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BORDEAUX - Japan face Canada in their final pool B rugby World Cup match on Tuesday with a mounting injury crisis which has seen flanker Yasunori Watanabe ruled out.
However, centre and kicker Shotaro Onishi has made a dramatic recovery from a rib injury and takes his place in the line-up, provided he passes a late fitness test on Monday, while fullback Go Aruba has also been restored to the starting line-up.
Having narrowly lost to Fiji (35-31) and suffered hammerings at the hands of Australia (91-3) and Wales (72-18), this match represents the Asian champions' last hopes of restoring some pride and going home with only their second ever World Cup victory.
But that task has been made much harder by a number of injuries, with Watanabe's bicep problem the latest, added to the previous losses of captain Takamichi Sasaki after the Australia game, scrum-half Yuki Yatomi after the Fiji game and fly-half Eiji Ando and winger Daisuke Ohata after a warm-up match against Portugal.
Japan's New Zealand coach John Kirwan, a World Cup winner in 1987, is relieved to have Onishi back.
"He's an important part of the team, he's playing well and he's also our goal kicker," he said.
"Fortunately, the injury after 24 hours wasn't as bad as we first anticipated so we just decided to give him as long as we could to recover and he's feeling pretty confident."
"Injuries are part of the game; we're up to our eighth now and that's just something you've got to get used to and adapt to. There will be no excuses coming from this camp."
Despite Japan holding a 9-8 advantage in head to heads between the two countries, Kirwan rates Canada as the favourites in this one.
"They're definitely the favourites, they're a good side, quarter-finalists in 1991, I played against them actually," he said.
"They've got a proud history, they're big guys and know how to play rugby. We're definitely the underdogs and that's fine, we're happy with that title."
Canada are in practically the same position as Japan, having lost their first two games to Wales (42-17) and Fiji (29-16), and with little hope of beating Australia, this is also their best chance of maintaining their record of having always come away from a World Cup with at least one victory.
"The players have a lot of pride and they know that in the record books Canada has come away with at least one victory from every World Cup," said coach Ric Suggitt.
"So they're well aware of that but we don't want to put any external pressure on them and say you have to win the game because we don't want to be the only team that goes away 0-4.
"We were quite unfortunate not to win the last game (Fiji) and I felt the first game (Wales) slipped away from us."
Suggitt has changed his entire back row ahead of the Japan clash, knowing that he needs more mobile players to counter the speed of the Asian side.
"We realise that they're very quick and play with a lot of tempo in the game so we've got some fresh legs in the back row.
"I'm putting (Aaron) Carpenter in there and (Adam) Kleeberger and (Colin) Yukes so hopefully we'll be able to take away a bit of their strengths by having some guys that can get around the field as frequently as they do."
Canada: Mike Pyke; DTH Van der Merwe, Craig Culpan, David Spicer, James Pritchard; Ryan Smith, Morgan Williams (capt); Aaron Carpenter, Adam Kleeberger, Colin Yukes; Mike James, Mike Burak; Jon Thiel, Pat Riordan, Rod Snow. Res: Mike Pletch, Dan Pletch, Scott Franklin, Josh Jackson, Mike Webb, Ed Fairhurst, Justin Mensah-Coker
Japan: Go Aruga; Kosuke Endo, Yuta Imamura, Shotaro Onishi, Christian Loamanu; Bryce Robins, Tomoki Yoshida; Takuro Miuchi (capt), Philip O'Reilly, Hare Makiri; Luke Thompson, Hitoshi Ono; Tomokazu Soma, Yuji Matsubara, Tatsukishi Nishiura. Res: Taku Inokuchi, Ryo Yamamura, Luatangi Samurai Vatuvei, Hajime Kiso, Kim Chulwon, Koji Taira, Hirotoki Onozawa
Referee: Joel Jutge (France)
- AFP
