Former Japan Football Association chief Ken Naganuma died of pneumonia in a Tokyo hospital on Monday afternoon. He was 77.

Naganuma, who became Japan's national coach in 1962 when he was 32 years old, led the country to the last eight at the 1964 Tokyo Olympics and to the bronze medal at the 1968 Mexico City Olympics.

Naganuma, a Hiroshima native, assumed the JFA's top post in 1994. Japan made its first-ever World Cup finals appearance four years later in France and cohosted the 2002 World Cup finals with South Korea.