That is, in fact, exactly what they did in the official English tank.
That is exactly the matter under discussion—which one works better?
Maybe I misunderstood you. I thought you were suggesting "This is what they should do with that particular section", and I was saying "Well! AS IT JUST SO HAPPENS, that is exactly what they did!" But your subsequent response leaves me with the impression that you didn't parse it that way.
In any case, I still prefer "love" over "like". It's romantic and fluffy. I wouldn't even call it confusion on Yamada's part. She's a teenager. When I was a teenager in high school, I wanted a girlfriend. I wanted to be loved, and I certainly had fantasies about having cute girls in class being in love with me. So I can absolutely get my head around the notion that Yamada, a girl with only one real friend, fantasizes about being loved (not "liked") by the coolest, most popular girl in her grade.
As for Kase-san, yeah she straight up has the hots for Yamada and has for a while. But she also makes it clear that she admires Yamada. She truly does think Yamada is amazing, and it's so obvious to her that it never occurs to her that it's not that obvious to Yamada. So when she says she's "in love" with Yamada and has been for a long time, I'm cool with that too.