Paraguay and Japan are taking on each other in a round of 16 match of World Cup 2010 on 29 June at the Loftus Versfeld Stadium in Pretoria. After showing excellent improvement on their performances in the pre-World Cup friendly matches, Japan is now pretty much confident to reach the quarter final of the tournament, while Paraguay who reached the last 16, ahead of Italy, must be happy to have got the Asian side as their opponent.
Time
The match kicks off at 14:00 GMT and 16:00 local time. In Japan, football fans can watch the match on TV from 23:00. According to Paraguay time, the match begins at 10:00. In USA, the match starts at 10:00 in New York time and at 07:00 in California time.
Live Score
Football fans can get the live score of the match in the following website address:
http://www.livescore.com/
Japan reached the round of 16 as the group E runner up with 6 points to their credit, after defeating Cameroon 1-0 and Denmark 3-1. Though they lost to Netherlands 1-0, the Asians would not be disappointed considering the kind of improvement they could make so far in the tournament.
Japan was struggling for form in the friendly fixtures before the World Cup and there were not many who had high hopes about Japan’s chances of getting into the knock out stage of the tournament.
In Group F, Paraguay put on some dominating performances and clinched their last 16 place as the group champion. Paraguay started their campaign with a 1-1 draw with defending champion Italy, before defeating Slovakia. In their last group match, the South Americans drew with New Zealand.
Japan has some excellent attacking minded players like Keisuke Honda and Shinji Okazaki. Some other players who pose enough threat for the Paraguayans are Yuji Nakazawa, Marcus Tulio Tanaka and Makoto Hasebe who could pull the strings for their team.
Here, it is noteworthy that Tanaka is fit for the Paraguay match after getting over his back injury. Given the recent form of the players of his starting line up, it is less likely that coach Takeshi Okada would bring any change in their starting eleven against Paraguay.
Paraguay also has some quality players who could dominate over the Asian side and help their team to overcome the Japanese challenge. They have two very strong central midfielders in Enrique Vera and Cristian Riveros, while their attacking line up features the players like Roque Santa Cruz and Nelson Valdez.
Paraguay would miss defensive midfielder Victor Ceceres as he is suspended after being booked in the previous two matches. Carlos Bonet is most likely to replace Ceceres. Center back Antolin Alcaraz, who missed their last group encounter with New Zealand, has recovered from the minor knock and could be in the starting eleven against Japan.
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