On 16 January, Beach Soccer Japan National Team had training sessions in both morning and afternoon in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Staying there for 3 days, the players are getting more familiar with the training environment and they have become more active raising voices to each other on the pitch. In the morning, they had physical exercises and shooting training. In the afternoon they had some internal games and Mr. Mendez, the Head Coach, gave various suggestions about the team’s strategy. After this afternoon training, they had an opportunity to play with some local boys beach soccer teams.

After the hard training sessions, the players love to recharge their energy with “churrasco”, Brazilian BBQ. They just head straight to this popular local BBQ place for both lunch and dinner.

On 17 January, they are having their first match of this South America Tour.

Comments

SUGITA Tetsuji（SHONAN SPREAD1545）
It’s my first tour in Brazil. We have some challenges in terms of the long journey time to here and this hot weather, but it is definitely a good experience for us to play in such a wonderful environment. However, I don’t want to finish this tour just as a “good experience”. I will keep working hard because I want to improve myself in various aspects and to contribute to the team.

MATSUO Naoya（Pracia YAMAGUCHI）
This afternoon, we had strategy training through internal games. I had two things that I particularly concentrated on: how we can improve our mutual understanding about what we have done in previous training sessions, and how much can we attack at a good time by moving the ball around. Personally I am more familiar with sand and the time difference and I feel my condition is getting better. Not only do I want to win tomorrow, I also want to keep our level of play as high as possible.

Schedule

*Local time