It was another beautiful day in Sugadaira, Nagano. Clouds occasionally blocking sunlight let a dry breeze blow over the field. The last day of the camp only had the morning session, so the team spurred their last practice in the limited amount of time, which saw three 30-minute scrimmages before moving on to two sets of physically demanding sprints in three groups.

Marker cones were set in rectangular-like layout like a pyramid. The players dashed enthusiastically into the area, but in several seconds they got tired out and could do nothing but slow down. Even cheers from teammates didn’t seem to reach them any longer. But to win critical matches against good teams in the world, the players must to be able to play to their best ability under any circumstances. After completing the drills, the players certainly showed victorious and satisfied look on their face.    

The team were dismissed temporarily today and will get together again on 26th.
They will improve themselves mentally and physically and move forward to their big goal stating “Play like champions and win the world”. Confident players will go all out, first for the top of Asia.

*98JAPAN is the nickname for the U-16 Japan National Team, who aim to compete in the FIFA U-17 World Cup in Chile

Comments

YOSHITAKE Hirofumi, Head Coach
To wrap up the camp, we had intra-squad matches. Both teams were highly motivated and excited and played under high pressure. I would like to praise them for that. Also they kept their defence line high, kept the midfield compact and tried to get the ball as his as possible. So they showed great performance as well in that regard. But when attacking, they couldn’t take advantage of the large amount of space behind the opponent defenders and couldn’t break down the compact defence. I gave them some tactical instructions to position themselves to take advantage of the 68 meters. Then they could start breaking it down a little.

And then, though the defence got stretched out and players were far apart from each other, the offense couldn’t build up effectively all of a sudden. That means after I give them a tactical instruction, they can do a good job for a while, but when the opponents changed their style, we can’t adjust to that any more. That problem hasn’t been solved yet. We will improve on that during the camp right before.

Lastly, in this camp we had a few injuries and we were about to miss our intra-squad matches, but AC Nagano Parceiro, the local club, kindly sent us two junior high school players. I would like to convey my appreciation to them.

TANAKA Kosuke（Kyoto Sanga F.C.U-18）
The practice was pushed us hard in the past two days and we had been very tired, so three 30-minute matches were a little tough for us. But we could have fun. “Pushing myself hard” has been my assignment in this camp, and I could do it so I am very satisfied. We will get back together on 26th and head for Thailand. I will be ready physically and mentally for the tournament.

CHIDA Keito（Yokohama F・Marinos Youth）
Before the practice, I was so excited telling myself to “work very hard” because it was the last day of this camp. But I fumbled the first ball in the warmup and also made a bad bass and fumbled a cross ball again. Then I remembered what one of the team staff said “You have the first time only once.” I will keep reminding myself of the importance of “the first time” and get ready for the final qualifiers starting on 6th.

YASUI Takuya（Vissel KobeU-18）
It was the last day. I had been thinking it would be important to take away fatigue from the last few days out of my body and focus on the next practice session. So I was careful in what I ate and the sleep I had. When we had the tough sprinting drill, all the 98 JAPAN players talked to and cheered up each other, so I think that got us together even closer as a team.

JFA-TV

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