From the first attempt at naturalization to the vigorous support of mixed races, why did the Japanese Football Association turn?

The reporter reported coldly The round of 18 is more than halfway through the tournament, and in some ways it is a test of the wave of naturalization that has swept across Asia. With the exception of South Korea, Iran and Japan in Pot 1, 14 of the remaining 15 teams have naturalized players to strengthen their strength (North Korea has none). Taking the round of 18 squad in November as an example, there are 5 teams with more than 10 naturalized players: Qatar (16), Indonesia (14), and the United Arab Emirates, Iraq, and Palestine (12).

It is worth noting that as one of the first countries in Asia to rely on naturalized players to achieve success, Japanese football has now taken a different path. At a time when the whole of Asia is looking for naturalized high-level foreign players and naturalized players who have grown up in Europe and the United States and have better physical conditions, we are seeing more and more mixed-race players who have grown up in Japan stand out in Japan and gradually enter the national teams of all age groups and become the main players.

From Ramos, Lu Bisu, and Santo, to today's Suzuki Ayayan, Mochizuki Kaihui, and Fujita Jeanru, why did the naturalization strategy of Japanese football turn, and how did local mixed blood emerge in batches?

In the 90s last season, in the early days of the development of professional football in Japan, the naturalization of foreign players and the introduction of high-priced senior stars "stirred up" the J-League atmosphere. However, with the improvement of the local youth training system and the large-scale retention of local players since the beginning of the 21st century, Japanese football has gradually shifted its development focus to the development of local players.

During this period, naturalization gradually stagnated for three reasons: on the one hand, the benign operation principle of the J-League almost did not allow high-priced foreign aid to join before, resulting in the J-League's foreign aid strength not being prominent over local players, and there was a lack of naturalization motivation; On the other hand, in 2005, FIFA significantly raised the threshold for non-blood naturalization, requiring more than 5 consecutive years of residence in the naturalization destination country, and with the significant increase in the number and quality of Japanese players in Europe, the strength of Japanese players in Europe even exceeded that of most J-League foreign players; Finally, in Japan, the belief that the national team should be formed with local players as the core in order to truly represent Japan has always been the mainstream.

However, the barriers to the top 8 of the World Cup have never been broken, so that the Japanese Football Association has to start rethinking and layout. Halilhodzic, the famous coach of Bosnia-Herzegovina, who has coached the Japanese national team, once pointed out that if Japanese football wants to compete with strong European teams, whether the players' size and confrontation ability can meet world-class standards will be the key. As a result, local mixed-race players began to gradually enter the field of vision, and compared with non-blood naturalization, these players who grew up in the soil of Japanese football can seamlessly integrate in the football system and are more easily accepted by the public in terms of cultural identity.

What is even more overlooked is that the declining birthrate caused by the declining fertility rate has actually directly affected the population base of Japanese football youth training.

In 1950, 55% of Japan's population was under the age of 24, and this is expected to fall to 18% by 2030. The total number of soccer players registered with the Japan Football Association has been growing from 795,000 in 2000, but by the peak of 963,000 in 2013, the number of elementary school students has begun to decline significantly, reaching a peak of 318,500 in 2013 and falling to 206,000 in 2023, a decline of 110,000 in 10 years. The number of secondary school players has dropped from a peak of 268,500 in 2014 to 154,000 in 2023, the number of college students has dropped from a peak of 178,600 in 2016 to 125,000 in 2023, and the number of players above college has dropped from a peak of 183,700 in 2004 to 96,000 in 2023.

In recent years, the Japanese Football Association has expanded the scope of the club's recruitment of young players, mainly because the youth population is declining, and the club's selection of materials in the original surrounding areas is getting smaller and smaller, and can only expand from the school to the entire community, and then cover the whole country.

The Japanese Football Association's strategy is to win the World Cup by 2050 and reach 10 million football families. However, under the general trend of declining annual births in the country, in order to maintain or even increase the youth football population, it is inevitable to favor the increasing number of mixed-race teenagers. In 1990 and 2019, Japan experienced two major changes in its policy of opening up immigration. The migrant population surged from 1.07 million in 1990 to 2.93 million in 2019, even more if you include illegal immigrants and other migrant workers working in Japan. These immigrants marry Japanese and have a higher fertility rate than native Japanese nationals. Mixed-race youths who are descendants of immigrants generally have a higher interest in soccer and are physically better than Japanese counterparts of their age, and their growth in numbers has slowed the downward trend in the youth soccer population.

In recent years, with the full liberalization of immigrants in Japan, immigrants and laborers have entered all fields of Japanese society and played an increasingly obvious role, and the concept of foreign immigrants and their mixed-race descendants in Japanese society is also changing. Not only the Japan Football Association, but also other sports in Japan are using mixed-race athletes, and there is also a growing trend, including Tokyo Olympic flag bearer Hachimura who plays for the Lakers, and Naomi Osaka, Japan's first ever Grand Slam women's singles champion.

Three years ago, Yasuharu Tamimachi, chairman of the Technical Committee of the Japan Football Association, publicly encouraged Japanese mixed-race players to obtain Japanese nationality and became an emerging "bonanza" for the Japanese team to select talents. At that time, Koji said that there were about 50 mixed-race athletes with Japanese nationality, and the Japanese Football Association would conduct a comprehensive investigation and support for mixed-race players to strengthen the Japanese national team. Japan's Nationality Law stipulates that Japanese nationals who can choose their nationality before the age of 20 must make a final choice of nationality before they reach the age of 22.

The Japan Football Association believes that this is the stage of diversification of football talent that developed countries in Europe have already experienced, and it is natural for Japanese football to catch up with this trend. Unlike other Asian countries, the level of the J-League and the Japanese football youth training system are among the best in Asia, which can ensure that local mixed-race players get enough football enlightenment and training, and at the same time, take advantage of the very mature foreign system of Japanese football to continue their studies in Europe.This complete football talent training system is the advantage of Japanese football over other Asian football powers. Moreover, these homegrown mixed-race players do not have the integration problems that are common in other countries when they bring in naturalized players from overseas.

The Japan Football Association has always wanted to bridge the gap between the players in terms of height, intensity and speed with the strong teams in Europe and the United States. Mixed-race players are generally able to make up for the above disadvantages, for example, the four "post-00" mixed-race goalkeepers are all more than 1.90 meters tall and have the physical fitness of modern large goalkeepers. Solomon Sakuragawa, who is 1.91 meters tall, is the strongest high school forward in the J2 League, and is regarded as the forward hope for the Japanese team to compete with the tall defenders of Europe and the United States in the future.

The presence of local mixed-race players in the Japanese national team is gradually rising from the younger age group. It is enough to show the patience and systematization of Japanese football in the development of mixed-race players.

In the 2019 U17 World Junior Championships, Japan's U17 national junior team defeated the favorite Netherlands in the group stage, and the Japanese national junior team had four mixed-race players. In addition to goalkeepers Ayaka Suzuki and Daishi Nozawa, there are also left-back Daiya Hata and midfielder Jeanru Fujita. Among these 4 people, except for Nozawa Daishi, the remaining 3 are the absolute main force, which means that the proportion of mixed-race players in the Japanese U17 national junior team has reached nearly 30%.

In September 2020, as many as six of the 29-man training roster for the U20 World Youth Championship were mixed-race players. At this year's Paris Olympics, the Japanese Olympic team also has four mixed-race players, in addition to Reio Kokubo, Daishi Nozawa and captain Jeanru Fujita, as well as midfielder Megumi Sato (Colombian/Japanese mixed-race).In addition, the mixed-race players who have been called up by the Japanese Olympic team include defender Amway Chase (American-Japanese mixed-race) and left-back Kashifu (Ghana/Japanese-mixed-race), who also made his debut for the Japanese national team in 2023.