Some bad news for Japanese fans: their top strikers, Naohiro Takahara and Atsushi Yanagisawa, will miss their final warm-up game against Malta because of injuries.

Fortunately, it seems the players will not miss the first match of the World Cup and, more, this would give Zico the chnace to test other strikers.

Takahara, who scored twice in the Asian champions’ 2-2 friendly draw against Germany on Tuesday, trained alone because of a sore knee on Friday while while Yanagisawa was sidelined a hamstring problem.

“These kinds of muscle injuries are always worrying,” said Japan coach Zico.

“We will see what’s what in training (on Saturday) but I very much doubt either of them will be able to play against Malta,” he added.

But Zico said he hoped to use the duo in Japan’s opener against Australia on 12 June in Kaiserslautern. “I want to play them in the Australia game so we will do our best to have them ready,” he said.

In the Malta game, Zico is expected to start Masashi Oguro and Keiji Tamada up front in the probable absence of Takahara and Yanagisawa.

Source: WCoffsite