The Hindu : Sport / Football : India-Japan pre-WC match

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Sep 01, 2004

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India-Japan pre-WC match

KOLKATA, AUG. 31. As the count down began for the India-Japan pre-World Cup match at the Salt Lake Stadium on September 8, the first hint of the team's strength came to light as the Indian Football Association (IFA) released the team list here on Tuesday.

The Japanese National team, coached by Arthur Antunes Coimbra, well known as Zico, sported four World Cuppers and five foreign-based players in the 23-member list. The delegation including the players, coaches and support staff numbered 45. Also a sizable number of Japanese fans and 80 journalists from the print media will also be in Kolkata for the game.

The FIFA has named three Syrian officials to conduct the game while Manirul Islam of Bangladesh will be the match commissioner. The match will be played under lights with the kick-off slated at 5-35 p.m.

Alessandro Santos, Shunsuke Nakamura, Koji Nakata and Shinji Ono are the four World Cuppers. Goalkeeper Yoshikatsu Kawaguchi plays for FC Nords Jaellard in Denmark, midfielder Takashi Fukunishi and forward Atsushi Yanagisawa both play in Italy for Reggina and Messina.

Significantly, Yanagisawa is the highest goal scorer with 13 strikes.

Midfielder Ono plays for Feyenoord FC in the Netherlands while forward Naohiro Takahara plays for Hamburg FC in Germany. He along with midfielder Shunsuke Nakamura have scored 12 goals each for their country.

The team will touch down at the Dum Dum airport in the wee hours of September 7 and will leave on the small hours of September 9. — Our Special Correspondent

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