Marinos to launch Nakamura raid

Nakamura says he wants to go home for the sake of his family

Yokohama F Marinos are expected to make a bid for Celtic midfielder Shunsuke Nakamura next week in an attempt to entice him back to Japan in January.

The player's agent is due in Glasgow next week to outline the offer after the J-League club secured funding from parent company Nissan.

But Celtic's manager says the player has never told him he wants to leave.

Gordon Strachan said: "I had a long chat with Naka last week and he never said a thing about that."

After more than three years in Scotland Nakamura, 30, wants to return to Japan and Marinos for family reasons.

Earlier this week the J-League club revealed they planned to make a bid as soon as they received transfer funds.

Now that money is in place they are in a position to make their move for the Japanese international.

Celtic have stated that they hope to persuade Nakamura to stay with the club until the end of the season, while at the same time acknowledging his wish to return home at some stage.

Nakamura says his agent, Roberto Takuda, had been speaking with a number of J-League clubs about a possible transfer.

However, the Japan international said that, when he eventually does return to Japan, Marinos is the only club he has considered joining.

In September, Nakamura expressed his desire to go home for the good of his family.

"A move in January might be possible, I leave things like that to my agent," said Nakamura.

"If I was Scottish, I'd love to play at Celtic forever, but I'm Japanese and I also have a family and kids.

"I've also had to think about the national team as well and I'm finding it quite hard travelling back and forward all the time."

Nakamura, one of Japan's top sports stars, joined Celtic from Italian Serie A club Reggina in August 2005.

In his second season, he was voted Scotland's player of the year by his fellow professionals.