Japan will face either Paraguay or Mexico in the last 16. Unless Mexico lost against Solomon Islands, then Japan will play against Australia.
I think that Handa could be another Tomiyasu. Even if Yamagata get promoted this season I think he will play alot next season. I'm not sure if his future is at CB though.
He is a little too small for CB imo. Maybe he can be tried at full-back or DM. Japan needs to bring their best squad instead of rotating too much imo, especially when this is a knockout match. Mexico will not be easy.
BTW, one of this team's best players, the CB number #2 Kosei Suwama is the son of famous heavy weight wrestler Kohei Suwama.
South Korea won 1-0 against Angola tonight. If Japan win their match tomorrow against Mexico, it will be Japan vs South Korea in the quarterfinals.
As always South Korea will be our harder opponent before we find Brazil at some time. But first, Mexico.
If Japan manages to get past Mexico(which will not be easy), the match against Korea will be interesting. Japan has not managed to win against Korea a lot in youth tournaments in past few matches.
What a horrendous display And John Helm's commentary couldn't be worse. What the ******** with this lads.
Yep, really disgraceful display but this is it. It's like Japan is happy enough to pass the group stage at these competitions... disappointing as it was a team balanced in all departments. Knew Mexico was going to be though, unfortunately. Handa was too important for this team and shouldn't have been wasted in the previous game.
End of the game. As always we can't score and the opponents always do it with the minimum effort. Anyway watching the MEXICAN U17 team outmuscled Japan U17 team is a real pain.