Japan coach Akira Nishino on Monday admitted his desperate disappointment after seeing the Blue Samurai bow out of the World Cup in an agonizing 3-2 defeat to Belgium in the round-of-16.
“I feel it was a tragedy, but I have to accept the defeat as a fact, I feel devastated and very disappointed,” Nishino said. “We started off very well, but at the end, right at the very end, to concede a goal like that is not expected.”
Nacer Chadli’s 94th-minute strike at the end of a counterattack gave Belgium a stunning come-from-behind 3-2 victory in their round-of-16 tie to floor Japan in Rostov-on-Don.
Photo: EPA
Japan had been 2-0 up after scoring twice early in the second half through Genki Haraguchi and Takashi Inui.
The Japan players slumped to the turf at the end and Nishino said they were too stunned to talk it through immediately afterward.
Instead of facing Brazil in a mouth-watering quarter-final in Kazan on Friday, Japan are heading home while Belgium march on.
“I told the players to take a shower in the changing room, because they were just standing around stunned. I will talk to them when we are back at the hotel,” Nishino said. “When we were 2-0 up and I didn’t change my players, I really wanted another goal, we were controlling the game, but at that point Belgium upped their game when they really had to. We were determined to disrupt a Belgium side at their best, but at the end we couldn’t really match them.”
Belgium pulled a goal back via a freak Jan Vertonghen header in the 69th minute and substitute Marouane Fellaini then equalized five minutes later.
The match was heading for extra-time when Keisuke Honda opted to try his luck from a long-range free-kick in stoppage-time.
Thibaut Courtois saved the attempt and Belgium broke from the corner that followed to snatch the winner and book a quarter-final with Brazil.
“We wanted to decide the match with a late free-kick and I thought we were going into extra-time, but we didn’t expect that kind of super counterattack,” Nishino said. “My players didn’t expect to see the ball carried into our half in a flash on time which decided the game.”
Nishino said that he was struggling with his emotions at the late sucker punch.
“When we conceded the goal, first I was questioning myself, whether I had control of the game, as we were 2-0 up and then the score was reversed,” he said. “It wasn’t the players who were to blame, maybe it was me who lost control of the game. I questioned myself and my tactics. I felt there wasn’t much in it between the teams, so maybe it was my decisions as a coach and we couldn’t keep up when Belgium upped their game.”
American rugby sevens star Ilona Maher is to join 15-a-side club Bristol next month in a bid to play in next year’s Women’s Rugby World Cup, the English club announced on Monday. Maher, 28, helped the US to a bronze medal at this summer’s Olympic Games in Paris and is the seven-a-side sport’s most popular player on social media. “This is a huge coup to be able to bring Ilona Maher to Bristol Bears on a short-term deal,” Bristol head coach Dave Ward said. “She is one of the biggest names in women’s sport, let alone rugby, and we believe she will
New Taipei Kings guard Jeremy Lin on Friday was named the Taiwan Professional Basketball League’s (TPBL) Player of the Month, the first domestic player to win the award, while the Hsinchu Toplus Lioneers are to welcome their third head coach in less than a year. Lin averaged 22 points, 5.4 rebounds and 6.6 assists over five games in October and last month, helping the Kings to second in the standings with a 4-2 record as of Friday. The Kings last night defeated the Lioneers 96-78 to move level with the top-of-the-table Formosa Dreamers (5-2), while in the night game, the New Taipei
LeBron James is in quite the shooting slump — especially from long distance, highlighted by his zero-for-four effort from three-point range for the Los Angeles Lakers in their 109-80 loss against the Minnesota Timberwolves on Monday. That return stretched the nearly-40-year-old’s skid to zero-for-19 from deep over his past four games. James’ birthday is on Dec. 30. After going four-for-16 from the floor overall with six of his team’s 20 turnovers for a season-low 10 points against the Timberwolves, James was asked to reflect on the Lakers reaching the quarter mark of their 2024-2025 schedule under rookie coach J.J. Redick at 12-9. “I
TO NO AVAIL: The Denver Nuggets’ Serbian center Nikola Jokic surpassed his 53-point performance in the 2023 Western Conference semi-finals against Phoenix The Washington Wizards withstood a 56-point explosion from Denver star Nikola Jokic to beat the Nuggets 122-113 on Saturday and snap their 16-game NBA losing streak. Jokic, who won his third NBA Most Valuable Player (MVP) award last season, posted a career scoring high — surpassing a 53-point performance in game four of the 2023 Western Conference semi-finals against Phoenix and a 50-point regular-season best against Sacramento in 2021. The Serbian big man added 16 rebounds and eight assists, but it was all to no avail as Washington, buoyed by 39 points from Jordan Poole, won for the first time
RSS