The Rainbow Nation

I do find it hard to believe I'm in a country so far from the est of the world where the places reflect the rough past. Years of apartheid and hatred by an invading people led the country to a racial schism that is hard to find else in history to its severity. The fleeing Dutch Calvinists came to South Africa seeking asylum from religious persecution. They took over the nation and separated the entire indigenous population into ethnically based sections of the countries . The blacks made far less than the whites, were treated with little to no rights and lost total self image in their country of South Africa. However one man spoke up. Nelson Mandela was on the for front of the unification of South Africa as a nation, and not a mob of bitter people. However the leaders didn't enjoy his critique, labeled him as a terrorist, despite his peaceful means and sent him to life in prison . However, after 26 years a political upheaval led to his release. Later he ran for president and united the country of South Africa in a dynamic way backing the Springboks, the national rugby team all the way to their victory in the rugby world cup in 1995.

Now I am at a place of so much history and ethnic backlash, it is hard to imagine it ever happened. The atmosphere is nothing short of electric. the tensity is incredible. I cant even begin to tell you, but this place, the Rainbow Nation, having gone through so much together seems to show a strong sense of unity. This is even more so each day the Cup draws near. This nation is truly all its own and there nowhere like this in the world.

SUPER AWESOME BLOG ENTRY WHOOO!!!! ************** :DDDDDD..... by Mick Ryan

My team and i plan on getting to South Africa by Flying with Japan Air. We will take a private, non-stop flight to South Africa, Mangaung to be exact. It's most likely going tro be an extremely long flight, around 20 hours, so I just plan on sleeping the whole time. And if that doesn't work, i guess i am just going to have to find another way to keep myself entertained on the plane. To bad we cant play soccer on the plane. After the 20 hour long flight, we will head over to our hotel. We will be staying in a really nice 4 star hotel called Protea Hotel in Bloemfontein. It has a great reputation of friendly staff members, good dining oppurtunities, and just a nice looking hotel in general. It also has it's own spa, and 3 pools, which will really help me and my fellow team members relax. which I expect the people in South Africa to be very welcoming and polite, and i believe we will be very accomodated to. The people of South Africa are known to be pretty welcoming. Our first game will be match number 9 and it will be held in Mangaung on June 14, at 3:00 P.M. and it's against Cameroon. I will admit, i am a little bit nervous about our first game, but i believe that our team will prove to be the better team and i have a lot of faith in our team so far. Let's just hope all things go well.

A Star's perspective

Japan perceives our team as a national team in which a big culture has grown around. Football is now one of our country's most popular sports Soccer has become an important pass-time for the adults as well as children. There are also lots of soccer fields in parks that anyone can play a game on. Soccer became popular in Japan in the 1920's to the 1930's. Japan has high expectations for us this year because of our outstanding playing for the premliminary rounds. If we win the world cup we might be given a parade because soccer is one of the most popular sports in Japan as well as the JFA and Jleague getting funds for more soccer oriented things. If we lose in the world cup then nothing very bad will happen because we know we played well and are not shamed. Originally in our culture if we lost in a contest of anything then we would feel ashamed and commit a form of suicide called seppuku. Seppuku is a ritual form of suicide that the samurai used if they were defeated in battle and still alive. The first part of the ritual is to take the short blade that is next to your katana and drive it through your stomach and then rip it sideways. Shortly after this is done someone you choose to help kill yourself will then chop off your head. I expect that the world cup games will be very organized, well thought out, and outstanding because it will be the first time the world cup is set in Africa.

Path to the World Cup

Japan beat Uzbekistan 1-0 and were the first team through for the second time in a row.  Shunji Okazaki claimed the only goal of the game after nine minutes.  Successfully reaching the final stage of the Asian Zone they qualified for World Cup 2010. Japan won four and lost only one of their eight matches; three were a tie. 

History

Japan's first major achievement in international football came in the 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico City, where the team won the bronze medal. This raised awareness of the sport in Japan but without a professional league it had to wait 30 years before qualifying for the World Cup.  In 1991, the owners of the semi-professional Japan Soccer League agreed to re-form as the professional league. This strengthened the national team. With the start of the new league in 1993, interest in football and the national team grew.  Japan co-hosted the 2002 World Cup with South Korea. Despite a 2-2 tie with Belgium in their opening game, the Japanese team reached the second round with a 1-0 win over Russia and a 2-0 victory against Tunisia. However, they had to leave, after losing 1-0 to Turkey.

Star Players

Japan's biggest star is Shunsuke Nakamura. Another major player is midfielder Keisuke Honda.  Leading from the back is 31 year-old defensive Yuji Nakazawa.

Coach

Takeshi Okada is widely considered to be one of the best Japanese strategists around. He was the leader during the team's first World Cup appearance at France 1998.