Japan coach Akira Nishino has named his 23-man World Cup squad, depending intensely on veteran players with past involvement in the competition. Keisuke Honda and Shinji Kagawa were among right around twelve named on Thursday who spoke to Japan four years back in Brazil when Japan neglected to progress from the gathering stage.
Nishino made his presentation as Japan’s mentor on Wednesday when his group lost 2-0 to Ghana in a neighborly. Japan let go Vahid Halilhodzic a month ago, just two months previously Russia’s World Cup opens, and supplanted him with Nishino. In two World Cup warm-up matches, Japan will confront Switzerland on June 8 in Lugano, Switzerland, and Paraguay on June 12 in Innsbruck, Austria.
Japan will play in Group H at the World Cup with Colombia, Poland and Senegal in its 6th straight World Cup. It has just twice achieved the knockout round, losing the two times in the last 16.
Japan Squad:
Goalkeepers: Eiji Kawashima (Metz/FRA), Masaaki Higashiguchi (Gamba Osaka), Kosuke Nakamura (Kashiwa)
Safeguards: Yuto Nagatomo (Galatasaray/TUR), Tomoaki Makino (Urawa), Wataru Endo (Urawa), Maya Yoshida (Southampton/ENG), Hiroki Sakai (Marseille/FRA), Gotoku Sakai (Hamburg/GER), Gen Shoji, Naomichi Ueda (Kashima)
Midfielders: Makoto Hasebe (Eintracht Frankfurt/GER), Keisuke Honda (Pachuca/MEX), Takashi Inui (Eibar/ESP), Shinji Kagawa (Dortmund/GER), Hotaru Yamaguchi (Cerezo Osaka), Genki Haraguchi, (Fortuna Dusseldorf/GER), Takashi Usami (Fortuna Dusseldorf/GER), Gaku Shibasaki (Getafe/ESP), Ryota Oshima (Kawasaki)
Advances: Shinji Okazaki (Leicester/ENG), Yuya Osako (Werder Bremen/GER), Yoshinori Muto (Mainz/GER)