‘A big chance for us’: Japan relishing Croatia challenge and shot at World Cup history

DOHA: Ninety minutes and 2018 FIFA World Cup finalists Croatia are all that stand between Japan and making history.

And after successfully navigating a group that contained four-time world champions Germany and 2010 winners Spain, the Samurai Blue are not lacking in confidence.

Speaking after a training session on Saturday (Dec 3), several Japanese players said they were looking forward to the round of 16 clash, which will take place in two days time.

“It’s a big chance for us, big opportunity for us to make … history. We’ve got a lot of confidence after the last three games, but we’ll try to stay modest to play this game against Croatia,” said goalkeeper Eiji Kawashima.

“I am happy to go through (from) the group stage but our objective is to play (in the) quarterfinals … We’ll do what we have to do on the pitch,” added Arsenal fullback Takehiro Tomiyasu.

Head coach Hajime Moriyasu had previously said that the goal for Japan was to get beyond the last 16, something they have never done.

“It (the mood) is so positive and we’re looking forward (to) the knockout stage. Croatia also is another tough opponent so we’ll try our best to be prepared and go for it,” said goalkeeper Daniel Schmidt.

Japan are more than aware of the quality their opponents possess.

Despite finishing second in Group H, Croatia have not lost a game this tournament and conceded just the one goal.

“They have got a lot of quality in the middle, especially the three midfielders (Luka Modric, Mateo Kovacic and Marcelo Brozovic),” said Tomiyasu.

“So of course it won’t be an easy game but we’ve got enough quality to beat them and the most important thing is to be ourselves.”

And just as they had stressed after shocking Germany in their first group match, Samurai Blue