Nissan puts hold on Shunsuke Nakamura move

The much ballyhooed move of Blue Samurai Shunsuke Nakamura 中村 俊輔 from Celtic to J-League’s Yokohama 横浜市 has been squashed as the F Marinos F・マリノス parent company, Nissan, is cutting costs during the worldwide financial meltdown.

The thirty year-old veteran has expressed an intense desire to return to Japan with Yokohama, where his professional career commenced in 1997. Although his contract is set to expire June, the Yokohama F Marinos 横浜F・マリノス had noted an interest to bring him during the January transfer window so that he would be available at the start of the J-League season. However Nissan as decided to hold-back on the fee, rumoured to be £3m and wait till his contract expires in June and he can join the club without additional cost.

Shunsuke Nakamura is coming home

I had been waiting on this one for a bit but after confirming, the deal to bring Blue Samurai Shunsuke Nakamura of home to play for Yokohama F. Marinos is said to be “done.”

Shunsuke started his professional career Yokohama Marinos in 1997 (upon the 1999 merger with Yokohama Flügels added the “F” prefix to their name) before moving to Reggina in Serie A and eventually to Celtic in the summer of 2005. This return home would be a perfect closing note to his career, satisfy many of his personal goals within his family that he has been anxious to deal with as well as be a tremendous boost to Nissan-owned Yokohama. The terms of the deal are said to involve a transfer in the range of €6.5.