U-19 Japan Women's National Team short-listed squad, who are scheduled to compete in the AFC U-19 Women’s Championship 2015 in Nanjing, China, next month, began their training camp in Niigata on 28 July.

The team were divided into groups and discussed about how Nadeshiko Japan played in the 2015 FIFA Women's World Cup in Canada as their theme in a meeting that they had on the previous day.

“While many of the countries in the world have developed, we are not going to be able to keep winning in four years if we keeps doing things just normally,” coach TAKAKURA Asako, who observed many of the World Cup games as a FIFA technical study group member, told her players. “You need to play that you are the Nadeshiko Japan players from your daily practice.”

In the first day of their practice, which was hit by some rains, the players started with an ice break in four groups. After they went through passing and controlling and possession, they played a 9-on-9 game to end their morning practice.

They work on some other training including core training and agility training and then played 3-on-3s. They had to practice under a higher heat than in the morning, but considering the climate in Nanjing, where they will have to deal with a 40-plus degree heat, and the schedule that they have to play every other day, they have to be aware of the measures for the heat in the AFC U-19 Women’s Championship 2015. They played an intra-squad match in the end to wrap up their first day.

Players' Comments 

NORIMATSU Ruka (Urawa Reds Ladies)
In our meeting last night, we reconfirmed Japan's strengths, issues and where each one of us needs to improve, by watching the videos of June's FIFA Women's World Cup. With those things in mind, I worked on possession, how to deal with opponents who try to come against us possessing the ball and retreat it, counter attacks and penalty kicks.

In the possession training, which I'm good at, I would often play with myself and the ball, and I wasn't able to rotate the ball well earlier. In Asia, most teams play in their territories against Japan. It's very important for us to encounter with fierce offence with the techniques of our individual skills, our ideas and fierce offence with many of us involved and collective plays. I would like to remember what we talked about in our meeting and take every daily practice importantly from tomorrow.

NISHIDA Meika (Cerezo Osaka Sakai Ladies)
We worked mainly on passing and controlling, possession and games this morning. In a meeting before the afternoon practice, we watched some videos about defence and reconfirmed about the importance of defence. Based on this, we went through training, mainly focusing on offence.

Individually, I found so many issues, including my shooting accuracy and locations of positioning. In this training camp, I would like to take as much communication as I can and improve my issues as much as possible.

Schedule

Future Schedule