BONN, June 14 - Japan's Hidetoshi Nakata has blasted the media for being pessimistic, telling them not to write off Japanese hopes of World Cup survival.

Monday's 3-1 defeat by Australia in their Group F opener has left Japan in a precarious position with matches against Croatia and world champions Brazil to come.

But Nakata was in a bullish mood after training on Wednesday and boldly predicted victory over Croatia, who will themselves need maximum points on Sunday after losing 1-0 to Brazil.

"You guys are always pessimists," Nakata told reporters. "There's only one thing we can do -- think about winning our next match. That's it."

Japan's playmaker was also unimpressed when asked if the Asian champions were realistically targeting four points from their last two group games.

"Why four points?" shrugged Nakata. "We still have two matches. We could get six points. Why do we have to think about four points?.

"Croatia are a very good team but I still believe we're a better team. We're calm."

NO RIFT

Japan's best known player had labelled the side a shambles in the run-up to the World Cup but the Japanese were quick to deny any rift amongst the players.

Nakata bit his tongue after Japan squandered the lead by conceding three goals in eight minutes in their late collapse against Australia.

"It's in the past," he said. "We had quite enough chances to win it but unfortunately we couldn't score the second goal."

Goalkeeper Yoshikatsu Kawaguchi was also losing little sleep over Japan's opening defeat.

"I usually don't sleep that well, thinking about what I should or shouldn't have done," he said. "But I didn't have any trouble sleeping after we lost to Australia.

"We have to move on -- get over it and bounce back against Croatia."