U-15 Japan’s national team began their activity at J-GREEN Sakai in Sakai, Osaka for their debut at the Japan-Central Asia U-15 Football Exchange Tournament, part of the SPORT FOR TOMORROW programme. Their immediate goal is to gain next year’s FIFA U-17 World Cup 2017 berth by passing through the AFC U-16 Championship 2016 Qualifiers in September. The squad consist mostly of 18 out of the 56 players who joined the Eastern and Western camps in late February.

The squad gathered in the afternoon of 23rd and worked out in a two-a-day practice. With the theme to always keep good vision and playing space, they went through 3v2, 4v4 with 2 neutral players and 6v6 drills on the first day. Head coach Moriyama said “Keep an eye on the space your opponents and teammates have around. And change angles and distances to have a better idea for the following play.” The boss halted moves at times during the drills and gave instructions by showing his own examples. During the limited practice time on 24th, the squad worked on defensive training and transitions between offence and defence, keeping situations of tomorrow’s match in mind. At the end, they got separated by positions and reviewed how they deal with their own tasks.

In the night meeting, the players shared their understanding on what kind of play they can show at present and what good plays actually are by watching their performance through video footage in the Eastern and Western camp. Moriyama said to the players, “You everyone try to take a leadership on the pitch in the opening match tomorrow and make decisions for yourself while playing. Do your best throwing your body to each play.” At the end, they wrote their own name on the national flag of Japan to boost their motivation and wrapped up the meeting. Tomorrow they will have their first friendly as “00 Japan.” The 00 Japan squad will display against strong opponents on the pitch what they learned out of their past experience.

Note: “00 Japan” is the nickname of the team led by players born in 2000. The team aim to compete at the FIFA U-17 World Cup.

Players' Comments

DF #13  SAKUTA Ryutaro (Vissel Kobe U-15)
In this camp, to improve my quality even a little, I try to learn how to maintain distance between me and my teammates and opponents, timing when to start moving and passing angles. My cross ball quality needs more improvement, so I practiced it in my team to create more chances. When I was called up for this team, I realised the great support from my teammates and family in my everyday life. Tomorrow is very important as the opening match, so we will definitely win.

DF #2  TOKUNAGA Haruto (Jubilo Iwata U-15)
Because I came here halfway through this call-up, I was sort of tense, but I was able to settle in the team in the afternoon session. I need to improve the timing when to overlap. I will implement today’s learnings into tomorrow’s match, in terms of how to make a distance against opposing players and how to receive the ball. I will try my best to test how well I can play against strong opponents.

MF #6  AWANO Kento (Vegalta Sendai Junior Youth)
I’m very glad to be selected for the U-15s. I feel in the practice up to now I still lack ability to move off the ball and predict the ball coming to me. In the Eastern camp, I wasn’t able to win against Cerezo Osaka U-18 in terms of physical strength. So I go to practice earlier in the team and work on enhancing my trunk and physical strength through trainer’s instruction. By playing matches against strong teams one after another from tomorrow, I will try to overcome the weakness and contribute to team’s win.

Schedule

*The schedule is subject to change due to the team condition, the weather, etc.

Entry teams of the programme

Future Schedule