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May 05, 2024
 

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SOCCER SCENE

Japan Times
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Apr 15, 2010
Old faces need new approach with World Cup looming
National team manager Takeshi Okada has run out of games to assess contenders for his World Cup squad, but the real question now is not so much who he takes to South Africa as how he uses them.
Japan Times
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Mar 25, 2010
Honda breathes life into Japan's World Cup aspirations
When Keisuke Honda arrived at Narita airport late last month for Japan's Asian Cup qualifier against Bahrain, he insisted he was "no savior" for a national team that had seriously lost its way. But with every impressive performance he gives, the 23-year-old is finding it harder to get people to listen.
Japan Times
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Feb 18, 2010
Time for Okada to step back and take stock
National team manager Takeshi Okada vowed to get straight back in the saddle after his public dressing-down on Monday. After the beating he has just taken, a period of quiet reflection might be a better option.
Japan Times
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Feb 11, 2010
Action, not words, needed to save Japan from humiliation
Given the empty rhetoric that has come to characterize his reign as national team manager, it was no surprise to hear Takeshi Okada attempting to put a positive spin on Japan's dismal 0-0 draw with China last weekend.
Japan Times
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Jan 21, 2010
Okada straying from beaten path with Ogasawara callup
As national team manager Takeshi Okada would have it, last week's decision to end J. League player of the year Mitsuo Ogasawara's three-and-half-year international exile was just the next step on his road map toward the World Cup.
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Jan 7, 2010
Nagoya flexing muscles with ambitious big-name signings
There is still plenty of time for the J. League winter transfer market to kick into full swing, but that hasn't stopped Nagoya Grampus from setting their stall out early.
Japan Times
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Dec 17, 2009
Time to face up to reality with Nakamura's star on the wane
As national team manager Takeshi Okada runs the rule over the year gone by, he will have to face up to an uncomfortable but unavoidable truth — 2009 has not been kind to Shunsuke Nakamura.
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Dec 7, 2009
Japan's World Cup group difficult, but not impossible
The World Cup draw could certainly have been kinder to Japan, but that is not to say Takeshi Okada's side is guaranteed to fall at the first hurdle next summer.
Japan Times
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Nov 21, 2009
Frontale, Antlers, Gamba taking J. League title race down to wire
The 2009 J. League title race looked like it would turn into a cakewalk when Kashima Antlers stretched ahead of the pack earlier in the season, but history tells us nothing can ever be taken for granted.
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Nov 12, 2009
Japan ready for dress rehearsal
National team manager Takeshi Okada was not impressed by the weakened squads Scotland and Togo rustled up for last month's friendlies, but motivation is hardly likely to be an issue for this weekend's opponent.
Japan Times
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Oct 29, 2009
Ghosts of past mistakes return as bad moon rises in Chiba
Barring a sequence of results too far-fetched for even the J. League, Chiba will play host to no first-division teams next season.
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Oct 14, 2009
Nothing holding Japan back against Togo
Two wins and eight goals might not sound like a false start to Japan's October three-match series, but Wednesday's friendly against Togo will be the first and last chance manager Takeshi Okada has to really let go of the hand brake.
Japan Times
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Oct 8, 2009
Fletcher, Adebayor set example for Okada's men to follow
The national team's three opponents over the next seven days may not present as severe a test as the Netherlands did last month, but that is not to say they have nothing to teach Takeshi Okada's men.
Japan Times
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Sep 14, 2009
Japan shows flaws, mettle in friendlies
National team manager Takeshi Okada was hoping his squad's recent tour of the Netherlands would give him food for thought ahead of the World Cup in South Africa.
Japan Times
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Aug 27, 2009
Double Dutch challenge too good an opportunity to waste
Catania striker Takayuki Morimoto looks set for his first national team callup when Takeshi Okada names his squad for next week's tour of the Netherlands on Friday, but don't expect many more new faces.
Japan Times
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Aug 13, 2009
Youth movement not enough to satisfy Reds' ambitions
Urawa Reds manager Volker Finke could barely conceal his disbelief at reaching the season's halfway mark on 34 points. But with his team stuck on the same tally one month and three straight defeats later, the German's caution seems well founded.
Japan Times
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Jul 30, 2009
Homegrown hit-men giving Okada plenty of ammunition
Japan's eternal weakness in producing strikers has long been reflected in the J. League top-scorer charts, but a strong homegrown challenge this season is proving to be a timely exception with the countdown to the World Cup under way.
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Jul 23, 2009
Forward thinking can ease Stojkovic's second-season blues
Dragan Stojkovic worked miracles leading Nagoya Grampus into the Asian Champions League in his first season as a manager, but he is now learning that achieving success and keeping hold of it are two very different things.
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Jul 16, 2009
Kashima leading by example at halfway point of season
One glance at Kashima Antlers' eight-point lead might suggest JFA president Motoaki Inukai is right to label the J. League "boring." But even if this season's title race is shaping up to be more one-sided than in recent years, an improvement in quality among the leading teams is a worthwhile tradeoff.
Japan Times
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Jul 9, 2009
Indecision over Chamusca can only worsen Oita's plight
After winning the Nabisco Cup and guiding his club to a fourth-place league finish last season, few jobs in the J. League looked as secure as Oita Trinita manager Pericles Chamusca's.
Japan says Biden's description of nation as xenophobic is 'unfortunate'
The National Diet building in Tokyo
G7 eyes plan on U.S.-led $50 billion aid package for Ukraine
A local resident visits the Lychakiv cemetery in Lviv, Ukraine, on Thursday. The U.S. is in talks with close partners to lead a group of allies that would give as much as $50 billion in aid to Ukraine.
With eye on China, defense chiefs agree to bolster interoperability
From left: U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, Australian defense chief Richard Marles, Japanese Defense Minister Minoru Kihara and Philippine Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro hold a joint news conference in Honolulu on Thursday.
The 'outsiders' creating some of Japan's greenest spaces
Rows of irises resemble a rice field at the Peter Walker-designed Toyota Municipal Museum of Art.
Japan drops to 70th in press freedom rankings
A businessman reads a newspaper outside a train station in Tokyo.
'Monster' Inoue ready to tear down Luis Nery in title defense at Tokyo Dome
Naoya Inoue (left) and Luis Nery following a pre-fight news conference in Yokohama on Saturday, two days ahead of their super bantamweight title fight.
Debate on constitutional revision at a standstill despite Kishida's pledges
With less than two months left before the conclusion of the current session of parliament, any possibility that Prime Minister Fumio Kishida can deliver constitutional reform before the end of his term as Liberal Democratic Party president in late September, as he has promised, appears remote.
Sapporo court ruling on Ainu fishing rights presents tough questions
A traditional Ainu preserved food called <i>satchep</i> (dried fish) being made at the government-run National Ainu Museum and Park, nicknamed Upopoy, in the town of Shiraoi, Hokkaido, on Dec. 25. The Sapporo District Court ruled last month that the Raporo Ainu Nation's rights as an Indigenous people did not extend to having an inherent right to fish for commercial reasons.
With eye on China, defense chiefs agree to bolster interoperability
From left: U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, Australian defense chief Richard Marles, Japanese Defense Minister Minoru Kihara and Philippine Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro hold a joint news conference in Honolulu on Thursday.
Yellow sand allergy: A health issue made worse by climate change
A screenshot of the Meteorological Agency's satellite image of clouds and yellow sand (in pink) on Sunday.

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Longform

Rows of irises resemble a rice field at the Peter Walker-designed Toyota Municipal Museum of Art.
The 'outsiders' creating some of Japan's greenest spaces
By Stephen Mansfield

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

Vol. 35: Travel in time — and stay there
Vol. 35: Travel in time — and stay there

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