By

Eniola Olatunji 

Japan on Thursday night pushed Ghana to the Exit Door of the Colombia 2024 world women’s U20 football tournament by 4-1.

Japan scored two late goals against Ghana from loss of concentration when deadly striker, Chinari Sasai scored in the 45th minute making her goals haul to three in the competition.

Midfielder, Manako Matsukubo who was playing her first game in the completion scored the 2nd goal in the 45+6th minute. The 3rd goal was scored in the 50th minute when Substitute Matsuaga found Miku Hayama who was scoring her 2nd goal in the games. 

Ghana had a penalty goal scored by Stella Nyameka in the 83rd minute while substitute Miyu Matsunaga made it four goals to Japan in the match.

Japan and Ghana met at their group stage at the last tournament and Japan won 2-0 on 14th August 2022. That was the only time they had met.

Japan had roasted New Zealand 7-0 in this tournament; lost to DPR Korea 1-2 on 16th March 2024; humbled Australia 5-1 on 13th March 2024 but lost again to DPR Korea by a lone goal on 10th March 2024.

Ghana lost all her group matches in the last edition of 2022 0-3 to USA; 0-2 to Japan and 1-4 to Netherlands. She lost 1-2 to Austria at Columbia 2024.

Japan tops group E with 6 points and +10 goals difference; Austria is 2nd with 3 points +1 Goals difference; Ghana is 3rd with zero point and -4 goals difference; New Zealand rocks the bottom with no point, no goal scored and -7 goals deficit.
 
The last group matches of group E will be played on Monday 9th September at 0000 hours between Japan and Austria and Ghana versus New Zealand at the same time.

In a group F encounter North Korea joined the league of three nations that massacred their opponents with 9 goals in a single match when the country slammed Costa Rica 9-0. Brazil had beaten Fiji 9-0 while Canada also slayed Fiji by the same margin.

Japan smashed Costa Rica with five goals to nothing in the first half. The first was an own goal by Noemy Segura in the 6th minute and Jon found Un-Yong Chae to score the 2nd goal in the 8th minute.

Il-son Choe got a brace when Ryong – Jong Jon again located her to score the 3rd goal in the 28th minute and she got the 4th goal in the 34th minute making three goals to her credit having scored in the 6-2 win over Argentina. Mi Ryong Pak got the 5th goal in the 43rd minute through another Jon assist. Jon has 4 assists so far.

On resumption of the second half, North Korea scored three more goals to make 8 goals. Song-Gyong Kim scored the 6th goal in the 49th minute and added another goal in the 55th minute to make it the 7th goal before Kum Jong scored the 8th goal in the 69th minute and Kang-Ryon Choe also put her name on the scorers’ sheet with the 9th goal in the 85th minute.

The last group F matches comes up on Sunday at 2100 hours when Netherlands will battle North Korea and Argentina will face Costa Rica.

The last group matches start on Friday with Mexico facing hosts Columbia in Group A at 2300 hours while Australia meets Cameroon at the same time also in group A.

On Saturday the Group B final matches are Canada versus Brazil and much whipped Fiji versus France at 2pm. That Saturday at 2100 hours, Nigeria will be against Venezuela and South Korea will face Germany in Group D.