Japan National Olympic Team
Just announced to participate in the Paris Olympic Games 18 people list and four alternates, surprisingly, this lineup does not have any one overage player, this is also since the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, Japan's national Olympic Games for the first time since the zero overage player lineup to the Olympic Games.
A number of players were previously tipped to potentially be selected as overage players, such as Hang Endo and Hiroki Machida, but due to transfer matters and clubs' reluctance to release them, they were ultimately not selected.
Technical director Masahiro Yamamoto explained that the reason why age-grade player Kyusei Matsuki was not selected was because he might move to Dutch Eredivisie side Heerenveen in the summer, and the decision was made not to call him up for the Olympics for the time being in order to allow the player to focus on transfer matters.
Making the roster, Yoh Hirakawa and Mitsui Saito will be the center of attention for the team. Yuto Hirakawa plans to join Championship side Bristol City on loan after the Olympics, while Mitsui Saito is hoping to showcase himself through the Olympics with a view to securing a desirable European transfer offer.
Japan's national Olympic team will play a warm-up match against France's national Olympic team on July 17 in preparation for this year's Olympics. Their group opponents include Paraguay, Mali and Israel.
This young Japanese National Olympic team will strive to excel at the Paris Olympics and show the strength and potential of Asian soccer.
