Philippe Troussier on the J. League: "The Japanese are soft and the players are soft and the referees are soft. One little bump in a game and it's a foul. These would never be fouls in Europe, in Spain or England."
On the coaches: "They all need experience. The managers should go to Africa, then they will understand everything."
On losing 5-0 to France: "If you go to New York and get robbed, what do you do? Next day you come back with a stick and a pair of guns. Our players will change."
But can they change soon enough?
Troussier's little outburst last month spoke volumes about the quality of all participants in the J. League. In short, he was reminding Japan that the J. League is still Little League in world terms; there's still a lot of growing up to do and the only way to do it is to gain more experience. That experience is overseas, Europe to be precise.
For the players, it's always a case of should I stay or should I go? Abroad, that is, assuming, of course, they have the opportunity to go.
Like baseball, the exodus of players heading overseas is more of a trickle than a flood. With the success, so far, of Ichiro Suzuki and Tsuyoshi Shinjo, Major League Baseball has finally woken up to the depth of talent over here. The floodgates are ready to open and Japanese baseball is worried, despite the restrictive free-agency rules over here.
For soccer, too, the floodgates have yet to open, but the potential is there. More importantly, the need is there.
The main difference between baseball and soccer is that soccer has an international testing ground, i.e., international competitions; it's a world game. Japan only proves itself by playing against teams such as Brazil, France and Spain.
Just being a good J. League player is not enough. Just being Asian champion is not enough. The standard is always the world standard.
Japan's recent performances against France and Spain (5-0 and 1-0 losses), as well as a disappointing Olympic showing, demonstrated that Japanese players still have quite a bit of catching up to do.
OK, so Hidetoshi Nakata is a star and recognized as a top-level player. But he wasn't recognized as such while he was playing in Japan. He was good, but not that good.
The example of Nakata is important because when he moved to Perugia and Serie A, he could either sink or swim.
He could have maintained the same level of play, failed in Italy and returned to the J. League, but Nakata knew what he had to do and he had the determination and skill to do it. In fact, he had the skill while he was in Japan, but he was never forced into a situation where he HAD to perform at a consistently high level.
In Italy, he had to perform at that level if he wanted to succeed -- and Nakata wanted to succeed. So he built up his body strength and his speed and his mental toughness and started fighting to become a good Serie A player. He became the star of the Perugia team and earned himself a move to Roma.
Troussier has emphasized that the Japanese players lack experience. That is why he is taking them all over the world to play teams like France and Spain. He can learn more in a loss to France or Spain than he ever will in a win over China or Thailand.
Hopefully, the players will too. Shunsuke Nakamura of the Yokohama F. Marinos was cruelly exposed by the physical American players -- and others -- in the Sydney Olympics and proved himself to be ineffectual in the recent loss to France. He has extraordinary footballing talents, but, like Nakata, he has to force himself to learn how to use them in adverse situations. He won't learn much playing against FC Tokyo and he won't improve by staying in Japan.
And he's not alone. The cream of Japanese soccer would all benefit from playing abroad. Players should never stop learning. Kazu Miura's biggest career mistake was returning to the J. League after his single season in Serie A. Contrary to what some people think, Kazu was not a failure in Italy. He didn't make quite the progress Nakata made (although Nakata didn't have his nose broken by Franco Baresi in his first game), but he made enough progress not to need to return to Japan.
There's a rumor going around town that the Marinos' Shoji Jo turned down an offer to play in Belgium, saying that Belgian soccer was beneath his level. If true, that is both arrogance and ignorance at its highest level.
Unlike baseball, soccer has a variety of professional leagues that players like Jo and Nakamura can aim at. If Nakamura aims at Serie A or the Spanish League, he may find it beyond his level and get disheartened. Certainly, he wouldn't walk into any first team at that level.
If he aims his sights a little lower -- perhaps France, Holland, Belgium -- he has more of a chance of finding a level he can work at. Remember, not even Romario or Ronaldo went straight to the top level in Europe. Both played for Dutch clubs before going on to greater things.
The Japanese players need to do it one step at a time. Jo, who had very moderate success at Valladolid, is not going to jump back into the Spanish League, so he has to look at a lower league and work his way up. It'll be the same for most of Japan's top players.
But as Troussier says, it's not only the players who need to learn. It is no coincidence that the best coach in Japan, Takeshi Okada of Consadole Sapporo, spent some time learning his craft in Germany. Japan's coaches also need to study abroad, to broaden their horizons and see where Japanese players are going wrong. How can so many players get away with so much posturing and so little discipline? (send your answers to: [email protected] or mail them to me on a postcard)
Which brings us to referees. Japanese referees just don't feel comfortable with the authority they are given and the players pick up on this and take advantage of it. When Scotsman Leslie Mottram is refereeing the Kashima Antlers, Bismarck plays like he's wearing calipers. When the man in black is Japanese, Bismarck goes down like he's been shot in the knees every time he is touched (unless the Antlers are losing) and gets a lot of dubious free-kicks. The linesmen, meanwhile, don't have a clue when to put up their flags and wouldn't dream of countering a referee's decision.
Again, there is a cultural divide. Whether or not the mentality of referees and linesmen can be changed is difficult to know, but there's no harm in trying.
It's easy for all the participants to stay in the J. League and potter along as normal, but soccer is a world game and you've got to get out into the world to measure your standard against others and, most importantly, to raise that standard.
The J. League has raised the standard of Japanese soccer. In a curious way, getting out of the J. League, for some, could raise it even more.