Asia Cup 2009 :: Japan to rebuild team into world class

Japan have embarked on team rebuilding in an effort to put themselves back among the elite hockey-playing nations.

And the ongoing Asia Cup tournament is part of their re-building programme.

They opened their campaign in Kuantan with a 5-0 win over Bangladesh and were beaten 3-2 by South Korea yesterday.

But Japan are confident of beating Malaysia in their last Group A tie and earn a place in the semi-finals.

Team mana­ger Yama­naka Manabu said yes­ter­day that they have a very young team with seven newcomers.

“We had only two weeks of training for this tournament. It will be tough playing teams who are well prepared but we feel this team have potential.

“Of course, one of our targets is to qualify for the 2010 World Cup and then the Asian Games,” said Manabu.

Manabu was the coach of the Japan team for the 2006 Doha Asian Games and also the 2008 Olympic qualifiers.

The current coach is Endo Takashi while Manabu has become the full-time manager.

Japan’s best placing in the Asia Cup is the fourth-place finishes achieved in 1985, 1989, 2003 and 2007.

The most experienced player in the team is Kazuhiro Tsubochi with 76 caps while Kei Kawakami, Ryuji Furusato and Hiroki Sakamoto have 67, 53 and 45 caps respectively.

They form the core of the new team. The team also have five players who will feature for Japan in the Junior World Cup co-hosted by Malaysia and Singapore next month.

They are Naoto Shiokawa, Ken Yoshikawa, Kenta Tanaka, Kenji Kitazato and Daisuke Suzuki.

Of the five players, Kenta has played for the senior team six times. The others are making their senior debuts.

“They are all talented players and we expect them to become our core players after their junior days. But we hope to start off a comprehensive programme soon to ensure they are well prepared for the future challenges,” said Manabu.

Japan are ranked 11th in the world and they know that their ranking could drop if they fare badly here.

But for the moment Manabu is more interested in ensuring his team re-building exercise stays on track.

“It is still early times for us. But the first thing is to get a semi-final place and I think we can beat Malaysia. It will all depend on the players. We have the ability to do it.”

In 2007, Malaysia and Japan met twice in the Asia Cup in Chennai. Malaysia won 2-0 in the group tie and 5-3 in the play-off for third place.

Last year, they drew 3-3 in the Olympic qualifiers in Japan.