 Good evening and welcome to this event. This is really a one-off opportunity for us and we hope also it's a one-off opportunity for you. My name is Fabio Gigi. I'm the chair of the Japan Research Center and it is my honor to chair tonight's proceedings. But before we begin, just to get a sense of the room, can you please raise your hand if you have an interest in the history of rugby? Okay, very good. Can you give us a big cheer if you're a fan of rugby? Excellent, thank you very much. That's, you know, more than I could hope for. Normally as an academic, all you can hope for is really a pointed question and a raised eyebrow. So it's very nice to have a bit of energy in the room because our guest of honor for tonight is Mr. Fujiyuichiro, who is the director of the national rugby team. So give him a warm round of applause. Mr. Fujiyu was a professional rugby player and the head coach of the major university team whom he led to victory in the Tokai League in 2003. He became the manager of the Fukuoka Sonics Blues in 2005. In 2019, he took over as the director of the national team and led the brave blossoms into the top eight. It was the first time that Japan had scored so highly. As rugby player, his position was center three quarterback and wing three quarterback. His son, Tatsuya Fuji, is playing professionally for Munakata Sonics Blues as well. So I will first proceed with the interview and immediately afterwards, you will have the opportunity to ask questions. So prepare, this is your only chance before the big match on Saturday. So I'll swap over. So thank you very much for joining us today. We're all very excited for the England-Japan match on Saturday at the Twickenham Stadium. It will only be the third time that England has faced the brave blossoms in a full test match. So what will happen on Saturday? What are your expectations? I can speak in Japanese too. That's a difficult question. Of course, I came here from Japan not to lose, but to gain all the strength. I think I'll do my best to get the Twickenham back to everyone's side. Thank you very much for having me today. Of course, this is a difficult question to answer, but we didn't come all the way to England to lose. So we are hoping that we will try our very best and we will leave the Twickenham Stadium with our heads up, held up high. And that's what we're expecting for. Thank you. So I understand that the team is already in England. Can you tell us a little bit about their training schedule and especially their dietary regime in the lead-up to Saturday's match? Well, the team is going smoothly without any injuries. If the players can do everything they want to do, they can do everything they want to do. I believe that the team will do everything they want to do. So far, so good. None of the members are injured, so we are hoping that this will continue. What we as staff are doing is that our team members can play with their best potential and that is the most important thing. So that's what we are working on while still training here at this moment. Thank you. So what did they eat? Did you bring your own cook to provide for them? Is it a Japanese diet? Of course, both of them are Japanese-speaking players. Also, there are Japanese chefs in the kitchen, so both Japanese and Japanese food is in a state of eating. The team loves both cuisines, of course. Some team members love English food too, so they would prefer that. But we have brought a Japanese chef with us. So they have the choice to choose between two cuisines. Thank you. So rugby is quite exceptional in Japan in that it is one of the few sports on the national level that contains a majority of non-Japanese nationals. Could you talk to us about the rules that apply? Who can be on the national team? Well, it's been five years now, isn't it? Yes, it is. If you are in Japan for five years, you can play as a Japanese player. There is a league called League One in Japan, so it has been more than five years. It was three years ago, but at that time, the players who played in the league could continue to play in the league. That is the situation. So in Japan, there is the professional League One team, and if you play for this team for five years, you can become part of the national Japanese team. This used to be three, and if they were playing at that time, then they can continue to play for the national team now. But now the rules apply, that you can only play for the national Japanese team if you have played for League One for five years. That's very interesting. I also understand that there has been some controversy about the ethnic makeup of the team. What do you say to the voices who argue that Japan should be represented only by Japanese players? In Australia and New Zealand, they are completely different. They have a different culture even if they look alike. Of course, they are different from the players they seek. Head coach is from New Zealand, so they should be connected with Japanese and foreigners. That is my voice. They are very careful about that. They have different meals, they make groups to eat, and they play games. They form a team in this tour. They have a different job in the other teams. I see. Okay. Obviously, it's quite difficult to control a team with various multiple cultures and various backgrounds. There is a lot of different demands from different players from various backgrounds and various nationalities. But the head coach is from New Zealand, but this is where I come in to connect all the players together. And what they do is they would form groups, go to meals together, play games together, have a time for people to mingle and to come together and have a notion that we are one team. Thank you. Is there something that you would describe as typically Japanese about the way that your team plays rugby? Is there a Japanese team that doesn't appear in the Japanese team? Well, the Japanese team doesn't have a big body, but they have a skill to move the ball quickly. And they are training very hard. So, they have to move the ball in the second half and win with a score. They have to keep moving the ball, invite the other players to play rugby, and let them know that they have the strength to play rugby. Okay. So, the Japanese team players are known for being quite smaller compared to other national players. So, what they do is they have very stoic routines for their training, making sure that the ball is moving very fast. It's moving constantly so that the other team is fatigued throughout the later on in the game, and then they can score their points in that later on. So, making sure that they're training well and that the ball is moving fast and constantly. Thank you. Rugby has started to attract an increasing also international audience, both at home and abroad. And I remember I was on sabbatical in Tokyo in 2019 at Tufts, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, which is quite on the margins of Tokyo. But there's a stadium about one kilometer down the road, and you could hear the fans. It was a massive sound. We thought, oh, God, what is happening? So, there's a great, there's sort of, you could feel the energy. And I wanted to ask you, how do you see the future of Japanese rugby? We have been coaching the Japanese team since 2016, and it's been a success. We have been coaching the Japanese team since 2016, and so since then we have made sure that they have been going through historic, very hard training. And through that this team has really made history in presenting rugby culture and permeating that throughout Japanese people in the country as well. So our job right now is to maintain this Japanese rugby culture, making sure that all matches are done with every bit of their capacity, making sure that they win and have a relationship with the fans. And so that in the future there are more children who are interested in rugby and who want to become rugby players and making sure that this rugby culture is continued into the future. Thank you. You may be aware of the current financial crisis in the English premiership. How do you see the structure of professional rugby evolve in Japan? Well, as I just mentioned, there has been a new league called League One since last year. We have just started. The Japanese rugby team has just started running. We have just established League One as well. So our next step, understanding this role, is to make sure that we have a good relationship with the Japanese team. We have just started. The Japanese rugby team has just started running. We have just established League One as well. So our next step, understanding the spaces, our next step is to really connect the fan base and the businesses and making sure that this connection is securely preserved into the future. Thank you very much. You now have the unique opportunity to ask questions. Obviously, you won't be able to ask about strategy for the match on Saturday, but anything slightly more general, please feel free. Mr. Fuji will have to return to Teddington after this. So this is your opportunity. Yes. Do the top Japanese clubs have an academy system to train young players and bring young players on? Yes. In Japan, before becoming a professional player, we all go to university. The university's strong team is basically where the selected players are. For example, there is Suntory and Panasonic. We don't have a lot of academies in Japan. Most of us become professional players after becoming a professional player. Recently, we have recently graduated from high school and became professional players. I think we need to think about academies in the future. As for Japanese style, we basically go to university. We go to university to study in a university team. So to answer your question, Japan doesn't have an academy, but what happens is a lot of the players go into university and then the strong university teams, if you are in a strong university team, you get picked up into going into a rugby team and from there, like top leagues in Japan and from there you are chosen to be in a Japanese national rugby team. There is a necessity perhaps in the future for Japan to set up an academy, but it is normalized in Japan for you to play rugby throughout high school and then go into university and then go into a league and then perhaps be picked up in a national team. Any other questions? This is your chance. Yes, please. It follows up a bit from that, that you're talking about children doing it at high school. Is there any children under 11, like a Saturday class scheme? Yes, there are a lot of rugby schools when I was a child. I go to high school from there, but I can only go to high school with that high school. So for example, England or New Zealand, I think there is a high school club, but I think you can go to various places in the city club, but in Japan, you can only do rugby in one high school, so if you are in a strong high school, you can go to a strong university. So to answer your question, there are rugby schools from a young age, but in Japan, once you enter a rugby team in high school, in secondary school, that becomes your team, and so you can't really join into a town-led rugby team or a council-led rugby team or any sorts. You go into high school that has a strong reputation for rugby, and that's what you do during secondary school, and then from there you're picked into going into a university with a good reputation as well. Thank you. I'm interested in how coaching styles are impacted. So there was perception, was very traditional. Well, in Japan, there are some foreign players, but we can't get the players we want. So we have to train in a way that we can fight against foreign teams. And therefore, I had to consider the way we are working in training, in training, in training, or in training, and in training, otherwise, we wouldn't be able to win. So in that way, we showed that we were on the other side and we were very strong in Japanese, Well, anyway, no matter how much Japanese people practice, it's okay to do it. If you don't do it in foreign language, it's okay to do it so that you're angry. And then I'll put it together every day and have this chance to win. And finally, I'm doing it so that I can win. Well, I did one try with O-Brux, so in that sense, I think that's how Japanese people fight, so I'm doing it while coaching them. Have you ever changed your coaching style in 10 years? I think it's completely different. What do you mean by that? Well, I think it's about the number of passes, the way you do it, and of course, the set play is also a unique way to do it in Japan. Play? I think it's a set play, but I don't think it's a scramble or a line-out. I don't have to be a very tall player, so I don't have to be tall. So what I can answer is Japanese players, especially in coaching, it's really concentrating on the body type of the Japanese person, so in that sense, it has developed quite a bit in understanding how the Japanese body works and how the passes and the set plays, the scrums and things like that. It has evolved by coaching, making sure that the Japanese players are trained really well, and he was saying how in terms of training, Japan never loses against any other country because we train so much. And so in that sense, understanding how they can go against bigger bodies across the world globally has been an important mark in the coaching style and the training style, and that development has happened in Japan throughout the last 10 years. Thank you. Maybe this is the question I should know the answer to, but in recent years we've seen many Japanese football players, soccer players, be going in European leagues and doing very well. I don't think I've heard of any rugby players that are playing overseas leagues, but have they? Do you think there's a chance that in the future there are particular players who could make the transition to leagues with other bigger players, and do you think what could they bring and what benefits would that have for Japanese players? Well, a lot of Japanese players play in Super Rugby, and a lot of Japanese players play in Super Rugby, such as Michael Leach, Pimeno, and Tanaka Fumi, Japanese players, who are also active overseas, but that's something that the head coach has decided on, which players he wants to use, and whether or not he needs to go to the other side of the team. Originally, there was no team called Super Rugby, but the players who experienced that team grew up a lot. What's your name? I don't know. It's Sanguru. Sanguru? Sanguru. Sanguru. Sanguru. Sanguru. Well, they absorb a lot of things, and now they're telling the young players about it. Well, that's the current flow, so of course, there are parents, Matsushima and the French team, but I don't know if they're in the game or not. If the head coach really needs it, I think we have to make that kind of player. So, for example, when Japanese players play in Rugby, do you think Japanese players will be able to bring this culture? Yes. Well, I think it's bigger for them to go to the other side of the team and learn how to play overseas, so they can go to the other side of the team and change something. That's something I haven't said yet. So, to answer your question, there has been a few Japanese players that has gone into the Super Rugby, but it is up to the head coach's decision, so it's very difficult for Japanese players to go into foreign rugby teams. There used to be a Super Rugby team in Japan called Sun Wolves, and so it no longer exists, but some players who were in it are able to share their experiences with the Japanese rugby players today. So, that's a really great positive move forward. In terms of Japanese players bringing something new to foreign rugby teams, they're still in this process of learning from foreign teams. They haven't really gotten into cultural exchange, so that development is necessary, but we're hoping to grow more in terms of that in the future. Excellent. Thank you. There's two more questions here. Yes, please. First of all, congratulations on the team's performance for the last World Cup and since, and also for the way the country put on such an amazing World Cup. I was just wondering what your plans for Paris, your for France 2023 look like. Have you determined a pre-season location, sorry, pre-tournament location where the team will be based, and perhaps why that area? It's a pre-season? I hope I'm answering your question. We hope to be, last time we were in best eight, so we hope to. Is that answering your question? No. I think he was asking, a lot of the plans are before the tournament in terms of location of the training. Ah, where is the training location in France? Planning to be in Italy, and then moving into France. Thank you, and there is one more question. Oh, okay. Yes, first here. You mentioned the sunroofs are now back in the workout in Super Rugby, but now that the South African teams have left Super Rugby, and it's focused on the Pacific, can you see a future where Japanese teams are back to play? We hope to stay, but Super Rugby has said no, so that's a disappointment. We think that we... We tried to convince them. We tried to convince them, because we think that it is great entertainment at the same time as well, in the style that we play, but due to the COVID-19 as well with the pandemic, it has been a very difficult transition. Thank you. There's one more question over there. Yes? Yes, I read that a number of parents in the UK are concerned about letting their children play rugby because it's breaking this calendar again. Do Japanese parents share this with them? These parents share this with them. So that's the same in Japan as well. I just asked a question, and I want to ask a follow-up question. In the professional game at the moment in Europe, in New Zealand, in particular England, there's a big controversy over concussions, and 119 professional players making a legal action against World Rugby and the English Rugby Union. I pick up similar things in New Zealand, but I haven't heard any such problems in Japan yet. Did you have a view on that? We think that it's going to become a problem in Japan in the future. My son also had a concussion and he couldn't play for six months. For him, his body is so small that the impact was quite large. It was really big, so as a parent, there is worry as well. What happens in Japan is usually players would have a concussion. They'll go to the hospital and they can't play for six months, and so that's also another issue. There hasn't been any movement yet, but because of these rhythms and cycles, there might be something that's going to happen in the future in Japan as well. Thank you. We also have quite a few questions online. I'm just going to go and have a quick look at... gosh. Okay, there's one question asked. What did your team learn from the England versus Argentina match yesterday? Sorry, I cannot answer at this moment. Thank you. There's a few more questions. They're quite specific, so I think it's worth asking them. Will we see more Japanese players or teams getting exposure in competitions outside of Japan, much like Hime no-san in New Zealand, similar to the question ideas asked? There has been offers that have been made, but sometimes there's an overlap within English season, so it becomes difficult for players to come into a foreign team. But we are hopeful. There is hope. Thank you. There's two more practical questions, maybe that we want to answer. If your high school has no rugby team, can you still join a combined team? Okay, so you can combine with another high school, and that is a way for you to play in a high school rugby team. It's up to the high school to win against others, but there is a possibility you can join a different high school for rugby. Thank you. And one last question, which I thought was quite cute. I know nothing about rugby, but I'm going to the match that is happening on Saturday and looking very much forward to it. Is there something in particular that I should be looking out for in order to enjoy the match even as a beginner? Take a look at Eddie Jones' face, that might be everything. And his expressions, that's very important. Thank you very much. So yes, okay, one more urgent question. I'm very sad that he's going to miss my presentation, but the final part of my presentation is to ask everyone in the audience who they think Japan is the greatest ever rugby player was. In my case, the answer is always a Kobe Steel player. Either who he thinks was the best ever rugby player in Japan, or when he was younger, who was his hero? Which rugby player was his hero? Well, I don't think he's going to play in this match this time. Oh, I wonder if he's going to play this time? I don't know, but he's a 2-meter-old player that hasn't been in Japan for a while now. He's been in Japan since high school. He's been in Japan for 2 meters, and he's been very gentle. He didn't have any tackle at all, but he was trained by Jamie Joseph. He's been taking the MVP for a while now, so I think he's going to be a super-standard in the future. He was a hero, an idol. Oh, I see. I don't have a lot of my idol heroes. I don't have a hero myself, but there is a player called Warner's Diaz. He's 2 meters tall. He plays for Japan. He's been in Japan since high school, so considering him as a Japanese player as well, he is a gentle giant, a very warm, generous guy, didn't tackle, didn't want to hurt people, but got the MVP. So really looking forward to his play style and his future in the Japanese rugby team. Wonderful. Thank you very much, Mr. Fuji. Sorry. Oh, it's the... Okay, sorry. Yes. Anything against? Against the team by Eddie Jones and... Eddie Jones is one of the most important players in Japan. Yeah, Eddie Jones was the Japanese representative last time. When I was in the top league coach, I practiced with my grand for three months. I went to drink alcohol, and I had a cup of tea, and I knew everything. I know Eddie Jones very well. He used my field for three months when he was coaching Japan. We got out to eat, had sake, know him very well, so there's nothing to fear, know him inside out. So nothing to fear against him. Thank you very much. Okay, I'm afraid we have to close the Q&A session here. Do stay. The evening will continue, but Mr. Fuji will have to return for a pretty much meeting now. He has to return to Teddington. So please give him a warm round of applause. Okay, just set up for our next bit, because on the program now, we have a comedic duo extraordinaire. Can I please ask you to join the panel, and I'll put up the PowerPoint. To start with a drum roll. So, Rhett Clark, to my right here, is CEO of Rhino Sports and Leisure LTD. After graduating in Modern History and winning two rugby blues at Oxford University, he joined Kobe Steel in 1980 to work and play for the company the rugby team from 80 to 83. He had a city career with Swiss Bank Corporation and J.B. Morgan before rejoining Kobe Steel as European Finance Director from 88 to 97. In 2016, he received the Foreign Minister's Commendation Award from the Government of Japan for services to UK-Japan relations. He's currently also a visiting professor at Neon University in Tokyo. And our second panelist is Satoshi Takehana, who's a rugby writer covering European rugby-related topics for Japanese publishers, including Rugby Magazine Japan, Numbers Sports Graphics, and Yahoo Sports Navi. He's also the Japanese ghost writer to current England head coach Eddie Jones for Pressure no Chikara, The Power of Pressure, published in 2020. He also has a city career as IT consultant in the finance sector and holds an MBA from Neon Road Business School in the Netherlands and they will be here to present the history of rugby in Japan. Take it away. Thank you, Fabio. Satoshi and I are here to inform but hopefully mostly to entertain. There are two parts to this presentation. One is focused really in a semi-academic way on the history of rugby in Japan. And the second is more conversational about who we think might have been the better Japanese teams and players of recent years. Satoshi and I in this picture are in Japan or two days before the Rugby World Cup final on our way to Nihon Daigaku to make a presentation far more extensive and historical than this one. And this presentation is a filleted part of that. You probably see what we're wearing T-shirts that are supposed to promote my company, Rhino. And the kanji is the Chinese-Japanese say and it just transpires that most young Japanese can't read it, so that backfired on me. Is that what you said? That's the case? Yeah, it's not only young Japanese. So is there anyone who can read this kanji? No. That was one of the more inspired pieces of marketing of my career actually. Satoshi and I also for a while about a year and a half wrote a monthly article for Rugby magazine of Japan called In the Spirit of Rugby. And what I learned from that was it took me a while to learn this, but Satoshi wasn't actually translating what I was writing. He used to make up his own stories based on it. And I only realized this when I actually got a threatening legal letter from one of my rival companies. And I was puzzled at that and I had to reverse Google translate what he'd written in Japanese, which was born no resemblance whatsoever. It's about a topic which I'm quite passionate about. So Japan is in many sense regarded as the Galapagos phenomenon. So Galapagos Island is the island in the Atlantic Ocean which is quite isolated from the reservoir. So they even have their own food chain. So the king of Galapagos Island can't survive outside of the island and it's vice versa. There are lots of things happening in Japanese whether sports or otherwise. One particular topic Ms. Reg picked up was the Japanese ball. So the Rugby ball, according to the World Rugby standard, there's a deviation. It can be at least this length, but it has to be shorter than this in both directions. So the Japanese company sort of abusing this deviation of the specification of the ball. So there's one Japanese company who was producing quite pointy rugby ball, which is quite long and actually it's pointy. So it's quite easy for Japan. Yeah, but that's not actually what I wrote, is it? I didn't mention the word Galapagos. And I ended up being sued by that company in question anyway. Look, let's just go ahead. But can you just try and sort of keep on talking? Yes, yes. Doesn't seem to be working. Here we go. Look, first of all, if you're ever talking, I am an amateur sports historian. I'm passionate about the history of sport. And because of my contacts with Japan, I'm particularly interested in the history of Japanese sport and Japanese rugby. The first thing you have to say before you talk about the history of football or rugby, is that it's slightly absurd to think that any culture kind of invented football. And the reason I always start with this slide is that in the Heian era, in the courts of Japan, they played a kind of game of keepy upy. So this is a Japanese form of football. I was on a business trip to China some years ago. And I think China were quite aggressive about staging the Football World Cup. And one of my host Japanese sports manufacturing companies played me a short video when I arrived that more or less said China invented football, actually. And actually, fun enough, it was called Kamari. Exactly the same word. We invented a game called Kamari. And I think that's Shimogamo Jinja in Kyoto, where on New Year's Day, every year, they stage a reenactment of Kamari. So I'm about to tell you the usual colonial story about the British invented everything sporting-wise. And I'm starting off by saying, actually, it wasn't like that in Europe. Whereas the Heian game of keepy upy was very civilized and probably didn't involve any fouling and tackling, the origins of most get forms of football in Europe are on highs days and feast days, a whole village having a semi-riot and kicking a ball around and getting drunk and making a complete mess. So there are various forms of the origins of football, but they are universal. It has to be said. Now, sorry. In terms of the history of rugby in Japan, there are two strands to this. And it's pretty obvious that there's two strands. Number one is, when was it first played in Japan? And secondly, when did Japanese people start playing it? And the obvious answer to the first question is in the mid-1860s, this is a very famous print from the Illustrated London News of 1874. It's a rather stylized picture of foreigners playing rugby on the bluff in Yokohama. You can see Mount Fuji from lots of parts of Yokohama, but that's a bit stylized. And obviously the locals are watching and the sailors and soldiers and expats are playing. And the Yokohama Football Club, if you look at the flag, you can make out the fact that it's YFC, the Yokohama Football Club. And the reason I'm going to mention that is that, I'll get it right eventually. The story of the origins of rugby in Japan is interesting in so far as the Yokohama Football Club has been proved to be the origin, which merged seamlessly into a club called the Yokohama Country and Athletic Club. This is a gentleman called Mike Galbraith, who's a great friend of mine and is another amateur historian who currently is writing a book on the history of rugby in Japan. And I must, at this point, as this is being recorded, pay tribute to Dr. Helen McNaughton, who's a very good friend of mine from SOAS, who would be here, but she's in New Zealand at the moment, amongst other things, watching the Women's Rugby World Cup. I saw her 10 days ago. She is currently writing jointly with Mike the history of Japanese rugby. The history of Japanese rugby in a real sense starts in the mid-1860s and it makes the Yokohama Country and Athletic Club the oldest continuously surviving rugby club in Asia. Which is, I think, Filma Gaons here. If you want to claim anything in rugby, you have to get Phil, who's the curator of the World Rugby Museum, to agree to it. And finally, Mike convinced Phil that this was the case. So rugby started in Japan in the 1860s and their club in Yokohama is the oldest continuously surviving rugby club in Asia, which I think is very nice. But, of course, in the past, I have to say Japanese rugby historians and officials were really not mad keen on that story because really, for them, the only thing that mattered was when did rugby start in Japan? And the story is, and the answer is here. So what you have there is 1899, Keio Gijuku, or Keio University, have the first ever Japanese rugby team and it's founded by the two guys in the middle, very interesting background. The guy on the left is Edward Bramwell-Clark, who had an English father who was a baker in Yokohama, I believe, and a Japanese mother and he went from Yokohama somehow to the University of the West Indies, which I've never managed to understand, but then on to Cambridge, where he met the guy on the right, Genosuke Tanaka. So they met at Cambridge and somehow they ended up both teaching together at Keio and they decided that they'd get the guys together for a team. The first ever team they played was the Yokohama Country and Athletic Clubs, no one else to play. But this is the first team and I think I just love this photograph because it's taken a lot of staging, the two sort of mentors in the middle, but if you look at the physique of those guys, I just think the idea that the Japanese have a physique unsuited to rugby, look at those books. I mean, they just, they look to me to be made for rugby and I love the way that they've been taught to sort of look into the distance with their arms folded, like you see in all sort of Victorian photographs of that era. So rugby starts 1899 onwards in the 1910s. It's, you know, it begins to make some progress, but the next great leap forward in Japanese rugby history is presided over by this gentleman called Shigeru Kayama and he was obviously a rather aristocratic background, I have to presume, because he went on tour of the world in Europe with the future emperor Hirohito when he was crown prince in the 1920s and amongst other things, he certainly trained and played with Harlequin's enrichment and came back to Japan and wrote the definitive book on rugby called rugby, which was not just about these are the rules, it was about this is the ethos of the game and it was decided by the powers that be that actually we quite like the idea of using rugby in our educational system and one of the theories that my colleagues at Nihon University in Tokyo have is that there was actually a confluence of ideas between the way that the Japanese thought about sport and the world and the way that the English did. So this is a very well-known book by Nitobe Inazo, Ushido the Soul of Japan which is a massive seller in the West when the West was very interested in learning about Japan in the 1890s and the theory of some people is that the idea of manliness and chivalry and a way of behaving that was shown for example in Tom Brown's school days which was published in the 1850s rather meshed. So I certainly think that the people who were in charge of education in Japan thought well actually we like the values of rugby and it chimes with our natural way of looking at things A nice story I like to tell about the history of Japanese rugby is that Shigeru Kayama designed the first ever Japanese rugby jersey and you'll see that there are three cherry blossom flowers and one of them is an unopened bud and Kayama's idea was that that bud would stay closed until such a time as the Japan could consider itself on a par with the rest of the world and so that I think is Phil the earliest known surviving rugby jersey it's up from one that you've had in the museum I think anyway it yeah 1932 it illustrates the point just to show the difference that's the modern one on the right and you see the one on the left now interestingly the point at which they decided to open the third bud was when Oxford University toured Japan in 1952 the first ever foreign sports team to tour after the Second World War and they played Japan and they decided rightly or wrongly that that that equal that represented equality so the third blossom was allowed to was allowed to open so another small anecdote about the history of Japanese rugby which I quite like is that Shigeru Kayama defended a gentleman called Edmund Blundon at Tokyo University so I think Kayama went back to teach at Tokyo University and Edmund Blundon is one of our most famous and revered war poets who survived the trenches of the First World War and went to teach English at Tokyo University and became a great friend of Kayama and he wrote this poem it's not his best poem I suspect I'll try and read the first thirsty if I can in case you can I hear from time I hear from winter's long ago resounding to the frosty sky that's a feet feet feet go low the splendid roar that hailed the tribe I hear from winter's yet to come those old died cries from throats hurled and feel when you and I are done still rugby will refresh the world now I think it's a very nice line still rugby will refresh the world and the interesting thing is that this is now the rugby club song of Tokyo University so if you go to a toad eye game the teams all get together afterwards in a rather stylized way they have a beer they have a snack and they sing their rugby club song against each other and if you're first listening to this one after a few minutes you think actually that's English that they're trying to sing and that's what they sing now the interesting thing is the 1930s at the time when Japan went extremely nationalistic and were not necessarily in favour of foreign words and concepts rugby temporarily became known as Tokyo which is fighting ball so rugby was dropped and they were playing a game called Tokyo and whenever I bumped into some old guys from Tokyo University I said well presumably in that era you dropped your rugby club song because it was in English and of course they didn't they kept singing in English I think this is quite a fun thing to look back on so that's there's a few sort of strands that I've plucked out from a much longer lecture on the history of rugby in Japan and that leads us really up to the Second World War and I want to next talk about the time since then since 1945 but Satoshi have you got any sort of things to come in on there that you want to what, sorry what was the question have you got any points to make any more to add yes, yes he is the one who lost the school song for the Tokyo University then he has got quite lots of connection with Japan and he's actually kind of a known figure in a certain circle among the Tokyo University rugby team the Toda is much revered in Tokyo University and his ancestors his ancestors, his relatives now are still very aware of his role in that now that's the sort of snapshot of a much longer lecture on the history of rugby in Japan which I hope you found interesting and I was thinking about how to approach rugby since the war in Japan and I think the I'm going to do something very straightforward this is from Wikipedia so anyone can look at this the story of rugby in Japan since 1945-50 is all about company rugby so there's a very interesting question why is company rugby so dominant in Japan and in the so-called amateur era of rugby prior to 1995 this was quite tricky really because the Japanese said yes we're rugby's an amateur game and they said well yeah but you've got company rugby teams and the company teams are recruiting people like me really to play rugby even though you have to work that was a delicacy that was well managed by Japan the JRFU the fact is it's still dominated by companies I don't think it's a bad thing I think it's a reflection on Japanese society less so now but certainly in the 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s if you joined a Japanese company it dominated your life if you played squash or badminton it was for the company team everything you did was to do with the company so the fact you played for the company team no big deal it's same as rugby for everything else the other big factor I think really was land and I think the absence of playing fields and land on which to build stadiums being an under recognised part of the history of sport in Japan so one of the reasons that company teams dominated the post-war scene was that certainly the big steel companies and the railroad companies had land on which they could easily put a rugby pitch and it was very different for other you don't get neighbourhood teams in Japan there just isn't a place to play you do get them but it's hard work for the people who are involved in that so I'm going to ask two questions to finish off the lecture and then I really want to get other people's opinion not just Satoshi's and the question is who was the best ever team that Japan ever had and who was the best ever player that Japan ever had so these are my two questions to finish with and we're going to scroll through these stats so if you look at that I would point out in the early days when it was the NHK cut for three years three years in five a team called Yawata Steel which was based in Kitakyushin was still an independent company then but then became Shinitetsu Yawata as it still is and at that time from 1960 to 61 all the way through to 1997 1998 the format in Japan was that they'd have a company championship and they'd have a university championship and the company team would play the university team in the national stadium usually on a big national holiday and at certain times with very big crowds so for the championship now the fact is that I would say seven or eight possibly more times out of ten because the university team was obviously younger but it was a nice concept and it lasted all the way through as I say to 1997 1998 now if we scroll down here you come into a period where a different Nippon Steel team from Kamaishi in Sendai correct? Yes had a fantastic team and it was quite an isolated town but the Nippon Steel Kamaishi team did very well then you come actually to the most exciting part from me when the Kabelko Steelers started winning a great deal and in recent years Toshiba Futsu did very well three wins in a row and then more modern you come into a period where the Sanyo Wild Nights which became Panasonic Wild Nights have done rather well as you can see and Santori Goliath Eddie Jones's team win three in a row here and I think he has been involved in all of those teams as an advisor and you can see Panasonic recently won so we have the question and I would welcome input onto this so who was the best Japanese team ever since the war Yawata Steel Nippon Steel Kamaishi Kobe Steel Wasuda Toshiba Futsu Sanyo Panasonic Santori the reason I put Wasuda in there was because they were the last ever university team under the old dispensation to win the championship and at this point I would just say we're here today because it's the England Japan game on Saturday but I've put in front of you a program for an event that's very close to my heart the Oku Memorial Trophy. Katsu Oku was a very distinguished Wasuda University player and administrator who's widely regarded as the person who first had the idea that Japan should pitch for a World Cup. He sadly was as you may know assassinated in Iraq in 2003 and every year we play this match usually at the end of November but if England Japan are in town we play it the same day so have a look at the program you all be very welcome to attend that. The reason I mention it is that a quite famous coach in Japan called Kiyomiya-san Katsu Oku together put together what most people consider the best ever Japanese university side which was the team that if we look back in the last Wasuda sorry bear with me the last ever university team to win was Wasuda somewhere. That was a very famous team in Wasuda they had a philosophy called the ultimate crush I don't know what that means but I think it's worth at least including one university team in the best ever team so who was the best ever team in my opinion of course if you think about it statistically 10 wins and 7 consecutive which has to be Kobe Steel really but other people might have a different view Satoshi what do you think? Well yeah definitely Kobe Steelers yes. You agree well that's no good yeah. Someone who knows absolutely nothing about Japanese sorry corporate university rugby at what stage did those teams start having foreign players? Foreign players yes. Yeah okay well without blowing my own trumpet I was the first foreigner to play top level rugby in Japan for Kobe steel for three seasons for 80 to 83 and then became a bit of a landslide especially in the 90s. So those ones at the bottom there they all have they have mainly international teams? Well the good thing about the Japan top league or whatever it's called our first division is that there is a limit on foreign players both the number you can have on the books and the number on the field at any one time now until recently used to be three on the pitch other what's the current rule Satoshi do you know? Well yeah there are some taps yes I don't know how many. It's more than three but they kept the limit on it because you know otherwise what does it do to develop the game. The first non-Japanese player ever to play rugby for Japan was a guy called Paione and he was a Tongvin who went to Daito Bunko University and I think he played for Japan in 86-87 and since then my final slide is of Dan Carter who played for Kobe Steel. I mean that tells you all you need to know. I think these days because of the seasonality it's possible for very for leading players especially from New Zealand Australia to less extent South Africa they can actually play in the European season for half a season and play in the Japan league and I won't go into detail but the money is phenomenal I mean the Japanese corporate teams are playing phenomenal amounts of money to foreign players and you know the dream scenario at the end of a distinguished career certainly in New Zealand possibly South Africa and Australia is to end up playing half the season in Japan and half the season in Europe that's your payday so again I'm very biased as to what the answer to that is but you know that's the scene in Japan it's corporate dominated well that's you know nothing wrong with that after the World Cup there was an attempt to try and make a more franchise based model for a top league so for example Oita was a huge success as a venue in the rugby World Cup and they thought well let's create a franchise in Oita but this involved going to Kobe Steel and saying would you mind just dropping out and letting the team be Kobe and going to Toyota and saying can we have a Nagoya team and you know and of course you know the answer from Toyota was no no we quite like our rugby team so the power of the corporates saw off that attempt to make it more city regional franchise based and I don't have a view on whether that's good or bad I mean I just think the system is what it is I think it works in Japan on a corporate basis and it's been in place for decades and I think you should you know be wrong to tamper with it so there you are that's teams so who was Japan's best ever player so this is Reg's list and Satoshi's got his own list so this is actually much neglecting recent years and he's really focused on times that I played so there's a gentleman called Demisakata who remarkably he played at Kintetsu in Osaka and for all Japan who went to New Zealand for a couple of years and actually almost got selected for the Orglax he was a winger he was that good he was called the hero of Shukuzawa who was a very famous university player who instead of joining a company team like Kobe Steel or Nippon Steel joined Sumitomo Bank and continued to captain the Japanese team by training on his own and not playing for a club team which was remarkable a guy called Yuji Matsuo who I played against by incident the hero of Shukuzawa was one of the founders of London Japanese rugby club and I remember playing with him Yuji Matsuo was a great fly half for Nippon Steel who always hammered us when we played them and I've never forgiven him but there you go Toshiyuki Hayashi at one time I would have said Japan's greatest ever forward first Japanese national together rugby blue at Oxford Seiji Hirau was an absolutely fantastic player for Kobe Seiko and Japan who sadly died too early of cancer a few years ago but world class and more recently the star of the 2015 rugby World Cup who certainly played some super rugby and Michael Leach I think it's a remarkable I picked all Japanese nationals but I think Michael Leach is a fantastic story born in New Zealand of Fujian heritage moved to Hokkaido when he was 11 and as far as I'm concerned is as Japanese as he could be in a real sense in the last 10 years there have been many many years in which I put him as one of the top 5 players in the world in the last game at Twickenham between England and Japan in 2018 he was unbelievably good but my cultural favourite clip of a Japanese rugby team in the changing room is Michael Leach at the centre of the room surrounded by the players delivering his pep talk in perfect Japanese and they have translators around the room translating it back into English for the non-Japanese players which I just think is fantastic sort of cross cultural glimpse so this is my list so Hiro Shukuzawa Demisakata Matsuo-san in his action shot he runs a bar in Shibuya which I go to every time I'm in Tokyo and he still hasn't bought me a drink Maru Hayashi great player Morumaru Michael Leach and Seiji Hiro now what do you think Satoshi you mentioned a couple of guys more recently you played in Super Rugby Kotaro Matsushima or the Kazuki Hime so those players played abroad in recent days so there must be which ones in particular I don't know both of them I think one back just mention their names again Kotaro Matsushima he played for then the Hime no Prey Hairandes is anyone else up another candidate that you put forward is Japan's greatest ever player Daisuke Ovan oh yes the winger record triscorer yeah I should have put him in actually yeah you'll never forgive me don't tell him anybody else any ideas thank you Koko yeah the winger he didn't play abroad but he played really well for the World Cup for Japan I mean I'm by this is heavily weighted towards thus I haven't been very good on the last 10 years just go back 30 years that's the ear of the eye so okay well this is you won't be surprised I'm gonna have one concert you mentioned Matthew Matthew yes yeah he had a fantastic World Cup in 2015 well here's mine so having nominated Kobe Steelers the best ever team in Japan I would normally have said in the past Maru Hayashi was Japan's best ever forward and I have to say now I really think that has to go to Michael Leach so it's not all going to be it's not all Kobe say go so he's a great player but Michael Leach I just think as a captain and a player has just been unbelievable in the last 10 years so he's got my vote for Japan's best ever forward but I have to say that I still think Japan's best ever back and player was Seiji Hirau I think he was just in a different league so you have to have a reward for giving a lecture and the next two slides are a complete indulgence to myself so I'm very fond I was fond of Seiji Hirau we played together for Richmond in 1985 in 1986 in the middle of his career bit of a hair there at the time and I was very moved one of my top experiences in the rugby world cup in Japan was actually not watching a match in the stadium I watched Ireland play Japan in the Kobe fan zone which was on the waterfront in Kobe and it was actually just a fantastic experience as good as being in the stadium but there was a whole exhibition or memorial to Seiji Hirau 20 30 yards of pictures of him which really moved me actually so that's a picture of me paying tribute to my old mate he's sickeningly good looking actually he was the David Beckham of Japan when he first arrived and finally who was the greatest rugby player ever to play in Japan I think it was Dan Carter who was my Kobe Seiko Kohai bit over here there as well I was very pleased to meet him when he became the latest guide in fly half of Kobe Steel which I was very proud to do in 1883 so that's my self indulgent lecture on the history of rugby in Japan and I'd be very happy to take any questions I didn't involve you very much I'm so sorry I actually don't trust you but it's mostly because I don't trust you actually any questions if you work for Toyota and you play for the company team are you balanced your career does the company pay you for playing rugby as well that's a very very good question and the answers changed over the years so let me give you the up to date answer as of now both Kobe Steel and Toyota and all of the other professional teams in Japan have two kinds of players one is pure professional and all of the foreign players are just professional rugby players they're not expected to work and they have a type 2 which is people who are actually earmarked to stay in the company and they will be given time off to train but unlike their other players some full time professional Japanese all of the foreigners they would train and then have to go off and work in the afternoon and around them would know that three afternoons a week they won't be here because they'll go and train so I think that's a nice two tier system because it gives you the ability to exploit your rugby ability but still lay down the foundations of a proper career in the company and genuinely if these people are good they won't be discriminated against as jocks or sportsmen in future they can make it now if you've come back to my time on joining Kobe Steel would deliberately recruit good Japanese graduates obviously good rugby players and starting with myself foreigners but we had to work 9-5 there's no question about it you know 9-5 and training Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday Saturday afternoon and playing on the Sunday wasn't a great life I have to tell you when I was there seriously it was tough it was great and it was fantastic but they kind of that's the way it's evolved it's a very good question I think how would you say the corporate teams I think that is a negative not a huge negative but I mean Kobe Steel I think there might be now a baseball team in the Kobe area but Kobe Steel was the only national ranking sports team in Kobe so Kobe Steel would get a lot of support from the region of Kobe but I don't think it's an automatic fit in other places and I think the proponents of a new top league that was regional city franchise base were hoping that that would create a bigger fan base and I think it would have done it's one of those I think that is the downside of the corporate thing you might live in Toyota you might live in Nagoya and not like Toyota you might live in Kobe and think Kobe Steel was an awful company so you are restricting yourself but swings around about Sweden yeah I was building on that question I wonder if the companies each have women's women's teams I suppose without building with that model without women's teams from the company then I suppose that's also restrictive the women's game is very underdeveloped at the grassroots level in Japan the Japanese National 7's women's team are very good at the moment and the 15's are getting there but the player base is very small I think I'm right in saying only two professional or even semi professional teams maybe three in Japan so I think where the women's rugby is one of the big growth areas of world rugby I think numbers wise it's still struggling in Japan they managed to field some women's teams but there's not much below there I mean I think I'm trying to think of the professional teams and they certainly and they're not corporate the top women's teams are not corporate they're sort of open clubs like we have elsewhere Shibuya Ladies was a very good team and there was two or three others I think Satoshi do you know that yeah there are some clubs but they're just open clubs aren't they I think so yes it's two minutes past sake time so I'm very happy to talk I think yes so thank you very much give a big round of applause for our speakers Reg and Satoshi and you can find them outside so now I would like to thank our sponsors Rie Yoshitake of Sake Samurai who is already outside preparing the sake reception to which you are cordially invited and of course the Japan Society who also helped with the catering and there should be some sushi waiting for you just outside the room so thank you to Heidi Potter of the Japan Society thank you very much thank you for coming and I hope you enjoy the evening and please join us outside