The wards of Mykola Kostenko arrived in Japan on September 27 at the invitation of the Japanese Football Association. After three days of training, today they met with the Japanese national team, which holds the fourth place in the BSWW ranking (Ukraine is in 17th position), on Okura Beach Park in Akashi in a friendly match.

The first period was dominated by the home team, who delivered several dangerous shots at the Ukrainian goal but failed to score.

However, early in the second 12-minute half, captain and playing coach of the Japanese national team Ozu Morreira made a fantastic shot from distance that Andriy Nerus could not stop. 1:0. However, less than a minute later, our team responded with an equally spectacular goal. Igor Levchenko scored with scissors from midfield.

In the first two minutes of the third period, the opponents exchanged goals. First, Dmitro Voytenko's shot from the left flank put Ukraine ahead, but soon Takaki Oba demonstrated Japanese mastery in executing scissors — 2:2. And with three minutes to go, Takuya Akaguma powerfully kicked the ball into our goal from a sharp angle. On the 32nd minute, Susui Yamaguchi scored the fourth goal of the home team with a shot from the central zone and put an end to the match.

Thus, Japan won 4:2.

Beach Soccer Friendly Match

Japan - Ukraine - 4:2

Goals: Ozu Morreira (15), Oba (26), Akaguma (29), Yamaguchi (32) — Levchenko (16), Voytenko (25).

Ukraine: Nerus, Kovalenko, Koroinychuk, Voytok, Medvid', Voytenko, Zavorotnyi, Pashko, Levchenko, Verbitskyi, Borzuk, Shchitnik.

The second friendly match between the national teams of Japan and Ukraine will take place tomorrow, October 2, also in Akashi (kickoff at 8:00 AM Kyiv time).