"To all of you in Kenshuusei, I'm thinking of doing various things (within Hello! Project) so you still have chances."
I don't know if I wrote this in this thread already, but anyway. Tsunku said that the reason to why he didn't add Sakura to S/mileage was that she wouldn't be able to grow if she joined with several girls. Instead he put her in kenshuusei and now as Morning Musume, if she's put in there alone she will be able to grow and improve in a way she wouldn't if she was with a bunch of other girls. He also said that the girl has luck with her. For the S/mileage auditions she just happened to be there whenever Tsunku went to check things out - he didn't go everyday they had an interview after all - but Sakura was always there on the days that he arrived there, so she was lucky that he saw her so much.
From one of the videos of the rehearsal:
Sakura wants to become like Takahashi or Niigaki when it comes to singing. When it comes to dancing she wants to be like Nakajima Saki (C-ute).