Here’s post 2 in the 18-part series (oh, God, that’s the last time I’m gonna call it that) giving some context and background for each team in this summer’s FIVB World League tournament. I’ll keep a running list of the teams profiled:
Egypt
Japan
Iran
Netherlands
South Korea
Finland
Canada
Italy
Argentina
Serbia
Russia
France
Brazil
Germany
Bulgaria
Cuba
USA
Poland
Japan were once stalwarts of men’s volleyball (they’re still reasonably relevant in women’s…they did win Olympic bronze in London on the women’s side), but it’s been a while since that’s been the case. They won medals in three straight Olympics — bronze in ’64, silver in ’68, and gold in ’72, all of them fully-attended Games (by any meaningful definition of the term ‘fully attended’). These were in fact the first three Olympic volleyball tournaments there ever were. Since then, they’ve mostly floundered. They played in the 2008 Olympic tournament in Beijing, but they didn’t win a single match. They were not present in London, losing out on the Asian qualification tournament in favor of Australia (Oceania do not have their own volleyball federation).
The team have managed fair showings at the world championships, coming 9th in 2002, 8th in 2006, and tying on 11th in 2010 (it’s a 24-team tournament). Their World League record hasn’t exactly been one to inspire jealousy, as they finished 6th in 2008, 9th in 2001, and didn’t even compete in 1998, 1999, 2000, or 2010. All other years since 1997 have had a double-digit final rank. They were in position to play in the qualifiers for the 2012 World League, having finished 15th in 2011, winning just one match that year. Though it bears mentioning that they were not able to host any matches out of concerns about nuclear safety in Japan following the big earthquake and tsunami that hit them that year, decimating the Onaganwa Nuclear Plant. I’m sure you remember that happening. For those same reasons, the FIVB awarded them an exemption from the 2012 qualifiers, letting them keep their place in the tournament despite their finishing position. Then this past year, they lost in the qualifiers for the 2013 World League, but no matter, the FIVB expanded the tournament to 18 teams and voila, they’re back in.
If it seems like the FIVB are dead set on including Japan….get ready for some more circumstantial evidence to back up that claim. The most important Olympics qualification tournament, and a prestigious event in its own right, is the FIVB World Cup. It’s quadrennial, taking place the year before the Summer Olympics (as of the 1991 event). That was actually the first reason it was dreamed up, to have a major quadrennial tournament in non-Olympic, non-world championships years. The fact that it grants an Olympic berth was kind of an afterthought. Japan have played in every World Cup. So they must be pretty competitive, at least, at this event, right? Wrong. They’ve been the host nation for every event after the first two, and those first two (’65 and ’69) corresponded with the golden years of Japanese volleyball. They’ll be there in 2015 and 2019 as well, as the FIVB have extended with Japan for those events. Makes you wonder just a little bit if anyone else even wants to host.
But that’s not all, as far as that goes. Another off-year quadrennial tournament, the Grand Champions League (it goes Olympics->GCL->World Championships->World Cup, in succession) was inaugurated in 1993. And guess who always hosts it. They finished at a high-water mark of 3rd in the 2009 event, which sounds awesome until you remember that there are only six teams in the tournament (Japan always qualify automatically as host nation; the determination of who exactly those five other teams are is a bit byzantine). Japan’s history in the Asian championships has been a scoche brighter than that in worldwide tournaments. That tournament is quadrennial from 1975 to 1987 and biennial since, and Japan were the champions in ’75, ’83, ’87, ’91, ’95, and ’09. Interestingly, this tournament rotates host cities, unlike the Grand Champions League and the World Cup.
Volleyball remains popular in Japan, though. I especially love this anecdotal tale from an exchange student living in Japan a few years back (and I especially especially love the first paragraph). Indeed, though you don’t usually think of the Japanese as being an especially tall people (which sure does help in volleyball), the game thrives there, with professional leagues and major media attention. More of this attention has been fawned on the Japan women’s team, as it’s been more successful recently, but as the exchange student I linked to notes the game is not considered a game just for girls like it (by and large) is in the US. Both the men’s and women’s national teams are esteemed and respected.
Now, more to the actual squad themselves. It doesn’t appear that anyone on the Japanese national team has seen time in the European professional leagues, but that doesn’t mean as much as it would have for Egypt, because as noted there’s thriving professional play in Japan. Why leave home if you don’t have to? The team’s most noteworthy player is probably pin hitter Takahiro Yamamoto, who at 35 probably has a fair bit of gas left in the tank. He was definitely Japan’s leader at the Beijing Olympics, and won the Best Scorer and Best Server honors at the third Olympic qualification tournament, where Japan lost only to undefeated Italy — and in five sets — to punch their tickets. The floor captain is noted as setter Daisuke Usami, though I can’t really dredge up any information about him. The head coach for the Japan team is, interestingly, American Gary Sato, being named to the post very recently. He replaces Tatsuya Ueta, who was fired after the London non-qualification. Sato is the first foreigner to take the helm of either Japanese national volleyball team.
So are we looking at a winner?
No.
I hate to be so blunt, but it really is that simple. Japan are a pretty weak program relative to the others that will be present at the World League, and they have been for quite a while. I hope they’ll be like I expect Egypt will be, and play loose, fearless, volleyball, but I fear the position they’ve held as the FIVB’s favorite sons, getting free rides in qualification to a great deal of events, might have them complacent. Their current FIVB world ranking would put them third-best in their pool behind Egypt and Canada. I’m not sure I buy that, and even if I do it wouldn’t be good enough to advance them to the championship round. I invite them to prove me wrong.
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