Japan and India will face-off in one-off T20I at the Sano International Cricket Ground.
The first-ever international cricket game between India and Japan will take place at the Sano International Cricket Ground a few days before the Asian Games in Aichi-Nagoya. Kadowaki-Fleming believes that hosting India, Afghanistan, and Nepal in the Asian Games demonstrates the rapid advancement of Japanese cricket.
“It's very exciting. And I think a massive development for cricket in Japan to have countries like Afghanistan and Nepal coming here is something that we probably would have thought was very difficult to manage even a couple of years ago,” Kadowaki-Fleming told PTI.
While the occasion will be historic, the Japan captain insists his side does not want to merely celebrate it. For Japan, the fixture is about much more than testing themselves against India's stars.
“As exciting as the occasion will be of playing India, we're not there to just celebrate the occasion. We're there to show what we can do as a men's team. Obviously, a team like India has all bases covered, whether it's fast bowling, batting, or spin.
So, it's just going to be great to be able to watch world-class players and the best team in the world in that format go about it. Hopefully this is the first step in a long history of playing against and competing against full member countries," he said.
Japan’s teenage all-rounder Charlie Hara-Hinze played against India in the 2024 U19 Asia Cup, when India had the likes of Vaibhav Sooryavanshi and Ayush Mhatre.
“That was a game we definitely went into with a lot of excitement. We got a lot out of it in terms of bowling to these guys, seeing first-hand how good they are and the standard at which they played. You had very little margin for error as well. The Indian cricket team was to come to Japan to face us, which was something that doesn't sound real to many people and still probably hasn't quite sunk in,” Hara-Hinze said.
(PTI inputs)