Road to Russia 2018 starts from... Sapporo Dome. Japan's first match in the 2018 World Cup cycle will be played on Sapporo Dome in 05/September/2014 at 19:20 Japan local time. Under the guidance of this man... Good Luck Japan!!
Uruguay will play us Korean nationals just three days after their game against Japan. It will be interesting what kind of players Uruguay will call up for their games. Also good chance to see what's to come for both us Korea and Japan. While us Koreans have yet sign a manager, it is likely that Bert van marijk of Netherlands will take the post. Also there was a Korea vs Japan friendly in our homeland in October but our football association declined the offer. But we do have a friendly against Iran in November. Declining a friendly match against Japan was odd because I thought we never turn those down. So anyway, it will be interesting what kind of team both nations will have leading up our likely clash in early 2015 for most important Asian cup down under. Very interesting next couple of months for both of us.
honestly i'm glad you guys turned it down. Nothing against Korea, just feel we've played more than enough, it's nice to have a change once in a while, even if it's the likes of Jamaica...
Now you guys mentioned it, there has been Korea vs Japan match every yr since 2007(exception being 2009). Top of my head I remember 2007 Asian cup third place playoff (Korea win in pk shootout) 2008 East Asian cup (draw) 2009 no Korea vs Japan match 2010 East Asian cup, may friendly (Korea win), october friendly (draw) 2011 Asian cup semi finals, fall friendly in Sapporo(Japan win) 2012 London Olympic bronze medal match (Korea win) 2013 East Asian cup (Japan win) 2010, we played a whopping three times in calendar yr. while 2012 Olympic is u-23 team, the game meant a lot to both teams and perhaps it was the most watched Korea vs Japan ever since it was the Olympics and there were no other football game that mattered as much on that same day. So yeah, I could see why someone could get sick of Korea vs Japan. With high potential probability to perhaps meet in the Asian cup, don't really need the match. But this was a return courtesy match the game back in 2011 Sapporo game. Shows you that KFA will save their biggest draw for later dates.
Frankly both FAs probably don't think it's worth the trouble (i.e. politicized media coverage, spectator and player incidents, etc.) at this point. The commercial/media uptick (if any) is likely negligible, and for squad-building/training purposes Asian friendlies are rather useless at this point. They still have a verbal or contractual commitment to play one more friendly, but I imagine they'll push it back until it's more convenient.
No, are games in FIFA calendar. The friendlies are international level are a bit different from clubs friendlies.
Squad announced: GK: Eiji Kawashima (Standard Liége), Shusaku Nishikawa (Urawa Reds), Akihiro Hayashi (Sagan Tosu) DF: Hiroki Mizumoto (Sanfrecce Hiroshima), Yuto Nagatomo (Internazionale), Masato Morishige (FC Tokyo), Maya Yoshida (Southampton), Hiroki Sakai (Hannover 96), Tatsuya Sakai (Sagan Tosu), Gotoku Sakai (VfB Stuttgart), Ken Matsubara (Albirex Niigata) MF: Makoto Hasebe (Eintracht Frankfurt), Hajime Hosogai (Hertha BSC), Junya Tanaka (Sporting CP), Ryota Morioka (Vissel Kobe), Takahiro Ogihara (Cerezo Osaka), Gaku Shibasaki (Kashima Antlers) FW: Shinji Okazaki (Mainz), Keisuke Honda (AC Milan), Yoichiro Kakitani (FC Basel), Yuya Osako (1. FC Köln), Yusuke Minagawa (Sanfrecce Hiroshima), Yoshinori Muto (FC Tokyo)
To note that Gamba hasn't any player in the squad despite they are doing well and Konno/Endo were called-up before. I think this was the time for Higashiguchi and Usami...
From our overseas contingent: 1- Kagawa missing because he is to settle his future. 2- Kiyotake to give him time to adjust to his new team. 3- Uchida and Haraguchi because of injury. Good to see Aguirre not calling up veterans like Endo, Konno and Okubo. Surprised to see Ogihara instead of Yonemoto.
Kagawa (concussion) and Haraguchi (shoulder) were not called up due to injury. Muto and Minagawa were called up as replacements.
By the way Tatsya Sakai played just 4 league games this season, and only one of them was after WC break, which was last week's match against Omiya! I don't have any idea about the player, but it seems that Aguirre and his staff are really impressed by him just from watching him in this single match!