The 2002 Korea/Japan World Cup — A Festival Embraced by a Nation

In June 2002, the Japanese islands were wrapped in a kind of heat they had never experienced before. Crowds packed in dark masses before the large screens outside train stations; in pubs, strangers threw their arms around one another’s shoulders, and blue uniforms became part of the scenery of the streets. Even people who normally took no interest in football found themselves in front of their televisions, rising and falling with the fortunes of the national team — that was the kind of summer it was.

The World Cup had come to Japan at last. And in an unprecedented form: the first-ever joint hosting with its neighbor, Korea. It was the moment when the Japan that had “gone to see the world” in France four years earlier now took its turn as the side that “welcomes the world.” From the position of crossing the sea to compete, to the position of a host nation receiving national teams and supporters from all over the globe. That very reversal told the story of how far Japanese football had traveled.

The World Cup Comes to Asia for the First Time

Since it began in 1930, the World Cup had long been held only in Europe and the Americas. The 2002 tournament became a landmark event, the first in that history to be held in Asia. What is more, hosting by two countries rather than one was also a first attempt.

The decision over where to hold it followed a fierce bidding contest between Japan and Korea, before reaching the unusual conclusion of co-hosting in the end. Two nations that were both rivals and neighbors would share and run the same tournament. There were political difficulties in this, but the common language of football drew the two countries, for a time, into the same circle of celebration.

The Challenge of Troussier’s Japan

Leading the Japanese national team on this historic stage was the French manager Philippe Troussier. Passionate and at times singular in his coaching style — which earned him the nickname “the White Witch Doctor” — he drilled discipline and organization into the team relentlessly, forging the young players into a side that could compete on the world stage.

At the heart of the team was Hidetoshi Nakata, who had returned hardened by his time in Europe. And supporting him were the talented young generation born around 1979 — players such as Junichi Inamoto and Shinji Ono — who would later be called the “Golden Generation.” They were also the first generation to have taken up football after the birth of the J.League and to have grown up in a professional environment. The seed sown in 1993 had, just ten years on, borne fruit in the form of the national team.

And then, the opening. The opponent in the first group match was a strong side, Belgium. With goals from Takayuki Suzuki and Junichi Inamoto, Japan scored twice to fight its way to a 2–2 draw. It was a precious single point, the first Japan had ever recorded at a World Cup finals.

Japan then beat Tunisia 2–0 in its third match to top the group and advance. A team that had not managed a single win at the France finals had, on the great stage of a tournament hosted at home, reached the knockout rounds for the first time. The fervor across the islands rose, at last, to its very peak.

The End, and What Was Left Behind

In the round of 16, the stage was Miyagi Stadium. On a pitch hazy with rain, Japan faced Turkey. The team conceded early in the first half from a set piece, and that single goal weighed heavily upon them. Japan tried to strike back, but in the end could not prise open Turkey’s solid defense. 0–1. Japan’s first World Cup summer drew its curtain in the round of 16.

There were tears in the stands. But they were clearly different in nature from the tears of France four years before, or of Doha nine years before. Behind the frustration lay a sure pride. They had won on the world stage and reached the knockout rounds — a view that had once been a dream within a dream, they had made real with their own hands.

What Troussier’s Japan had shown was one answer: that if it fought as an organization, Japan could go toe to toe with the world’s powers. Disciplined defending, and a brand of football in which everyone ran in concert, ceaselessly. Modest though it was in flair, it was the prototype of a “Japanese style” that carried a genuine sense of substance. At the same time, the tournament threw the next challenge into sharp relief. To break through the wall of the knockout rounds and see the view one step higher, individual quality — the power to finish chances by world standards — would be needed. The players, amid the afterglow of victory, received that homework clearly.

After the Festival

The summer of 2002 was, for Japanese football, a point of arrival. From the distant Meiji days when hired foreigners first brought the ball, to the eve of the J.League when players gritted their teeth in empty stadiums, the long, long climb had — in the form of reaching the knockout rounds at a World Cup hosted at home — crested a great mountain pass for the time being.

But a truly strong story does not stop at the summit. Once the fervor of the festival had quieted, the players’ gaze was turned somewhere farther off. To merely welcome the world to their own country was no longer enough. To leap into the world itself, and in the harshest of environments, week in and week out, to fight by world standards — such a thirst had begun to bud in the hearts of the young generation.

Running at the front of it was Hidetoshi Nakata, who had already crossed to Europe. Following the path he had opened, Japan’s players would cross the sea one after another. From the festival called the national team, to the daily life in which individual players challenged the world. Next time comes the story of the era of the overseas players, in which Japanese football would acquire “world standards” from the inside.