Japan midfielder Makoto Hasebe left training early on Monday after having pain in his hip. The 26-year-old Wolfsbug player first suffered the injury just a few days ago during Japan’s 2-0 warm-up loss to Cote d’Ivoire. Of course nobody knew anything because the Ivorian diva Drogba (okay, he’s a decent person, but we’re talking soccer here) hogged all of the headlines, what with his broken arm and all.
A spokesman for the Japanese football team confirmed that he (Hasebe not Drogba) was taken to a hospital but the extent of the injury still isn’t known. Hasebe has served as the team’s captain in the matches running up to the start of the Cup.
Honduras gets good news as Wilson Palacios is okay after all. He was stretchered off the pitch in a 3-0 loss to Hungary over the weekend, but it turns out his groin is just fine and he’ll be good to play the opener against Chile (who if you didn’t know are without Humberto Suazo). We shouldn’t gloss over the fact that getting blanked by Hungary is bad enough news in itself.
Rafa Marquez returned to training today after a suffering a right leg injury in Mexico’s 2-1 win over Italy. We’ll refrain from talking s**t about Mexico lest we get called racist again. Instead we’ll just say that Marquez is getting old.
