Japan Starting Eleven
Japan’s team manager Akira Nishino has announced the names of the 23 men who will be representing Japan in the upcoming World Cup. The Group H challengers will be playing against Colombia, Senegal and Poland in Russia.
The part that we are most curious about is the names of the starting line-up of Japan. Given that Japan has recently played a friendly against Ukraine, we predict that the 11 players who will be part of the starting lineup will be:
- Eiji Kawashima (Metz)
- Sakai (Marseille)
- Tomoaki Makino (Urawa Reds),
- Yuto Nagatomo (Galatasaray)
- Maya Yoshida (Southampton)
- Makoto Hasebe (Eintracht Frankfurt)
- Hotaru Yamaguchi (Cerezo Osaka)
- Keisuke Honda (Pachuca)
- Genki Haraguchi (Fortuna Dusseldorf)
- Shinji Okazaki (Leicester City)
- Yuya Osako (Werder Bremen)
When Are Japan’s Matches?
- Japan vs. Colombia: Tuesday, 19th June
- Japan vs. Poland: Sunday, 24th June
- Japan vs. Senegal: Thursday, 28th June
Team Profile
Japan will be coached by Akira Nishino, a plyer who has played in four World Cup qualifiers himself in 1977. Since taking on the job as national coach, Nishino has guided Gamba Osaka all the way to the FIFA Club World Cup semifinals in 2008.
The man who will be in the spotlight from the Japanese team is Maya Yoshida. As the captain of Japan’s 2012 Olympic Games team, the Southampton player is more than capable of scoring goals.
