Samurai Blue 2006

This is it. It's only a little over one week until the whole world watches closely as the whole world plays. Fifa World Cup 2006 in Germany is finally upon us, and coming June 9, 2006, time may indeed stop.

This is Japan's third consecutive World Cup, with the first effort in France '98 ending without a win for Japan, and with the second effort in Korea/Japan giving a Final Round of 16 appearance.

With about a dozen of Japan's Germany roster currently playing or have played in various European leagues such as the Italian Serie A, English Premiership, and most of all, the La Liga Espanola, Japan seems poised for a real chance at bettering its previous Cup appearance.

Our first match is against Australia, followed by Croatia, and finally against reigning World Champions Brazil. We're ranked 18 in the world, I hope we that the Samurai Blue Nippon team show the world that we can do better than that.