Behind Japan’s 4 goal-glut: Forwards encouraged to have ‘ego’, like anime hero

Against Tunisia on Saturday, Japan made history becoming the first Asian team to score four goals in a World Cup game. And these came from confident, unapologetic strides into the box. While Daichi Kamada needed simply to divert Keito Nakamura’s delivery goalwards in the fourth minute, it was the poster boy of the new-age, striker Ayase Ueda, who didn’t think twice from the edge of the box, embarrassing defender Montassar Talbi by sending a drive through his legs to make it 2-0.

Japan’s top-scorer in qualifying, Ueda doubled his count in the 86th when he leapt in the air to meet Kaishu Sano’s flick and lobbed a header over a pretty tall defender. Earlier, the designated poaching-forward Junya Ito had struck a solo-run and shot coolly, collecting a pass from Ueda. It was yet another shrugging of the bashfulness that held Japan back in front of the goal.

The country that gave the world Captain Tsubasa – who is even on Lionel Messi’s tattoo sleeve – has been rethinking its football heroes for a few years now: Do Japanese minds need to be reprogrammed to create a striker who doesn’t apologise for taking a shot?

Japan’s top-scorer in qualifying, Ueda doubled his count in the 86th when he leapt in the air to Kaishu Sano’s flick and lobbed a header. (AP Photo)

The Zeyad Football YouTube channel delves into the cultural concept of Waa – where harmony and extreme teamwork culture brought in loyalty but “killed selfish instinct that a true striker needs to finish.”

Blue Lock was that intense, dark-tinged anime in which the protagonist, Yoichi Isagi, is the striker who learns to be ruthless and “have a massive ego in front of the goal.” In other words, to be selfish.

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The Japanese Football Association (JFA), in fact, are said to have collaborated with the Blue Lock creators since 2024 to alter the deep cultural bashfulness in their mindset, as the team seeks to shatter the Round of 16 ceiling. Artist Nomura would recently explain, “The egoists we imagined may also exist in this real world. No, I am sure they do!” The occasion was a formal announcement of a collaboration of Blue Lock plan with JFA for project ‘Future Camp’.

Besides tapping into Blue Lock’s reach in USA, South America, Concacaf and with Liverpool in England, and acting as talent hunters for Japanese-heritage players abroad, the series aims to propagate the cartoon’s themes of “individual awakening and the passion to become the best in the world.”

Investigation

The World Cup only needs to wind up and JFA will be at Great Park in Irvine, Orange County, California, scouting for players born between January 1, 2010, and December 31, 2011.

It’s a wild synthesis of read-meets-real, given Blue Lock’s plotline starts out at a very real inflection point in Japanese football history: defeat at the 2018 World Cup to Belgium in the dying seconds after leading 2-0.

Kodansha Publishing USA describes the story: “As Japan’s team struggles to regroup, what’s missing? An absolute Ace Striker, who can guide them to the win. The Japan Football Union is hell-bent on creating a striker who hungers for goals and thirsts for victory, and who can be the decisive instrument in turning around a losing match…”

In this team, Ueda is seen as the ruthless No 9 – physical, aggressive in the air and clinical. Having done all the right things in football development since beating Brazil at the 1984 Olympics, patiently putting in the structure, and allowing Tsububasa to work his slow charm, Japan was ready for the next step.

The 2018 defeat stung terribly. Belgium had scored twice in six minutes, and proceeded to procure a turnover relayed by Thibaut Courtois to Kevin de Bruyne. It came from a nervy corner kick by Japan, and has since received the Rashomon treatment from Japan, as a NHK documentary ’14 seconds of Rostov’ which premiered on December 8, 2018, within six months of the loss.

Made on a budget of 500,000 euros, the documentary spoke to over 50 people – Japanese and Belgian players, as well as former coaches, to analyse what all possibly had gone wrong. These were visceral dissections, where players volunteered to return to those 14 seconds and threadbared their hearts about those excruciating moments resulting in a 2-3 loss.

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Besides coach Noshino, all the characters involved – Maya, Makoto, Nishino, Renki, Yuto, Hiroki, besides Courtois, Romelu Lukaku, De Bruyne, Thomas Meunier, Shazley, Roberto Martinez and Fabio Capello were interviewed by four filming units, Min.news wrote.

Whether it is Makoto Hasebe wondering if he lost possession because he was too relaxed, or former coaches dreading the inevitability of Belgians scoring pointing to lack of self-confidence in Japanese, the documentary zooms into split-seconds to tease out perspectives from inside and outside. Did Japan not believe it had stamina for more than 90 minutes? Was De Bruyne’s marker distracted? Did Belgium see spaces on the field that Japan didn’t? How significant was De Bruyne sprinting off at 30.1 kph? Every detail is wrenched out of the past – not to villainise, but look for what was overlooked.

Slow, sad sunsets and a timer clocking down to 14 seconds teem in the film. It’s how Japan does football — break down what went wrong and reflect, and then manifest through Manga, for a playing mindset that can get past the dark day of July 2, 2018.