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Tachibanada playing for more than Frontale’s badge

Tachibanada playing for more than Frontale’s badge

Jeddah: Kento Tachibanada will be drawing his motivation from the recent past as Kawasaki Frontale look to navigate past Al Nassr Club in the semi-final of the AFC Champions League Elite™ Finals Jeddah 2025 on Wednesday.
The 26-year-old played a key role in Frontale’s 2023 Emperor’s Cup win against Kashiwa Reysol, which booked their place in the AFC Champions League Elite, and the midfielder wants their continental campaign - having reached the semi-finals for the first time - to continue.
“In 2023, we won the Emperor’s Cup which qualified us for this competition,” said Tachibanada, 
who converted his spot-kick against Reysol as Frontale won the penalty shootout 8-7.

“Some staff and players from that time have already left but for them, we have to do our best to win and go to the final.”
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The midfielder came on in the 81st minute in Frontale’s 3-2 extra-time win against Qatar’s Al Sadd SC in the quarter-finals, his 10th appearance of the campaign and is hoping to start on Wednesday as the Japanese side will have had a day’s less rest compared to Al Nassr. 

“We’ve only got two days after the last game so it’s not easy to prepare our condition but we will do our best.

“In the last game, some players played 120 minutes or almost that much. Actually I didn’t play that much, so I’ll try to be in the team tomorrow.”
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Tachibanada and his fellow midfielders will be up against the colossal Marcelo Brozovic, who has the most passes in the AFC Champions League Elite this season with 824, almost 150 more than second-placed Roger Ibanez of Al Ahli Saudi FC.

While mindful of the Croat’s influence, Tachibanada believes that it would be a folly to just focus on Brozovic or any other superstar in the Al Nassr side.

“They have many talented players who we have to be aware of. The key point is not to be afraid of the big name players.”

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