Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-4436931-20190412021820/@comment-26182480-20190412142050

I don't know why, but my message was deleted somehow before clicking the "Reply" button, so I'm forced to rewrite it. Anyway, even though I did see only the raw version of today episode, I can say it wasn't good. We could agree it was somehow mediocre - but it would be an euphemism.

I don't have a lot of hope for the upcoming matches, but I was really curious of how they would handle Japan vs Spain match. I was disappointed, why I'm even slightly believing? Let's start with Endou's hissatsus. Super God Hand, aside for the undoubted attention they paid in the naming, is awkward, sloppy, lazy, rushed. We can't even talk about it - too ephemeral! Just a filler to insert a new, only used in one episode, hissatsu. Diamond Hand seems almost a parody, a sort of bad joke. They don't even build hype: the characters pull them out of the void like rabbits from a magician's hat. In a season full of OP shots, they don't even seems useful, just used to buy minutes.

Alonso's hissatsu, from the other hand, is still awkward, but at least something more than Endou's ones. At least, it isn't the umpteenth light/fire-themed catch hissatsu (I know we had also Eternal Dancers' one, but I was afraid it could be an isolated case), and somehow fits with the Spanish's jiggly attitude. However, disappointed by the fact that a world-class goalkeeper like him didn't even tried to use it against Fubuki twins' shoot or tried to catch it. Come on, don't be Kidokawa Seishuu goalkeeper's epigony. Also, I hope "boyon" means something, and doesn't was a random word for the foreign effect. I didn't find anything  on the Internet, and the water thing remembered my only of the La llorona, but I'm sure it is a flight of fancy.

The Orion disciple with that weird tomato earring... was shameless. A sloppy way to add drama, too rushed, ineffectual, convenient. It would have been better if he was a normal player and Orion tried to interfer in other ways, maybe with the help of the referees. Too bad the "no Orion disciple in Block A" seems a fraud.

Shameless was also how Fubuki was used, I'm quite sad for how they treated him. Giving role only because in the next episode he would abandon the team. The hissatsu wasn't so bad, but slow, full of "dead moments" (pass me the world). If you can't arrange a good plot, don't use some fancy effects and a lot of hissatsu to be a filler.

Dulcis in fundo, Orion seems to want desperately to go on, conscious of how bad it is turning itself, but it is too proud to admit defeat.

Thing I somehow appreciated: Maxter's return and Scoglio shouting "forza!" (it means "strength", but in this case is a cheering, like "Go!").

Also, I agree with Angelo that China match was really the only enjoyable till this moment.