Last night, Wales played Japan in the Rugby World Cup. You can read about it at the BBC here, or in Japanese (日本語) here.

It wasn’t a full stadium, with attendance at about 44000 people. Ticket costs had put people of I guess, and also some fans travelling from Japan maybe couldn’t justify the cost of going to both France (for three of their games) and Wales for one more game.
Still, there was a reasonable number of Japanese fans there. There were a few Japanese families there, some of which I think were those who live in South Wales because of the Japanese factories based in South Wales. Yuko spoke to some, and they said they had travelled down from the North of England for the game, again familes of people working at Japanese factories there.
The other main contingent of Japanese fans seemed to be older men (and the odd older wife in tow). One chap we spoke to ran a travel agency company, so he was pretty much mixing work and pleasure. Younger women though, it seems, don’t tend to support Rugby much. They all end up being Baseball and Football (soccer) fans.

The game itself was reasonably enjoyable, and the Welsh crowd got behind the Japanese side, appreciating their playing style (running the ball a lot) and their ‘never give up’ attitude.
The Welsh side played pretty poorly in the first half, and the first Japanese try was a corker. The 2nd try the Japanese got in the second half was pretty good too.
In the end though, in the second half, Wales started playing better and we started to score a lot more.

Yuko enjoyed herself though, and now would like to see a proper 6 Nations game. Wouldn’t mind using the 6 Nations as an excuse to go up to Scotland for a game.

I’ve got some pictures… over here in my gallery. I’m putting together a small video too, if I get the time.

Samurai Fan