There are several things Celtic and Sporting Lisbon have in common.
The first one is the fact that Celtic and Sporting are champions of their respective countries, and they also wear the famous green and white colours.
Added to that, the duo also have some outstanding players from the Japanese market on their books, and two of them are already legendary figures.
Of course, they are Celtic duo Daizen Maeda and Reo Hatate, as Sporting posted about the pair on social media before their pre-season friendly encounter in Lisbon.
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Sporting’s post about Reo Hatate, Hidemasa Morita and Daizen Maeda
Celtic beat Sporting 2-0, with Hatate getting himself on the scoresheet when he converted his penalty following a foul on Johnny Kenny.
One man who was missing for Sporting was their midfielder Hidemasa Morita, because of injury, but he was present for the match and he was posing with his fellow countryman before the game.
Sporting posted a brilliant short clip on social media of Hatate, Morita and Maeda embracing one another with the caption ‘reunion’, and an emoji of the Japan flag.
How many Japanese players have played for Celtic?
The standout name, and the cult hero, is Shunsuke Nakamura, after his legendary spell in Glasgow during the mid to late 2000s.
Nakamura is still talked about today, and he is well-known by the likes of Maeda and Hatate.
But, throughout Celtic’s rich and trophy-laden history, how many players from Japan have put on the famous colours of Scotland’s most successful club?
- Shunsuke Nakamura
- Reo Hatate
- Daizen Maeda
- Hayato Inamura (yet to make his official debut)
- Tomoki Iwata
- Kyogo Furuhashi
- Koki Mizuno
- Yuki Kobayashi
- Yosuke Ideguchi
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