FOCUS: Nadeshiko Japan’s Kumagai Seeks to Promote Soccer among Girls

Tokyo, Aug. 21 (Jiji Press)–Saki Kumagai, a defender for the Japanese women’s national soccer team, nicknamed Nadeshiko Japan, is working to encourage more girls to play soccer while continuing her own career as an active player in England. Through the general incorporated association Nadeshiko Care, or Nadecare, where she serves as representative director, Kumagai, 35, ran a program from March to April that sent elementary school girls on an overseas soccer trip. “I want children to experience the world as early as possible. I want them to expand their own possibilities and options,” says Kumagai, who plays for London City Lionesses in the Women’s Super League. Aiming High Four players selected through a screening process in Japan visited London for a stay of roughly 10 days. They took part in training with the youth academy of Arsenal, a powerhouse in English soccer. They also had opportunities to interact with Japan national team players based in England, including Maika Hamano of Chelsea and Toko Koga of Tottenham Hotspur. Both have played for the national team since their teens. Kumagai says she hopes the program will inspire young players to set their sights on joining the national team. “I hope Nadeshiko Japan, which may once have seemed like a distant dream to them, becomes a place they feel they too can reach,” she explains. Junior High School and Beyond Kumagai helped Japan to win the 2011 FIFA Women’s World Cup, scoring the decisive penalty in a shootout victory over the United States in the final match. After the tournament, she moved to Germany at the age of 20 and has spent about 15 years playing in Europe. In 2019, she launched Nadeshiko Care. “From the beginning, our hope was to take children overseas,” Kumagai says. With support from FIFA, that ambition has now come to fruition. The program is aimed at girls in the upper grades of elementary school. In Japanese women’s soccer, the decline in the number of players in the transition to junior high school has long been a concern. Reflecting on her own experience, Kumagai says, “When I was 12, there were no opportunities around me to play on a girls’ team.” Until junior high school, she played alongside boys. She later left her hometown in Hokkaido, northernmost Japan, and enrolled at Tokiwagi Gakuen High School in Miyagi Prefecture, northeastern Japan. “There wasn’t an environment that allowed me to go abroad through women’s soccer,” Kumagai says. Precisely because many Japanese female players now have opportunities to compete overseas, she hopes girls “will learn that a variety of environments and possibilities are available to them.” 2027 Women’s World Cup Nadeshiko Japan is now preparing for the FIFA Women’s World Cup, which opens next June, and Kumagai is eager to help Japan to win a second title. “I want to approach the World Cup determined it will be the pinnacle of my playing career,” she says. Kumagai is also ready to give her all on the pitch so that she can serve as a role model for future Nadeshiko Japan players. “I want to be the kind of player, and part of the kind of team, that makes children watching us think they want to become like us,” she says. END [Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]