Football: ‘Japan good candidate for World Cup’

Japan will also stage the rugby World Cup in 2009, says Fifa President Sepp Blatter.

TOKYO: Japan will be a ‘good candidate’ to host the 2019 women’s football World Cup although they will stage the rugby World Cup in the same year, said Fifa President Sepp Blatter. Japan, who won the women’s World Cup in Germany last year and lost to the US in the London Olympic women’s football final last month, were playing host to the women’s under-20 World Cup due to end in Tokyo on Saturday. Blatter said he had talks with Kuniya Daini, the new president of the Japan Football Association, about the country’s wish to host the women’s World Cup after the 2015 edition is staged in Canada. “Japan would be a good candidate or contender,” said Blatter. “They are a little bit afraid because they’ll have the rugby World Cup in the same year but the sports are totally different.”

Published in The Express Tribune, September 8^th, 2012.