The others are Eintracht Frankfurt's Junichi Inamoto, Saint Etienne's Daisuke Matsui and VfL Wolfsburg's Makoto Hasebe.

The clash in Bahrain is the opener of the Asian final qualifying round for the 2010 World Cup.

"This is the first match of the final round and it is very important. I chose these 20 players who are able to fight in hot weather and understand the concept of the team very well," said Japan coach Takeshi Okada.