Japan head coach Sadayoshi Shirai has acknowledged that his team faces a difficult challenge against Nigeria\u2019s Flamingos in the final of the 2026 FIFA U-17 Women\u2019s World Cup.<\/p>\n
The Japanese have enjoyed an unbeaten run in Morocco, conceding just two goals throughout the competition.<\/p>\n
Shirai\u2019s side also had to overcome stern tests against Ghana and DPR Korea in the knockout stages to secure their place in the final.<\/p>\n
However, Nigeria\u2019s Flamingos have equally impressed, bouncing back from a 2-1 opening-game defeat to Poland to reach the tournament\u2019s showpiece match.<\/p>\n
The West Africans have since won their last five matches and will pose a serious threat to the Japanese side as both teams battle for the coveted title.<\/p>\n
Shirai Declares Japan Ready For Flamingos Test <\/p>\n
Shirai admitted that his team would need a collective effort to overcome the Nigerian challenge.<\/p>\n
\u201cWinning the World Cup has been our goal ever since this team came together,\u201d Shirai told FIFA during the pre-match press conference.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve told the team that we all need to pull together tomorrow, including those who won\u2019t be in the starting line-up. I want everyone to remember that we\u2019re all fighting together as one.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve already faced three African sides that have all been very powerful and determined to score goals.\u201d<\/p>\n
Source: <\/p>\n
Japan head coach Sadayoshi Shirai has acknowledged that his team faces a difficult challenge against Nigeria\u2019s Flamingos in the final of the 2026 FIFA U-17 Women\u2019s World Cup. The Japanese… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11650","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11650","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11650"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11650\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11650"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11650"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11650"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}