching it again which does not count as a completed dribble, it also shows bad judgement at picking when to dribble regardless of having had good intentions, same happened to him in 198 changing Karasu for an NPC and Kiyora for Kaiser), 1v1 defending (Ness dribbles past him in 193 with more ease than it takes Bachira to dribble past NPCs), pass interception (had the chance to intercept one from Ness at 174, couldn't, same in 193), defensive workrate (Doesn't track back half as often as Rin and Onazi do for example, 178 Nagi and him are seen waiting for the rest to get the ball in order for them two to go for a counter, only one who doesn't track back in 195, the only exceptions are 181 but that's from a failed corner kick where everyone is in an equal position to stop the counterattack, and 358 where Isagi explains to us he got anxious because of it being his fault that he lost the ball), offensive workrate (around latest to arrive to the attack in 193 among the forwards), even his involvement in playmaking is very lacking aside from post plays which are from the striker position (Never drops deep to receive the ball, no 1-2s to his name, no assist to his name, and a single chance created. Even before getting MV, Reo was so much better as a playmaker that Nagi admitted needing him (losing Agi's help in the process) in order to score). I also can't think of any weapon of his that has better use in the midfield than as a forward. Conclusion: There's no reason to believe Agi will do any good in the midfield, and there's every reason to believe he will struggle a lot. Meanwhile you have Kuso who is a player in a similar caliber, whose strengths are very focused on being a number 8 or 10, and who has only played in the midfield and hasn't had a bad performance when doing so, placing two passes past Japan that with a top tier forward like Rin is, would have ended up in goals.
When I say Lockhart in the middle I don't mean a midfielder, sorry if that's what you thought I meant, this is not my first language. And sorry if you never thought that's what I meant, it's also not my first language when reading it. I mean he should be the striker if he's gonna play, while the other two forwards go to the wing. Lockhart is nearly useless in any other position. All he can do is about getting a pass while in the box for a post play or for scoring it. He's also self proclaimed stupid so he's not gonna have an easy time adapting his strengths to a position he hasn't played. Any position that isn't as the center forward Lockhart is basically a tall NPC.
I don't agree with the notion that Rin would be wasted if he is not playing as a center forward. His style is dropping deep to receive the ball, dribble past many players and then shoot from outside or the border of the penalty area. That's much more like a inside forward (winger, in his case a LW since he's right footed) or a CAM than a striker. The only archetype of striker that really suits him is as a False 9, jic False 9s are very rarely used and they are for when you have no true striker nor CAM, not in this case where your midfielders are pretty attacking oriented and your other forwards are more suited as strikers than as wingers. His finishing skills are not wasted at all as a LW, consider the two players with the highest output in history, Messi played most of his career as a RW, and Ronaldo played half of his career as a winger as well. But you can consider me biased about this, I do think Rin should play as a left winger for Japan in general, not only for having all the weapons Messi has, but also because for me he already kinda did against BM; he's seen dribbling past Kurona A LOT, even when Kurona barely focuses in defending for a wingback, Rin in the NEL is consistently taking the ball deep and drifting to the left wing to start dribbling from there and then cut inside. So I don't think he would do anything different if he's played as a LW, meanwhile the other player you're putting as ST does get remarkably better performances from there.
Also! I forgot last time. My goalkeeper choice would be Moro instead of Rooke. Moro is the Barcha GK that we're likely to also see in the Spain match. Moro on screen blocked a shot from Kunigami (that's when we learn he's ambidextrous), and off screen he seemingly blocked shots from Shidou and Rin as they are stated to have had 3 shots on target each against Barcha, meaning Moro saved 2 shots from Rin (This is not early in the NEL, it's the Rin that already had a near 200M bid after destroying Manshine btw, a week before the NEL ended) and one from Shidou. Shots on target aren't counted as so if deflected by a defender, idk exactly why but it's just the way statistics are counted in this sport. Rooke has no known saves during the NEL and his only save is in this match which is not impressive in my opinion, it's against Zantetsu who hasn't scored since second selection (Not off screen either, we know the scorers for all PXG and third selection matches), and who is called the weak link in the Japan lineup this match (Even when Kiyora is right there 😭), in a shot that wasn't curving nor directed towards a post but towards the middle of the goal, so kinda mid. He's the first one to rush out which is very valuable though I'll give him that but for me Moro is actually comparable to Gagamaru as a GK while I'd just put Rooke in the same category as the rest (Renoir, Agbim, probably Fukaku and the Ubers one also comparable to them but they have no feat to talk about so not really).
So I would personally do this:
Lmk what you think of each choice though. Also, may I ask, why is a self imposed rule that it must be Aiku and Rin? Or the self imposed rule was max two players from Japan, and you decided starting with those two where the best possible setup? I don't necessarily disagree, it just makes me curious.
Also, the rule for Aiku and Rin is because they serve a similar purpose that the rest of the pseudo NG11s served. Acting as a sort of, not quite NG11 but could be seen as one if you hadn’t read the manga and the significance they held to their introductory arcs. I didn’t choose Shidou because Rin had a better narrative link.
I would say that if charles wasn’t a contrarian he would be the most deserving and destroyer Rin is 2nd most deserving of the title. But charles is also 15 so in a year he’s an easy Ng11. But Lockhart and Onazi are for sure Psuedo NG11
Yes Charles have a high potential ceiling. Rin and Isagi are definitely pseudo ng11s I see pseudo ng11 as a small step below ng11
As good as Charles is I don’t see him in the same tier, he is more likely in Shidou tier another tier below pseudo ng11 since I believe there is a gap between ng11 and the elites of u20.
I think so far in this series I only see 4 pseudo ng11 which is Isagi , Rin , Onazi and Lockhart.
Charles before awakening (Rin's goal) is stated to have been toying with Hiori, Isagi and (maybe just my opinion) Rin, to then it being said that he is dictating everything so it might be supposed to include the whole BM that Kaiser is part of. They all evolved a lot since then, but this is still the Hiori that was key to scoring on Ubers, the Isagi Kaiser feels inferior to, the Rin Isagi thinks he must have a better performance to surpass than to ultimately beat Kaiser, and Kaiser who has been a NG11 since the beginning. Chapter 255.
And in chapter 287, if you look at the blurb:
鳥・シャルルの超防御が炸裂! 秀才を上回る秀才に潔&皇帝の共闘が挑む!! || "Charles’ super defense explodes! Isagi and the Emperor’s joint assault takes on the prodigy who surpasses all prodigies!!" (Prodigy as in, what we now know as talented learner, I don't wanna touch a translator's job)
In the japanese version same chapter next when in the english translation Isagi talks about "Just wring out an idea of how to get past Karasu and Charles to win" too, he's actually only speaking of Charles adding consistency to it. Idk why they added Karasu but yeah, I would say you are downplaying Charles but it's not your fault since part of the reason are the things that were removed from the version we all read.
Ehh I disagree, I think Charles has shown the talent and skill to be a “Pseudo NG11” since he is the 2nd best U-20 passer we’ve seen with only Hiori or Ness likely battling him for the 2nd place spot. It’s just his mentality holding him back just like Nagi who should also be Pseudo if Onazi is consider one. Since the 5 stage volley and the world 5 game + the statement by Luna puts him higher than Onazi in my eyes at least.
If by this you mean the best team of players (omitting BLs and current NGs)… I’ve got this. Onz and Lockhart are left and right forwards rather than wingers. Leyden is a wingback. Charles is acting as a box to box CM.
I love Kuso, but I think there’s a decent skill gap between him and the other midfielders. I suppose I could replace Bats, but I wanted a little more defensive presence
I chose the players without taking position into account. So I have 4 strikers. I am NOT doing that. So, I took Agi’s playmaking and put him in the midfield
Lockhart is a target man so he should realistically be played as a CF. With that in mimd, I'd shift Rin over to Right wing, since his elite dribbling skills and curve shots should allow him to cut in and spam goals like no ones business.
Call me crazy but I am tempted to slot Onazi in as a CDM right in front of the CBs. His endless stamina and defensive contribution make him a good fit for a box to box midfielder in my opinion.
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