Dominic said:
Ah so Jun-Hide is Japanese, always thought you were Brittish 
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Anyway, Nakamura is class. He started making a name around 1999 if I remember correctly with his classy left foot. He was skinny as a bone back them though. You think Shunsuke is weak right now then look at his earlier frame he would have got killed playing likes of Matrix. And I am not kidding.
Shunsuke is a weird case because he has actually become more publicly recognized and viewed since moving to Celtic. I guess it comes with playing for a team that strive to win not to survive and the fact that he is playing consistently in a pretty piss-poor leauge also helps. Cozza, by the way, got to be one of the most undderated players in Italia for last 3-4 years. He is sheer class -a la Giovanni Tedesco.
It was petty he didnt make the WC 2002 team because Troussier thought he had one too many fantasista in his team. Alex (who was primarily attacker back then), Ono, and Nakamura were competing for two spots. Ono was almost certain pick - that meant it was either Alex or Nakamura. Troussier to the former. I know some till gripe at this but I consider Alex to be Japanese and I have no problem with that. By the way, some of rants against Alex by commentators during the international matches is out of line and they should stop. One match against Costa Rica last year, Miyamoto was clearly the one who mis-positioned his stance and commentator goes "It's not Alex again." - They were rooting for Murai back then who had one good game against nobody Korean RB.
Back to Nakamura - If we have anything to thank Zico then he is the one who saw Nakamura had genuine skills that is not only good for Asia but for a wider world. He knew as a technician himself the prodigious talent of his protege and Nakamura essentially replaced Nakata as a fulcrum of the team. I think he was convinced of this in the Asia Cup in China. He run the whole team based on Nakamura - and whilst some may say unexpected rise of Tamada Keiji was the biggest gain for Japan - I say Zico privately would have most pleased that Nakamura is more than pretty decorative player. Luckily for us in that tournament Korea got knocked out with a blinder of match against Iran - what was essentially a lets see who score more match - and Iran itself got knocked out by home team China. If we played either of those two then who knows what could have happen.
There is no doubt that Nakamura is the fulcrum of new Osim Japan. I still think he has a few good years in him, and we can slowly replace him with more direct, vibrant Morimoto as we head for WC. It is nice to see Shunsuke becoming more direct and scoring more goals than usual. Everyone knows he can see passes that nobody can see (Quotes from Stracchan) but he is also getting end of things these days.
As for Jeeks comment, I also heard the possibility that Nakamura could have some foreign blood. I wasnt whether it was Korean or Japanese. I wouldnt be surprised if his Grandmother is Chinese though since Yokohama is known to inhabit many Chinese migrants. Same for Koreans, Osaka, and Inamoto.
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