MADRID, 29 Jul. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Spanish women’s team will seek this Monday to add to their qualification for the round of 16 of the World Cup in Australia and New Zealand by doing so as first in Group C, for which they need not to lose against Japan, a rival they have never officially faced absolute level, but with which he has a history of joys and disappointments in the lower categories.
In its last match of the group stage, Spain faces one of the countries that has invested the most in women’s football and that has many similarities in terms of style and philosophy of play. In fact, the RFEF and the Japanese Association have a collaboration agreement to work to exchange knowledge in different fields
Japan seems to have lost some strength in contrast to the growth of the national team, which has even surpassed it in the world ranking. But although Jorge Vilda’s team is now sixth in the world, five places above the Japanese, the list of winners of the Japanese is surely higher, especially with their ‘elders’ since they were world champions in 2011 and runners-up in 2015, two times ‘queens’ of Asia and Olympic silver in London 2012, milestones still far from Spanish women’s football.
But they do coincide more in the lower categories, where both countries shine, although the Asian can boast of being the only one in the world that has won the world crowns at an absolute level, Sub-20 (2018) and Sub-17 (2014), these last two crossing the path of Spain, which has been able to take revenge and is currently the world champion in the two lower categories. On Monday, Spanish and Japanese players will meet again after having experienced a rivalry when they were younger
You have to go back to 2010, to the U-17 World Cup in Trinidad and Tobago, to see the first duel between the Spanish and Japanese, settled by a clear 4-1 in the group stage for the former, where Alexia Putellas and Ivana Andrés were. Spain, European champion, finished third that event, and Japan runner-up.
Four years later, at the World Cup in Costa Rica, both teams met again with their Under-17 generations. The Asian won both the first phase (2-0) and the historic final (2-0), with a team already led by the talented Yui Hasegawa and Hina Sugita, two starting players presumably on Monday. The Spanish team already had figures who are in this World Cup such as Aitana Bonmatí and Rocío Gálvez, as well as Patri Guijarro.
In 2016, Spain and Japan collided in the U-17 and U-20 World Cups. In the first, the Spanish team, where Eva Navarro and Ona Batlle already excelled, fell in the semifinals and finished third after losing in the reissue of the final from two years earlier against the Japanese, finally runners-up. Weeks later, with a goal from Mariona Caldentey and with a team with Bonmatí, Gálvez or Alba Redondo, Spain won 1-0 in the group stage of a date where Japan was runner-up and Hina Sugita was chosen as the best player.
THE LAST UNDER-20 AND UNDER-17 WORLD CUP BRING A SMILE TO SPAIN
Part of these generations met again two years later in the U-20 World Cup and also in a double match. The Spanish team, with players like Bonmatí, Batlle, Guijarro, Navarro or Cata Coll as goalkeepers, won 1-0, with a goal from Carmen Menayo, in the group stage, but fell 3-1 in the final against a Japan with footballers like Miyazawa, Ueki, Endo, Nagano and Minami, present in Australia and New Zealand.
However, four years later the script was favorable to the ‘Red’, who took revenge at the Under-20 level, proclaiming herself world champion for the first time by beating Japan 3-1, with a double from the now World Cup player Salma Paralluelo that on Monday he will meet again with Maika Hamano, chosen Ballon d’Or, Rian Ishikawa, or Aoba Fujino. And months later, in the U-17 World Cup, a double by Vicky López in minutes 87 and 93 served to epically come back from 1-0 and bring the Japanese down in the quarterfinals of a date that ended with a title for Spain.
The two teams know each other well and they already saw each other a few months ago. At the end of November, at La Cartuja in Seville, Spain won 1-0, with a goal from Alba Redondo, in a match where they suffered against an opponent who fielded almost a dozen players who could start on Monday. In addition, the team coached by Jorge Vilda won 3-1 in the 2020 She Believes Cup and the 2017 Algarve Cup and tied (1-1) in a friendly in 2019.