Houston \u2013 Japan can beat Brazil in the World Cup last 32 by embracing an \u201cunderdog mentality,\u201d Monaco striker Takumi Minamino said.<\/p>\n
The two sides clash on Monday in Houston, and record five-time champion Brazil will be favorites to reach the next round.<\/p>\n
But Japan, considered by some to be an outsider to go far at the tournament in North America, beat Carlo Ancelotti\u2019s side 3-2 in a home friendly in October.<\/p>\n
Minamino, who is at the World Cup in a nonplaying capacity after suffering a serious knee injury, said Japan can pull off another surprise.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf we play with the underdog mentality, as we always have, I believe we have the ability to make something happen in these one-off games,\u201d said the 31-year-old, who scored in the friendly win eight months ago.<\/p>\n
Speaking to reporters on Friday at Japan\u2019s training base near Nashville, Tennessee, Minamino said attacker Takefusa Kubo could play a part after a knee injury.<\/p>\n
The Real Sociedad winger came off in the 2-2 draw with the Netherlands that launched Japan\u2019s World Cup campaign.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe is especially spirited, so he needs no encouragement from me,\u201d Minamino said, according to Kyodo News.<\/p>\n
\u201cEveryone believes we will welcome him back in the knockout stage, and he is rehabbing with that same belief.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Houston \u2013 Japan can beat Brazil in the World Cup last 32 by embracing an \u201cunderdog mentality,\u201d Monaco…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":514486,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[35581,1083,85,46,234840,105],"class_list":["post-514485","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-2026-fifa-world-cup","tag-brazil","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-samurai-blue","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/514485","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=514485"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/514485\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/514486"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=514485"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=514485"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=514485"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}