I can’t help thinking that Kyogo Furuhashi made a huge mistake back in January when he left Celtic for French side Rennes….
He listened to the no-doubt well intentioned advice from the Japan National Team manager Hajime Moriyasu about getting a move to a top five so that he’d stand a better chance of fulfilling his dream of playing for his country in the World Cup next summer in USA, Canada and Mexico.
Kyogo changed agents, coincidentally joining the same agency as Moriyasu himself and last summer he chapped on Brendan Rodgers’ door to request a transfer. As Celtic’s main striker that never happened immediately but there did seem to be a dip in Kyogo’s performance levels earlier in the season.
By January an offer was on the table from French side Rennes and the deal was done with a separate transfer involving Jota returning to Celtic also taking place. At the time that seemed to be a perfect solution for all parties and it was smiles all round or in Jota’s case tears of joy as he scored for Celtic at Motherwell.
For Kyogo Rennes has not been so good. The manager changed, the director of football who signed him was sacked and he’s apparently now been deemed surplus to requirements and looks certain to be offloaded on the cheap this summer after falling out of contention. Not that he was ever given a chance.
From being loved at Paradise to being unwanted pretty much from the word go at Rennes must be tough of Kyogo. He might even watch the Scottish Cup Final tomorrow and think that he could have been there at a stadium he always relished playing in and which gave him so many career highlights. That croissant he was given by a Rennes supporter on his arrival at the club was about as good as it got for him in France.
And all the while he watched as Daizen Maeda and Adam Idah took over the striker’s role at Celtic and both, especially Daizen, who has won every Player of the Year award going, have become real heroes at the Scottish treble chasers.
We reported earlier on The Celtic Star that Hajime Moriyasu has decided to rest many of his mainstay players for the remaining two World Cup qualifiers on 5 and 10 of June. These rested players include Daizen Maeda who has played over 50 matches for Celtic this season. Many of Japan’s other top stars playing in Europe are also rested for the two matches with Japan already qualified having already secured qualification for the World Cup Finals.
Here’s the Japan squad…
Goalkeepers: Keisuke Osako (Sanfrecce Hiroshima), Kosei Tani (Machida Zelvia), Zion Suzuki (Parma)
Defenders: Yuto Nagatomo (FC Tokyo), Tsuyoshi Watanabe (Gent), Koki Machida (Royale Union Saint-Gilloise), Ayumu Seko (Grasshopper), Hiroki Sekine (Reims), Junnosuke Suzuki (Shonan Bellmare), Kota Takai (Kawasaki Frontale)
Midfielders/Forwards: Wataru Endo (Liverpool), Yuki Ohashi (Blackburn), Daichi Kamada (Crystal Palace), Ryoya Morishita (Legia Warsaw), Shuto Machino (Holstein Kiel), Keito Nakamura (Reims), Kaishu Sano (Mainz), Yu Hirakawa (Bristol City), Koki Kumasaka, Mao Hosoya (Kashiwa Reysol), Takefusa Kubo (Real Sociedad), Yuito Suzuki (Brondby), Joel Chima Fujita (Sint-Truiden), Shunsuke Mito (Sparta), Kodai Sano (NEC Nijmegen), Kota Tawaratsumida (FC Tokyo), Ryunosuke Sato (Fagiano Okayama).
EIGHT players yet to start for Japan included in this “experimental” squad, as well as NINE more with five caps or less!
Congrats to the SANO family for two selections here.
Lucky Australia get to play a “weak” (but ready to prove themselves) squad in very important game for them pic.twitter.com/Dlhnr2UuyV— jsoccermagazine.bsky.social FOLLOW at BLUESKY (@JSoccerMagazine) May 23, 2025
You might notice that there’s no place for Kyogo who certainly hasn’t been over-played this year since his move to Rennes. Kyogo wanted to leave Celtic to fulfil his dream of playing for his country in the World Cup next summer and as mentioned above was apparently advised by Hajime Moriyasu to move to one of five big leagues in Europe.
Kyogo asked for a move and got it in January but it has not worked out at all well for him and he looks like being offloaded by the French outfit in the summer and now he’s been overlooked entirely by Japan for the summer qualifiers.
It doesn’t look good for him as far as Kyogo’s World Cup dream is concerned. These two dead rubber matches would have been the perfect chance for Moriyasu to assess Kyogo in action with a view to selecting his squad for the World Cup. Yet he has chosen to look closer to home and bring in the best emerging talent from the J-League.
As we’ve said many times before the grass isn’t always greener and so many player have regretted their decision to leave Celtic. It certainly looks like Kyogo will be added to that list.
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Kyogo was advised to join a big 5 league but the squad is made up of players from japan, lower english leagues, holsten kiel and small dutch and belgian clubs? Something isnt right there