Japanese footballing hero Marcus Tanaka has urged his nation to prepare for their next World Cup campaign by forming a team around on-fire Celtic attacker Kyogo Furuhashi.
Having joined the Hoops as a relative unknown in the summer of 2021, Kyogo shot to prominence almost immediately with eight goals in 15 Premiership games before being injured in and around the Christmas period. He ended his debut league campaign with 12 goals in 19 games, alongside another five in European competition.
But it is this year that Kyogo has shown his true self. Despite a relatively poor Champions League campaign, the striker has 19 goals in just 23 Scottish Premiership games, 12 of those coming in his last 14 matches. As a result, it came as quite the shock that he was left out of Japan's World Cup squad earlier this season, especially with Daizen Maeda making his way into the team despite being in worse form than Kyogo at the time. They got to the last 16, but were dumped out by Croatia on penalties - ironically when they needed a striker the most. However, with the qualifiers for the 2026 World Cup beginning in the upcoming November, Tanaka has urged his nation to start Kyogo as a 'key player'.
He said: "Kyogo Furuhashi is a player I want to see playing for Japan moving forward. He is an explosive striker and a very good player. I want him to play.
"We know he wasn't taken to Qatar, but he is doing extremely well in Scotland, I can't remember any Japanese player in Europe scoring as many goals as he has by this stage of a season ever.
"For me, the team should be built around Furuhashi, with Brighton's Kaoru Mitoma and Takefusa Kubo of Real Sociedad heavily involved too."
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