{"id":13173,"date":"2012-08-04T14:04:26","date_gmt":"2012-08-04T12:04:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/08\/olympics-soccer-japan-coach-denies-rule-bending\/"},"modified":"2012-08-04T14:04:26","modified_gmt":"2012-08-04T12:04:26","slug":"olympics-soccer-japan-coach-denies-rule-bending","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/olympics-soccer-japan-coach-denies-rule-bending\/","title":{"rendered":"Olympics-Soccer-Japan coach denies rule-bending"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

Aug 4 (Reuters) – Japan women’s soccer coach Norio Sasaki
\nhit back after being criticised for ordering the world champions
\nnot to win their final first-round game at the London Olympics.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

A defiant Sasaki denied any rule-bending on his part in
\nTuesday’s 0-0 draw against South Africa.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

“We never set out with the intention for playing for a
\ndraw,” he told reporters after his team beat Brazil 2-0 in
\nCardiff on Friday to reach the semi-finals. “We never tried to
\nplay for a draw from the start.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

“From the start we were playing for three points. I made a
\ndecision based on the way the game was going and with time
\nrunning out.”<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

Sasaki’s instructions to his players not to press for a
\nwinner against South Africa meant Japan went through in second
\nplace behind Sweden in Group F.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

It also ensured they stayed in Cardiff for Friday’s
\nquarter-final and did not have to travel to Glasgow, triggering
\ncriticism from rival coaches.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

“None of the players complained,” said Sasaki, whose team
\nwill face France in the last four at Wembley on Monday. “We
\nwanted to stay (in Cardiff).”<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

Soccer’s governing body FIFA found there were insufficient
\ngrounds to launch disciplinary action against Sasaki based on
\nhis post-match comments.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

However, the controversy came after eight players from South
\nKorea, China and Indonesia were kicked out of the women’s
\nbadminton competition for trying to lose group matches to secure
\neasier draws in the knockout stages.
\n\u00a0 Continued…<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Aug 4 (Reuters) – Japan women’s soccer coach Norio Sasaki hit back after being criticised for ordering the world champions not to win their final first-round game at the London Olympics. A defiant Sasaki denied any rule-bending on his part in Tuesday’s 0-0 draw against South Africa. “We never set out with the intention for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[830,2370,183],"class_list":{"0":"post-13173","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-news","8":"tag-reuters","9":"tag-south-africa-2","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13173","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13173"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13173\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13173"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13173"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13173"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}