Photo/Illutration In this March 20, 2019, file photo, Olympic torches of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games are displayed during a press conference in Tokyo. (AP Photo)

Members of the victorious Japanese women's soccer team who lifted the spirits of a nation in winning the 2011 FIFA World Cup will have another day in the sun next spring.

The Tokyo Organizing Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games on Dec. 17 selected the beloved “Nadeshiko Japan” to be the first runners in the Olympic torch relay that will start on March 26 in Fukushima Prefecture.

Nadeshiko Japan’s historic victory at the World Cup in Germany, the first Asian team to hoist the coveted cup, came just four months after the deadly Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami.

The organizers asked the 21 members of the championship team including captain Homare Sawa, as well as the team’s head coach, Norio Sasaki, to participate in the relay as a group.

How many will actually run the route has yet to be determined.

The announcement was made to mark the beginning of the 100-day countdown to the start of the torch relay.

The route will start at the J-Village sporting complex in Naraha and Hirono towns in the prefecture.

The complex has been used as a soccer training center. It also served as a front-line operations base for workers who battled the crisis at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant in the aftermath of the 2011 earthquake and tsunami.

The national team also held a training camp at the J-Village in February this year, the first since the 2011 disaster.

The Tokyo organizers said the selection was based on the women’s national soccer team’s strong ties to the J-Village and the recovery process in Fukushima.

The Olympic torch will be lit in Greece on March 12. Mizuki Noguchi, who won a gold medal in the women’s marathon at the 2004 Athens Olympics, will be the first Japanese runner in the portion of the torch relay that passes through Greece.

The torch is expected to arrive at the Air Self-Defense Force’s Matsushima Air Base in Higashi-Matsushima, Miyagi Prefecture, on March 20.

A traveling exhibition of the torch will be held in the disaster-stricken Miyagi, Iwate and Fukushima prefectures before the start of the relay on March 26.

A total of 858 municipalities in all 47 prefectures will participate along the route.

Details of the torch relay routes are expected to be announced on the organizers’ official website and other sites on the afternoon of Dec. 17.

Some routes that pass through Sapporo, the new venue for the 2020 Olympic marathon and competitive walking races, and small islands in Tokyo, will be announced as soon as they are decided.

Runners in the torch relay have been selected by municipal governments, official partners of the Olympics and others. About 10,000 people are expected to take part in the relay.

The organizers will send a formal notice to the selected runners after Dec. 25.