There’s nothing more legendary that seeing something becoming world-wide, property of everyone, global. J. League is trying to achieve that, but to do so, you need a global fanbase. And it’s there, although its numbers can certainly rise. In this series of pieces – which will all fall under the label “J. League Worldwide”, we’re trying to tell the personal and professional stories of Japanese football fans all over the world.
Before introducing the sixth installment of the series, I want to remind the efforts of Stuart Smith in starting this column (you can find him @Sushi_Football on Twitter, doing the good job of spreading the hype for J. League). Between March and April 2016, he had already published four numbers and I want to give them a fresh exposure, adding the last episode we featured on the website a year ago:
- No. 1 – David Clements, @dclements54
- No. 2 – Ryan Steele, @Steelinho
- No. 3 – Ben, @NavyWaspBlue
- No. 4 – Gabriele Anello, @nellosplendor
- No. 5 – Federico Zanon, @FedeZanon15
For Episode number 6, we turn to Germany, which has a lot of strength in the J. League-sphere. It’s probably one of the most culturally similar populations compared to the Japanese one and J. League would probably like to follow the steps made by the Bundesliga to step into the global stage. And it will be certainly easier than ever if there’s support for the Japanese championship even in the Old Continent.
Our protagonist of today, Daniel (a.k.a. @LakerByNature), is no exception. We had a chat with one of the most active members of the European side of the J. League-sphere, who opened up about why he got into J. League following and for which team his heart beats for (although it might not be a mystery…).
- Where are you from and when you first started following J. League?
I currently live in Frankfurt, but I am originally from the beautiful city of Dresden, Germany. I have always been quite interested in international clubs; so much that, in the early 2000s, I became a fan of Celtic Glasgow and they have been my favorite team ever since.
From 2005 to ‘09, Shunsuke Nakamura played for Celtic and he was just unbelievable in those four years. I continued to follow his career after he left Glasgow and when he went back to Japan in 2010, I started to check J. League results to see how he was doing after that adventure.
- Do you have a favorite team or player?
Yes, I started to follow V-Varen Nagasaki in 2017 after my first trip to Japan. My fiancee’s parents are living just a few driving minutes from Transcosmos Stadium and, even though I was not able to go to a game back then since we visited for New Year’s Eve, I liked the area and the people… so much that I just wanted to follow the local team. I’m currently running two Twitter fan accounts in English and German, an Instagram account and, since the beginning of this year, also a blog about the club.
Apart from Shunsuke, I like Yu Kobayashi of Kawasaki Frontale a lot and also Marcos Júnior of Yokohama F. Marinos. At V-Varen, my favorite player is defender Makoto Kakuda. He joined the team last year and he has been quite inspirational because of his experience and personality.
- How you’re able to watch J. League games? And how do you keep up with the news regarding the league?
I watch all the V-Varen games through Bet365 on my tablet. The stream is not in the highest resolution, but they show every game and I’m really thankful for that. In Germany, Sportdigital are currently holding the rights for J1 League, but I have not subscribed so far because I rarely manage to watch first division matches.
Regarding news, I mostly rely on Twitter and the J-Talk Podcast. I really like the English-speaking J. League community and also already invited quite many fellow fans of J2 teams to my blog to preview some games. Ben, Sam, Jon, Stuart and all the guests they have on J-Talk are doing an outstanding job. Furthermore, Alan Gibson – with JSoccer Magazine and his website – is great, especially for new fans.
- Did you have the chance of visiting Japan, maybe even attending a match? If so, which kind of experience it was? And do you want to visit the country again?
By now, I have been to Japan three times and we stayed at least two weeks each time. The first trip in early 2017 really changed my life. Before that, the furthest East I had reached by travel was to the west of Poland, so you can imagine that I felt like I entered a different world. I hope I will be able to go to Japan again soon and I wouldn’t mind going there once per year.
So far, I have been to four games in Japan. The first was a 2-2 between Gamba Osaka and Kashiwa Reysol in March 2018. Panasonic Stadium is a great place to watch football and I was impressed with the support on both sides: they just kept jumping for 90 minutes and the fact that they were all singing for the entire game made me forget that the stadium was less than half full.
I also went to three V-Varen games in October 2019. A 2-1 defeat in Okayama, a 2-1 home win in the Emperor’s Cup semi-final against Ventforet Kofu and a 2-4 home defeat against Zweigen Kanazawa. I have to say I absolutely loved the matchday atmosphere at all games. The stadiums are not full, but it does not matter, if the supporters are giving it all for 90 minutes.
What I also liked was that people were just so relaxed and welcoming. And the food was great, too! I never expected such a wide range of dishes to be available at a football game.
- From what I can understand, you’re German. How do you think J. League has been perceived in your own country? And there’s a space to improve the image of the league, both in Germany and in Europe?
I do not see a lot of information in German about the J. League. There was a bit more going on when Podolski played for Vissel Kobe. At that time, DAZN Germany started to show J1 games, but at some point, they started showing only Vissel, regardless of how bad they were playing. Some of the commentators did not seem to prepare for the games at all, so I cancelled my DAZN account.
I felt that they were not really interested in promoting the Japanese game and they actually stopped showing the J. League as soon as Podolski left. Other than that, when I see something about the Japanese champonship in German, it’s rather bizarre news like the crazy penalty shootout between Vissel and Marinos in the Super Cup or King Kazu playing even in his 50s.
It is a shame because I think that the J. League is really entertaining and colorful: I hope it will be recognized for that one day. How that can be achieved is difficult for me to say, but I think they have done well with their international YouTube channel this season. I really like Goal Zone, which is a 25-30-minutes show, in which they show all highlights from every J1 match day with English commentary.
Last but not least, they have been showing J2 games live on this channel. I think most of the people watching are from other Asian countries, but there are some Europeans watching too.
I wanna thank Daniel for his time and I’m hoping he will continue enjoying his time as a V-Varen Nagasaki fan. This club has taken many steps forward, trying to reach J1 again: will they come back already in 2021? We shall see, while we wait for Episode 7. And we promise it won’t get too much long to appear on the website.
[…] if you can read here his interview with us, for Episode number 7, we move a little South. We had already several […]