Friday, April 14, 2006

World Cup 2006: Japan chances


With less than 2 months before the world cup, it is time to study Japan chances in Germany.
Japan is in Group F along with Brazil, Croatia and Australia.
No doubt, Brazil will go to the knock out stage. Meaning that Japan, Croatia and Australia must fight for one place.
Croatia has beaten Japan during the 1998 World Cup in France.
Japan has beaten Australia during the 2001 confederations cup in Japan.
But that's history and things have evolved.
In my opinion, the Japanese team have became weak since Zico took over.
I respect Zico as a player, but as a coach he is not of the bests.
Now, let's put Japan aside and try to analyze their opponents.
Australia is back in the world cup stage after 32 years of absence.
Australia will try to prove itself and lets not forget that Australia has one of the world best coaches: Guus Hiddink.
Croatia did a stunning performance during the world qualifiers and has recently beaten Argentina in a friendly.
I won't say that Japan wont make it to the second round, but their chances are pretty slim. But hey, Greece is the actual champion of Europe, so in football everything is possible.
Personally, I would like Brazil and Japan to advance.
In my next entries, I will introduce Japanese key players.

RedSpider

1 Comments:

Blogger LazyNinja said...

Wow!
After all, I was right. Brazil finished first and Australia finished second. As I predicted, Hiddinks was great, as for Zico the facts spoke for themselves.
Major blow after World Cup for the japanese team. Nakata and Nakazawa have retired from internationl games.
RedSpider

10:54 AM  

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