Kōji Nakata

Koji Nakata
Personal information
Full name	Koji Nakata
Date of birth	(1979-07-09) July 9, 1979
Place of birth	Otsu, Shiga, Japan
Height	1.82 m (5 ft 11 ¹⁄₂ in)
Playing position	Defender, Midfielder
Senior career*
Years	Team	Apps	(Gls)
1998–2004	Kashima Antlers	144	(27)
2005–2006	Olympique Marseille	9	(0)
2006–2008	Basel	62	(3)
2008–2014	Kashima Antlers	122	(6)
Total		337	(36)
National team
1999	Japan U-20	7	(0)
2000–2007	Japan	57	(2)
* Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only.

Koji Nakata (中田浩二, Nakata Kōji, born July 9, 1979) is a former Japanese football player. He played for Japan national team. He played at both the 2002, and the 2006 FIFA World Cup.^[1]

He announced that he will get married with Nao Nagasawa on February 22, 2014.

Football career

The 'other Nakata', as he is known to most non-Japanese fans, is a left-footed midfielder. A very versatile player, Nakata has established himself as one of the best defensive midfielders for Japan. Although his preferred position is at defensive midfield, his versatility means he can also operate as left wing-back, his normal position with Basel.

In 2004, during the Asian Cup final versus China, Nakata gained notoriety amongst Chinese fans by scoring the second Japanese goal with his hand.^[2] Despite Chinese protests, the goal was still allowed. The Chinese media refer to this incident as the "Hand of Koji" incident, alluding to Diego Maradona's infamous hand of god goal.

Nakata moved from Japanese giants Kashima Antlers to France at the start of 2005 when former Japan national team manager Philippe Troussier, then the Olympique Marseille coach, signed him in a deal. After an understandably unhappy season in France (Troussier was sacked just a few months later), the frozen-out Nakata jumped at the chance to leave and by early 2006 had moved to Switzerland's top team Basel where he played as a defender.^[3] Kōji was highly rated by Japan coach Zico and is sometimes compared to Junichi Inamoto, also a defensive midfielder for Japan. He returned to J1 League club Kashima Antlers in July 2008.

In October 2008 Nakata underwent knee surgery, effectively ruling him out for the remainder of the 2008 J. League season after appearing in 12 games.

Club statistics

Club	Season	League		Cup		League Cup		Continental		Total
Club	Season	Apps	Goals	Apps	Goals	Apps	Goals	Apps	Goals	Apps	Goals
Kashima Antlers	1998	5	1	0	0	0	0	–		5	1
	1999	17	4	2	0	1	0	–		20	4
	2000	29	4	5	2	2	2			36	8
	2001	25	8	3	1	6	0	–		34	9
	2002	29	6	5	0	3	0			37	6
	2003	18	3	–		2	2	3	0	23	5
	2004	21	1	3	2	2	0	–		26	3
	Total	144	27	18	5	16	4	3	0	181	36
Olympique Marseille	2004–05	5	0	–		–		–		5	0
	2005–06	4	0	–		1	0	5	0	10	0
	Total	9	0	0	0	1	0	5	0	15	0
Basel	2005–06	10	1	–		–		–		10	1
	2006–07	34	1	5	0	–		9	0	48	1
	2007–08	18	1	2	1	–		5	0	25	2
	Total	62	3	7	1	0	0	14	0	83	4
Kashima Antlers	2008	9	0	–		1	0	2	0	12	0
	2009	22	1	4	0	1	0	2	0	29	1
	2010	32	3	6	1	1	0	6	2	45	6
	2011	26	2	1	0	3	0	6	1	36	3
	2012	5	0	0	0	2	0	–		7	0
	2013	25	0	2	0	6	0	–		33	0
	2014	3	0	0	0	1	0	–		4	0
	Total	122	6	13	1	15	0	16	3	166	10
Career total		337	36	38	7	32	4	38	3	445	50

National Team statistics

Appearances in major competitions

Team	Competition	Category	Appearances		Goals	Team Record
Team	Competition	Category	Start	Sub	Goals	Team Record
Japan	AFC Youth Championship 1998	U-19				2nd Place
Japan	1999 FIFA World Youth Championship	U-20	7	0	0	2nd Place
Japan	2000 Summer Olympics	U-23	3	0	0	Quarter-finals
Japan	2001 FIFA Confederations Cup	Senior				2nd Place
Japan	2002 FIFA World Cup	Senior	4	0	0	Round of 16
Japan	2003 FIFA Confederations Cup	Senior	1	1	0	Group Stage
Japan	2004 AFC Asian Cup	Senior	1	3	2	Champions
Japan	2005 FIFA Confederations Cup	Senior	0	2	0	Group Stage
Japan	2006 FIFA World Cup	Senior	0	1	0	Group Stage

Goals for Senior National Team

^[1]

#	Date	Venue	Opponent	Score	Result	Competition
1.	3 August 2004	Jinan, China	Bahrain	4-3	Won	2004 AFC Asian Cup Semi-Final
2.	7 August 2004	Beijing, China	China PR	3-1	Won	2004 AFC Asian Cup Final

^[1]

Japan national team
Year	Apps	Goals
2000	7	0
2001	13	0
2002	13	0
2003	7	0
2004	6	2
2005	8	0
2006	2	0
2007	1	0
Total	57	2

Honours

Club

Kashima Antlers

Olympique Marseille

UEFA Intertoto Cup: 2005

FC Basel

International

AFC Asian Cup: 2004
FIFA Confederations Cup Runner-up: 2001
FIFA World Youth Championship Runner-up: 1999

Individual

J. League Best Eleven: 2001
J. League Cup MVP: 2000

References

1 2 3 "NAKATA Koji". Japan National Football Team Database.
↑ Japan crush Chinese dreams to keep Asian crown
↑ "Zwei neue Nationalspieler für den FCB" (in German). FC Basel. 31 January 2006. Retrieved 28 December 2012.

External links

Kōji Nakata at National-Football-Teams.com
Kōji Nakata at the Japan National Football Team
Kōji Nakata at J.League (in Japanese)
Rising Sun News profile

2001 J.League Team of the Year
GK: Arno van Zwam DF: Go Oiwa DF: Yutaka Akita DF: Akira Narahashi MF: Mitsuo Ogasawara MF: Takashi Fukunishi MF: Toshiya Fujita MF: Toshihiro Hattori MF: Kōji Nakata FW: Will FW: Atsushi Yanagisawa

Japan Squad

Japan men's football squad – 2000 Summer Olympics
1 Narazaki 2 Nakazawa 3 Matsuda 4 Morioka 5 Miyamoto 6 Inamoto 7 H. Nakata 8 Myojin 9 Hirase 10 Nakamura 11 Miura 12 Sakai 13 Yanagisawa 14 Motoyama 15 Nishi 16 K. Nakata 17 Takahara 18 Tsuzuki Coach: Troussier

Japan squad – 2001 FIFA Confederations Cup Runners-Up
1 Kawaguchi 2 Uemura 3 Matsuda 4 Morioka (c) 5 Inamoto 6 Hattori 7 H. Nakata 8 Morishima 9 Nishizawa 10 Miura 11 Nakayama 12 Narazaki 13 Yamashita 14 Ito 15 Fujita 16 K. Nakata 17 Myojin 18 Toda 19 Kubo 20 Hato 21 Ono 22 Suzuki 23 Tsuzuki Coach: Troussier

Japan squad – 2002 FIFA World Cup
1 Kawaguchi 2 Akita 3 Matsuda 4 Morioka 5 Inamoto 6 Hattori 7 H. Nakata 8 Morishima 9 Nishizawa 10 Nakayama 11 Suzuki 12 Narazaki 13 Yanagisawa 14 Alex 15 Fukunishi 16 K. Nakata 17 Miyamoto (c) 18 Ono 19 Ogasawara 20 Myojin 21 Toda 22 Ichikawa 23 Sogahata Coach: Troussier

Japan squad – 2003 FIFA Confederations Cup
1 Narazaki 2 Narahashi 3 Akita 4 Morioka 5 Inamoto 6 Hattori 7 H. Nakata (c) 8 Ogasawara 9 Ōkubo 10 Nakamura 11 Matsui 12 Doi 13 Oku 14 Alex 15 Myojin 16 K. Nakata 17 Miyamoto 18 Nagai 19 Endō 20 Takahara 21 Tsuboi 22 Yamada 23 Kawaguchi Coach: Zico

Japan squad – 2004 AFC Asian Cup winners (3rd title)
1 Narazaki 3 Tanaka 4 Endō 5 Miyamoto (c) 6 Nakata 8 Ogasawara 10 Nakamura 11 Suzuki 12 Doi 14 Alex 15 Fukunishi 16 Fujita 17 Miura 18 Matsuda 19 Motoyama 20 Tamada 21 Kaji 22 Nakazawa 23 Kawaguchi 24 Nishi 25 Chano 26 Yamada Coach: Zico

Japan squad – 2005 FIFA Confederations Cup
1 Narazaki 2 Tanaka 3 Chano 4 Endō 5 Miyamoto (c) 6 K. Nakata 7 H. Nakata 8 Ogasawara 9 Tamada 10 Nakamura 11 Suzuki 12 Doi 13 Yanagisawa 14 Alex 15 Fukunishi 16 Oguro 17 Miura 18 Inamoto 19 Motoyama 20 Tsuboi 21 Kaji 22 Moniwa 23 Kawaguchi Coach: Zico

Japan squad – 2006 FIFA World Cup
1 Narazaki 2 Moniwa 3 Komano 4 Endō 5 Miyamoto (c) 6 K. Nakata 7 H. Nakata 8 Ogasawara 9 Takahara 10 Nakamura 11 Maki 12 Doi 13 Yanagisawa 14 Alex 15 Fukunishi 16 Oguro 17 Inamoto 18 Ono 19 Tsuboi 20 Tamada 21 Kaji 22 Nakazawa 23 Kawaguchi Coach: Zico

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