Japan awoke on Monday morning, appropriately the Sports Day national holiday that commemorates the hosting of the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, to revel in the historic Rugby World Cup victory over Scotland.
However, the celebratory mood accompanying Japan’s first qualification for the World Cup quarter-finals was dampened by news of the growing death toll from Typhoon Hagibis, which had come close to causing the match to be cancelled.
The Asahi Shimbun ran a photo of the victorious national team in the locker room after the 28-21 win “celebrating with pizza” and detailed the praise heaped on Japan by the international media, players and pundits. The newspaper also trumpeted the history-making nature of Japan’s win: the first team from outside the top tier nations to make it to the knockout stages since Fiji in 2007 and the first Asian team ever to make it that far.
The Mainichi Shimbun described the unusually animated commentary by Nippon TV’s announcers during the broadcast of the game, quoting Kengo Nakano as his voice quivered with emotion at the climax of the already famous victory: “The global mark that couldn’t be reached four years ago, the quarter-finals. The team has surpassed that. This is Japan’s victory road!”
A translation of the description of Japan’s second try from the official Rugby World Cup site was also carried in local media: “The hooker creates it and the prop finishes it – with three offloads in between. It’s the sort of try only Japan can score …” Japan’s move up to seventh in the world rankings, the national side’s highest position, was also widely lauded.
Domestic media coverage of the victory was also notable for its handling of the diverse nature of the current Japan team with the New Zealand-born captain Michael Leitch, who has played in Japan since high school, and their star winger Kotaro Matsushima, who was born in South Africa to a Japanese mother and Zimbabwean father.
Today papers in Japan. Brave blossoms are headline news #RWC2019 pic.twitter.com/5zYNEdeL7V
— ugo monye (@ugomonye) October 13, 2019
Analysis of previous World Cup tournaments featured discussions of the number of “foreign players” in the side, but still largely homogenous Japan has embraced this crop of players, with its “One Team” slogan, as its own. Twitter users commented on the “cute” halting Japanese of the New Zealand-born Luke Thompson, veteran of four World Cup campaigns, in his post-match speeches.
Newspaper special editions were rushed out in Tokyo on Sunday night after the game, as they were after the earlier pool victory against Ireland, though some papers refrained from distributing them in areas badly hit by the typhoon. The mood of self-restraint, what the Japanese call jishuku, was also evident on Monday morning television news and chat shows, which all led with extensive coverage of the ongoing rescue efforts and damage from the weekend storm before covering the rugby.
