Indonesia 0-4 Japan: Visitors stay unbeaten with rout

Japan continued their unbeaten start to World Cup qualifying with a 4-0 victory over Indonesia on Friday.

Two goals from the visitors in either half were enough to seal the three points and get them back to winning ways after a stalemate with Australia last time out.

Ragnar Oratmangoen should have put Indonesia ahead, but he hesitated one-on-one with the goalkeeper, and Japan did not look back after that. They got a bit of fortune with their first goal, Justin Hubner deflecting a cross into his own net in the 35th minute.

Takumi Minamino got their second just before the break, finishing off a pacy counter-attack by darting onto the end of Kaoru Mitoma’s cross to sweep it past Maarten Paes.

While there was not much the goalkeeper could do with that one, he was at fault for the third as he gifted the ball to Hidemasa Morita, who coolly picked out the bottom corner just after the break.

Yukinari Sugawara came off the bench to round off the scoring in the 69th minute. He raced down the right wing and instead of looking to his options, he rifled it in from a tight angle at the near post.

Japan are up to 13 points after five games, sitting top of Group C, while Indonesia are bottom, still in search of their first win.

試合終了 FIFA #ワールドカップ 26アジア最終予選(3次予選) SAMURAI BLUE 4-0 インドネシア代表?? 21:00() #DAZN で無料配信(https://t.co/UfXi6jhq5u) https://t.co/1GBkVvh7PK@FIFAWorldCup #FIFAWorldCup #AsianQualifiers#夢への勇気を #SAMURAIBLUE #jfa #daihyo… pic.twitter.com/Ekx3OVZ557

— サッカー日本代表 (@jfa_samuraiblue) November 15, 2024

Data Debrief: Clinically done

For a team still chasing their first win, Japan are probably not high on the list of opponents they would want to face, and Indonesia were undone by their visitors.

Hajime Moriyasu's side created 0.79 expected goals (xG) to Indonesia's 0.72, while they only had four more shots than their hosts (12 compared to eight).

Japan took their chances, and though the win margin may look harsh, they were deserving of the three points, having dominated throughout the game.