Japan's women's soccer team, Nadeshiko Japan, won a comfortable 2-0 victory against New Zealand in a warm-up match for next year's World Cup.
Nadeshiko Japan, ranked 11th in the world, are preparing for the World Cup, which will start in Australia and New Zealand in July next year.
Japan started the match with six players who play overseas, including captain and defender Saki KUMAGAI and midfielder Jun ENDO.
In the first half, Japan aggressively attacked the opponent's goal, and just before the end of the first half, midfielder MIYAZAWA Hinata took the ball in front of the goal and calmly shot with his left foot to score the opening goal.
In the second half, forward UEKI Riko headed a cross ball from the left to extend the lead.
Japan did not score against New Zealand in defence, winning comfortably 2-0.
After this, Japan will play a warm-up match against England, ranked 4th in the world, in Spain on the 11th of next month.
Director Ikeda "Aggressive press evaluation"
Futoshi Ikeda, head coach of Nadeshiko Japan, said, ``The players showed the momentum to press aggressively from the front and win the ball to score goals.''
On top of that, looking toward the future, he said, "First of all, I want each team to grow day by day. Then, when we reunite as 'Nadeshiko Japan', we want to fight against the world as a group of grown-up individuals." was talking
Miyazawa: "I wanted more goals"
MIYAZAWA Hinata, who scored the opening goal, looked back, saying, ``I'm glad that we were able to keep our team together, even though we had enough teammates.''
On top of that, he said, ``The relationship in front of the goal was better than in the previous match, but to be honest, I wished for more goals.
Ueki: “We improved in the second half, so it was a good game.”
Riko Ueki, who scored the second goal in the second half, commented, “Nagano gave me a good ball and I was able to score with my favorite header. , I was able to improve in the second half by talking with various players at halftime, so it turned out to be a good game."