Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters right-hander Yu Darvish and Lotte Marines lefty Yoshihisa Naruse were named Friday among 34 final candidates for Japan's team for the upcoming qualifiers for the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Aichi Kogyo University left-hander Kohei Hasebe was also named by manager Senichi Hoshino for the Asian qualifiers in Taiwan from Dec. 1-3, making him the only amateur player selected. "I wanted to cut the number of players to 28 or 30 but decided to leave 34 since we never know what's going to happen with events such as the Japan Series coming up," Hoshino said. "I've agreed with other coaching staff that Hasebe is as good as left-handers in pro baseball or even better," he said. Hasebe helped Japan's team of collegiate and professional minor leaguers win a four-nation rehearsal tournament held in August for the Olympics. China, France and the Czech Republic took part in the event. The 21-year-old Darvish, who holds both Iranian and Japanese citizenship, has decided to choose Japanese nationality as he hopes to play for Japan in the Olympics. The 34 members will be reduced to 24 by the end of November's training camp in Miyazaki.
