SA U23s face Japan in friendly

SOUTH Africa’s under-23 side take another step forward in their preparation for the Olympic Games in Rio in August when they face Japan today.

It is a potential early sighter for both teams ahead of what could be a quarterfinal meeting at the tournament in Brazil if both make it out of their respective pools.

It is a useful exercise for the Japanese‚ who must contend with Nigeria in their first-round pool.

Although South Africa also have an Asian opponent in Iraq‚ their style is different to Japan’s.

“We haven’t had too many match-ups against African teams, so this will be an excellent opportunity to test ourselves‚” Japan coach Makoto Teguramori said.

“It’ll be a training match‚ not a send-off. We’d like to have a game that will make people anxiously await the Rio Games.”

Japan have a locally based squad for the match‚ not calling up their European-based U23 stars‚ Yuya Kubo and Takumi Minamino.

South Africa’s preparation for Rio has been adequate – they lifted the Cosafa Castle Cup on Saturday, having seen off Lesotho‚ Swaziland and Botswana – but this will likely be a step up again in terms of ability.

They scored an impressive nine goals against those teams but conceded four times and defensively looked all at sea at times.

It will be the major area of concern ahead of their tournament in Brazil.

“The game against Japan is crucial in that it will help check how far we have come and what more needs to be done‚” South Africa U23 coach Owen da Gama said.

“A win will most certainly keep the positive momentum in the team going on.”

Impressive midfielder Lebogang Phiri has not travelled with the squad as he returned to Denmark to his club Brondby to start their Uefa Europa League campaign away to Icelandic side Valur tomorrow.

South Africa and Japan do have a history at U23 level. They met in 2000 as South Africa lost 2-1 to the Japanese in their opening game.

They also met at the Festival Espoirs de Toulon in France two years later‚ when Japan were 3-0 winners. But the last two meetings‚ in Toulon (2005) and Qatar (2007), resulted in 1-0 wins for South Africa.