Michael Fitzgerald (Albirex Niigata | Japan)

Fitzgerald's Albirex Niigata beat Yokohama 2-0 in the weekend, he played a full game. A crowd of 62,632 - if Yokohama had won they would have taken out the league. Fitzgerald's Albirex is now 7th - since he went there they have moved up from 12th place. His last game will be at home playing Josh Kennedy's team Nagoya.

http://www.j-league.or.jp/eng/gamereport/00000266.html

Got a japanese football reporter friend to see if he can get an answer for us

Won last game of the season last weekend:

"Albirex Niigata (7th) consolidated their fine finish to the season with a 2-0 home win over Nagoya Grampus (11th). That was Niigata's ninth consecutive home league victory. The goals came from Kengo Kawamata, the second top scorer in J1 this season with 23 goals, in the 65th minute and Atomu Tanaka, seven minutes from the end."

Surely he'll get the call up for the March friendly considering it'll be easy travel!

Should do at least another year before goin to europe youd think

You go when the right offer presents itself....

Totally

Has this guy got a twitter account? be interesting to follow...

This 2011 report on Fitzgerald at the time of his All Whites debut has much interesting information - seems to have a complicated national background - Samoan mother, born in NZ, holds a European passport, he has NZ citizenship (now has Japanese residency as of quite recently - since this article). With his European passport and Japanese residency, would have no problems getting a work visa for Europe:

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/sport/news/article.cfm?c_id=4&objectid=10715128

"They did not want him to play for New Zealand," says Wynton Rufer, who tutored Fitzgerald through his Wynrs academy. "They were not happy. They initially told him not to accept it [the call-up to the All Whites], which was very sad. They are worried he won't get the visa now.

"They don't want him to count as a foreigner. If he was a local, he could get a contract of US$150,000 but the foreign players are on $500,000 and he won't get one of those because they go to Brazilians. If you're there for five years, you can get residency. Playing for New Zealand puts that in jeopardy.

"But I encouraged him and told him, 'you've got to go for it'. He's a New Zealander. He's from Mt Roskill, his mum is Samoan. You can't say no to that. We are on an all-time high and I know Ricki [Herbert] will be happy with what he sees. The boy is quality."

It was on Rufer's recommendation that Herbert selected Fitzgerald in the first place. Like most people in this country, Herbert hadn't seen the youngster play. He left New Zealand at 16 to take up a football scholarship with one of Tokyo's top high schools and was soon signed by Niigata. Incredibly, his selection for the All Whites was his first stint with any New Zealand team at any level.

Rufer describes him as a "typical Japanese" player with good technical ability and good passing range. At 1.86cm and 70kg, he's slight, but is said to have the ability to get forward. Fullback looks his best fit in a New Zealand side even though he can play anywhere across the back or as a holding midfielder.

Nothing unless your other option was driving a mercedes benz around stuttgart

Might want to watch 3News tonight.

guess I was justified in worrying :(

FFS! Nix sign this kid on marquee so he's a Kiwi again

Not worried. He'll go to europe

In the interview on TV 3 he didn't seem to have any grudges about not being called up by Ricki since his three caps a couple of years ago and receiving no communication since then from Ricki - which is reassuring ("evey manager has his own style") - though he did say regular selection for All Whites squads might have changed his mind about taking out Japanese citizenship.

Lets just hope he goes to Europe so he can become a Kiwi again...

I don't understand this, is he now effectively eligible for no one?

To be fair fitzgerald kicked on from what late august onwards. If hed been playing since march reg and not being selected for AW id be pissed

I was going to say that he might be allowed to get his NZ passport back now, but I suspect you're right. A lot of countries which ban dual citizenship (or just ban it with certain other countries) don't actually stop you re-gaining your first nationality once you've initially dropped it in order to get the sole nationality of your adopted nation. So to explain, if an ordinary New Zealander was to drop their NZ citizenship in order to get Japanese citizenship, there might not actually be anything stopping them regaining their New Zealand citizenship, as this is out of the hands of the Japanese authorities and they might not even know. 

However, I'm not sure that would be the case here, as I think the slightly weird system of dropping your citizenship and subsequently regaining it is one based on your adopted country turning a blind eye, rather than expressly allowing this to happen. If this is the case you're right that they might not be so lenient if Fitzgerald was openly flouting the rules by representing New Zealand internationally in football.

Also, Fitzgerald was playing 4th tier Japanese football until he was no longer an import. It would have been a big call to pick Fitzgerald ahead of people playing in fully professional leagues at the time. 

The issue here is NZF not realising he was unavai till Oct when we started talking about this months earlier. Personal attention fail

he was? Though he was playing J2 at start of the year?