2024-04-04 01:59:59
Some differences between Chinese and Japanese football – exclusive interview with Toshi Ukishima, head coach of the Chinese U15 men’s football selection team
Xinhua News Agency, Suzhou, April 3 (Reporter Ma Bangjie) Japanese football makes us feel both close and far away – close to each other, but far apart in strength. Player quality is a direct reflection of strength. Japanese football, separated by a river, can produce many outstanding players, but why can’t Chinese football? This is the main content discussed by Xinhua News Agency reporters in a recent exclusive interview with the new head coach of China’s U15 (under 15) national men’s football selection team Toshi Ukishima.
Head coach of China’s U15 national men’s football selection team Toshi Ukishima (left)
Ukishima Toshi, 56 years old, is an AFC professional-level coach training instructor (the Chinese Football Association currently has no domestic professional-level coach training instructor) and has rich coaching experience. He recently accepted an exclusive interview with reporters while inspecting players at the Suzhou Football Sports Center. Some questions involved the micro level of player training, and Ukishima answered patiently and meticulously. The questions and answers reflected the differences and underlying reasons between Chinese and Japanese football.
The following is a compilation of the interview content:
1. Player’s spirituality
Reporter asked (hereinfollowing referred to as “Q”): Watching the Chinese and Japanese adult team games, it is not difficult to find that the Chinese players’ physical condition is not inferior, but they always feel that their spirituality is not as good as that of the Japanese players. Why is there this difference?
Ukishima Toshida (hereinfollowing referred to as “A”): Chinese players’ physical conditions such as running speed have always been good, but their passing speed and decision-making speed are indeed slightly lacking. Japanese players have had the same problem before. Later, we discovered that the training of Japanese players during the sensitive period of 9 to 12 years old was unscientific, which led to some problems in their decision-making ability as adults. It’s not the fault of the players, it’s more the fault of their coaches when they were 9 to 12 years old. When I was a kid playing football, the coaching style of coaching was very command-oriented. After Japan discovered this problem, it invested a lot of energy in training grassroots coaches.
Q: Currently, Chinese football still has coaches who teach by command. Players are afraid of making mistakes and being criticized by the coach. How did Japanese football change at that time?
Answer: In fact, it is not that the Japan Football Association directly discovered this problem, but as more players went to play overseas, they discovered that overseas coaches coached differently. The Japan Football Association also sent coaches to study abroad and found that the player education models and ways of thinking are indeed different. In addition, Japan has also invited a large number of foreign teachers to Japan to explain and teach.
The responsibility of Japanese coaches now is not to tell players what to do, but to guide players to do what they do. Of course, sometimes you have to teach, but the ultimate goal is to guide and let the players understand. Not every Japanese coach does this. There is a trend in Japan: Rather than directly telling players what to do and giving clear instructions, coaches are now more likely to ask questions to inspire players to think.
Question: In which year or time period did this significant change occur in the training methods of Japanese coaches?
Answer: About 15 to 20 years ago.
Question: Some foreign coaches who are engaged in youth training in China have reported that there is a problem of overemphasis on performance in the field of Chinese football youth training, which has led to a series of problems such as high-level talent selection and simple tactics. How to solve this problem?
A: Japan also had this problem before, especially 20 years ago. Winning and developing players are actually both important, just like the front and rear wheels of a car are important, but the question is who wants to win. If the coach’s desire to win is excessive, the players will be intimidated. Specifically, it will deprive the players of the opportunity to think. Players may not make judgments, but do what the coach says. This makes it difficult to develop players’ decision-making skills. For example, the coach shouted from the side: Everyone, run. Players just run without thinking regarding anything.
Q: How has Japan changed?
Answer: The first thing is to train coaches and constantly instill this concept into coaches. In Japan, getting your coaching certificate is not something you can do once and for all. You have to renew and study once more at a certain time. The Japan Football Association will emphasize this concept once more during coach retraining. First, instill this into the coach so that the coach knows how to inspire the players reasonably.
Question: What qualities should a youth training coach have? What is the difference between a youth training coach and a professional team coach?
Answer: Professional coaching performance is everything. On the contrary, the most important mission of youth training coaches is to educate people, that is, to teach players how to behave through football. Therefore, the code of conduct for youth training coaches is very important because the players are always watching you. In the youth training stage, coaches must give players opportunities to fail. If players are deprived of the opportunity to fail, they will become “robots” that mechanically follow orders.
Question: “Robot”, some foreign coaches often use this term when describing the problems of Chinese football youth training…
Answer: This is absolutely not possible. This brings us back to the topic just now, the training of youth training coaches is very important. Most children start to like football between the ages of 9 and 12, which is the sensitive period. And then they basically stay in the sport. It is also during the sensitive period of children that coaches begin to teach them some technical things.
Question: Just now we mentioned a problem that Chinese youth training coaches attach great importance to physical condition when selecting players. Therefore, there are more precocious players with strong bodies, which seriously squeezes the living space of acquired players. It turns out that the latter is more likely to become a professional player. How did Japan solve this problem?
Answer: When examining players, we mainly look at their future development potential. First, the coach needs to predict their height, which depends on the height of their parents. Japan now records the height of all children playing football every year, and uses the children’s annual height growth to determine whether they are early-developing or late-developing players. For players who develop late, their training volume should be controlled to avoid injuries.
If a child develops early and has excellent physical condition, do you think he will still actively want to practice skills? In Japan, players of different age groups move frequently within the same club. You can let precocious players play in an age group competition, and let him know how to play following his physical advantage is overtaken by others. If his advantages become smaller and smaller as he gets older, of course you need to tell him: You have to focus on strengthening your skills, otherwise there is no hope if you continue like this.
Ukishima Toshi (left)
2. The “12-year-old retirement” phenomenon in Japanese football
Question: There is a “12-year-old retirement” phenomenon in China that is particularly troublesome for us, that is, children stop playing football when they reach around 12 years old. Mainly because they are in junior high school and their study tasks are heavier, so they have no time to play football. I wonder if Japan also has the same problem?
Answer: It’s very interesting. This phenomenon also occurs in the wealthy areas of Tokyo, Japan. Children there stop playing football before they are 12 years old. Rich areas are populated by social elites, such as lawyers and doctors. They hope that their children will engage in similar jobs in the future, so they will not let their children engage in football. Of course, this phenomenon is mainly found in wealthy areas of Tokyo, and it is also unique in Japan.
Question: Will ordinary Japanese families prevent their children from continuing to play football?
Answer: Maybe on the contrary, parents will urge their children to play football and hurry up to play football. Most parents will say to their children: “You have played football for so many years, and now you don’t play, wouldn’t you feel a little pity?”
Q: Now Liverpool’s main defensive midfielder Endo Hang was once your player. In addition to studying hard in the third year of junior high school, he still had time to go to the club for trial training. He was also admitted to college the year he was promoted to the club’s professional team. How did he do it?
Answer: Speaking of Endo Endo, I heard from a friend that there is a report that I discovered Endo Endo and have been training him to become a professional player. But that’s not true. It wasn’t me who discovered Endo Hang.
Endo was born in Yokohama, so it was natural for him to want to play for Yokohama F. Mariners. He tried out many times in elementary school and junior high school without success. He has been playing on the school team in junior high school. When Endo was in the third grade of junior high school, I was the youth training director of Yokohama FC. At that time, the club recommended me to visit their school, so I sent scouts to investigate, but the scouts did not take a fancy to Endo. Later, the person in charge of youth training at Shonan Ocean Club selected him. When Endo was promoted to the first team of the club in 2011, I was the coach at the club. Endo Hiro has a strong desire to study. He said he wanted to take the college entrance exam, and he passed the exam.
Question: Can we understand that the competition in Japan’s college entrance examination is not as fierce as in China?
Answer: It actually depends on which university you want to go to. The difficulty is different. Japanese children are also under great pressure to study. It is normal to study for 10 hours a day. Of course, children who play football may not spend so much time studying.
Question: Most Japanese families want their children to go to college, right?
Answer: There are still many. Most parents still think that there is a better way out in college.
Ukishima Toshi (left)
3. Attitude of excellent players
Question: You said that Endo Hiro has a strong desire to learn and has received a relatively complete education. Do you think his education will help him play football?
Answer: Definitely. Hang Endo is actually not a player that you can tell at a glance how good he is. If you keep an eye on him in the outfield, you’ll notice that he’s been doing unobtrusive things for the team. He is good at analyzing the situation on the field at all times. He will analyze the wind direction and speed, the humidity and length of the grass, etc. He will analyze how he should move based on various factors on the field. For example, if his team invests a lot of manpower in the frontcourt, he will drop back to protect and prevent the opponent from counterattacking. On the contrary, if the team has too many people in the backcourt and he feels that he does not need so many troops to defend, he will go to the frontcourt himself. He is doing something that others are not doing.
Question: Is this characteristic of his innate or acquired?
Answer: It’s acquired, it’s developed by learning lessons from constant failures. He also has another characteristic, which is also his character: he will not completely listen to the coach. He will always be thinking regarding what to do during the game, how to change the situation and make the team’s offense and defense smoother. He has been thinking like this since the youth training stage. At that time, I gave him a lot of advice as a coach. He will think regarding these suggestions and may or may not adopt them. That’s the kind of player he is.
Question: There are many Japanese players playing in top European leagues. How can Chinese players gain a foothold there? Any suggestions on this?
Answer: What I heard is that Chinese players have always been treated better. Have you heard of Takehide Kubo? Now plays for Real Sociedad in La Liga. Previously, Kubo received an offer from the Middle East, which offered him a salary that was 10 times that of Real Sociedad, but Kubo rejected it. He still made his decision from the perspective of improving the level of football rather than money.
When you go to play football overseas, the most intuitive feeling is that the intensity has increased. If you don’t think faster, your body won’t be able to keep up. Hang Endo transferred to Stuttgart in 2019, and I went to Germany to meet him that year. He mightn’t play at all at that time. He said he was not worried regarding not being able to play, but thinking regarding what to do to win the opportunity to play. He knows how to control the negative emotions that come with not getting a chance to play. Of course Endo Hiro doesn’t do this only when he goes overseas, he does this in Japan as well. After he moved to Liverpool last year, he did not have a chance to play at the beginning. Now he’s basically an indispensable starter. But he is very slow, really very slow.
Question: Then he needs to think quickly, right?
Answer: He is always thinking, has strong thinking ability, and is particularly good at observation. For example, let’s say the opponent’s forward has broken through two or three people and rushed towards him with the ball. How do you think he will respond? He will never pounce on him, he will first block the opponent’s straight line towards the goal, always like this. Opposing players will be forced to slow down when they find someone in front of them. Endo Hang tried to slow down the opponent before fighting. In addition, Endo Hang has always had the same hairstyle and does not have any luxury goods. His interests are all in football.
Takefide Kubo is that kind of genius player, talented and hard-working at the same time. Have you ever met Takehide Kubo in person? He is smaller. Endo Hang and Kubo Takehide are not the type of players to listen to their coaches. This type of player can show their ability in close games.
Question: We in China currently lack such players…
Answer: The kind of players who obey the coach’s words will feel pressure in front of the audience in a very close game and will often look at the bench and the coach. During the training session of the Chinese U15 men’s football team a few days ago, I observed that some players would often look at the coaching bench when they succeeded or made a mistake. This proves that their focus is not entirely on football. They were probably thinking: What does the coach think of me? Seeing players react like this, I can basically judge how they grow up.
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