Okazaki, Iwashita, Kaito Called Up

Barry writes:

The twenty-eight man squad for the Japan national team's three upcoming games was announced today. Japan are set to face Hong Kong (Oct 8th @ Nihondaira) in a qualifier for the 2011 Asian Cup, and Scotland (Oct 10th @ Nissan Stadium), and Togo (Oct 14th @ Miyagi), in 2009's Kirin Cup.

In addition to Okazaki, Kaito Yamamoto and Keisuke Iwashita have been reward for excellent seasons with their first full national team call ups. As a result, all three will be unavailable for our Emperor's Cup 2nd round game with Sagawa Printing on October 11th.

Their inclusion comes as no surprise to any S-Pulse fan who has watched them both grow in stature and experience as the season has gone on. Both have been instrumental in our 12 game unbeaten run, and have been frequently praised on these pages, so we're made up to see them join their team-mate Okachan in the dark blue of Japan. Good luck, fellas!

The squad in full:

GK:
Eiji Kawashima (Kawasaki Frontale)
Kaito Yamamoto (SHIMIZU S-PULSE)
Shusaku Nishikawa (Oita Trinita)

DF:
Yuji Nakazawa (Yokohama F.Marinos)
Marcus Tulio Tanaka (Urawa Red Diamonds)
Yuichi Komano (Jubilo Iwata)
Yuki Abe (Urawa Red Diamonds)
Daiki Iwamasa (Kashima Antlers)
Yasuyuki Konno (FC Tokyo)
Yuhei Tokunaga (FC Tokyo)
Yuto Nagatomo (FC Tokyo)
Keisuke Iwashita (SHIMIZU S-PULSE)
Atsuto Uchida (Kashima Antlers)

MF:
Shunsuke Nakamura (RCD Espanyol)
Hideo Hashimoto (Gamba Osaka)
Junichi Inamoto (Stade Rennes)
Yasuhito Endo (Gamba Osaka)
Kengo Nakamura (Kawasaki Frontale)
Daisuke Matsui (Grenoble Foot)
Naohiro Ishikawa (FC Tokyo)
Makoto Hasebe (Vfl Wolfsburg)
Keisuke Honda (VVV Venlo)

FW:
Keiji Tamada (Nagoya Grampus)
Ryoichi Maeda (Jubilo Iwata)
Hisato Sato (Sanfrecce Hiroshima)
Yoshito Okubo (Vissel Kobe)
Shinji Okazaki (SHIMIZU S-PULSE)
Takayuki Morimoto (Catania)