Ashito was finally able to make a full game in the B team and, after the victory, the head coach came to tell him that the last game would be decisive in whether Ashito can move to the A team.
Leave gaps
For several volumes, the Ao Ashi series makes us discover the defense. Indeed, Ashito is now at the back of the field. Yoshitsune, a player of the recovering A team, came to help them. Ashito has been captivated but this champion asks him not to imitate him to follow his own path. If his arrival brings the group a goal, it gives them an inordinate confidence in this still fragile team. Focused on a technical gesture, Ashito had not understood the true dimension of a defender: he must not block a player but manage a space. Unable to anticipate movements, he only took information about players without looking at the spaces. The coach showed him that defense and offense are not so different. Ashito then understands the role of the playmaker, a position that coach Tatsuya Fukuda secretly believes is made for him.
Beyond football, writer and cartoonist Yûgo Kobayashi's series focuses on Ashito's coming of age. He no longer gets upset and analyzes the situation to understand what to do. However, he still struggles to hold on physically. When he is exhausted, he loses the overall vision of the game. This reflection goes through drawing: Yûgo Kobayashi takes up previous boxes that he puts in very small like a thought bubble and plays on light gray to represent the past. His style has further progressed with more varied faces. Each player is recognized by very different haircuts.
A decisive match to come
Ao Ashi is also a series about the life of a group. Accumulating counter-results, the Tokyo City Esperion team is in a delicate position. The striker, in crisis of confidence, no longer scores and this is not the only problem: internal tensions are very high and players leave the group to go to team A. In this time of crisis, Ashito asserts himself as a positive leader cheering up everyone. Despite his efforts, however, the team seems deeply divided. The next match against a local team is decisive for staying in the division. By going back in time, the reader understands the origin of the opposition between the two teams. Some of the players are former colleagues not retained from the Tokyo City Esperion selections. This small club surprises all specialists by achieving much better results than its former status. Ashito and two friends will observe their future opponents but especially coach Satake who would be the key to the success of the team. This character helps explain the decisive role of the coach in football. He has designed a very solid collective organization of the defense and pushes his players to take risks to compensate for their technical shortcomings. By accepting their weaknesses, these players have mental strength while their former colleague is in crisis. We also see the differences in means between clubs. Esperion has several fields while the opponent, Musashino, has only one field for all his teams.
This flagship series from the publisher Mangetsu that follows the career of Ashito continues to progress with each. It offers an exhaustive vision of football but always remaining accessible. In addition, by presenting very accurate portraits of different teens in crisis, it becomes the portrait of individuals struggling to move forward.
You can find on these links the chronicles of the previous volumes: the seven and the eight.
