After Japanese substitutes Ritsu Doan and Takuma Asano scored late goals Wednesday to help Japan come from behind and upset Germany 2-1, Japanese fans celebrated the win by collecting the litter and cleaning up the area before leaving the stadium spik and span.
Tidying up after one of their greatest #FIFAWorldCup wins 👏
Huge respect to these Japanese fans 🙌 #Qatar2022 pic.twitter.com/RVwLwykPeq
— FIFA World Cup (@FIFAWorldCup) November 24, 2022
In a video that has gone viral, the Japan fans were seen picking up the litter in the area they occupied.
The players also behaved with similarly impeccable politeness, too, cleaning their dressing-room.
After an historic victory against Germany at the #FIFAWorldCup on Match Day 4, Japan fans cleaned up their rubbish in the stadium, whilst the @jfa_samuraiblue left their changing room at Khalifa International Stadium like this. Spotless.
Domo Arigato.👏🇯🇵 pic.twitter.com/NuAQ2xrwSI
— FIFA.com (@FIFAcom) November 23, 2022
Meanwhile, it was the first competitive meeting between the two nations.
They played two friendlies in the past, with Germany winning 3-0 in 2004 before a 2-2 draw in 2006.
Ilkay Gündogan had given four-time champion Germany the lead with a first-half penalty. But Doan, who plays for Freiburg, pounced on a rebound to equalize in the 76th minute after Germany goalkeeper Manuel Neuer blocked a shot from Takumi Minamino.
Then Asano, who plays for Bochum, sprinted clear of Nico Schlotterbeck and beat Neuer from a narrow angle in the 83rd minute.
Germany outplayed Japan for much of Wednesday’s match and had 24 attempts on goal compared to Japan’s 11. The Japanese had only 24% possession.
