{"id":15324,"date":"2023-04-20T04:06:54","date_gmt":"2023-04-20T04:06:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/for-japans-ageing-soccer\/"},"modified":"2023-04-20T04:52:19","modified_gmt":"2023-04-20T04:52:19","slug":"for-japans-ageing-soccer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/for-japans-ageing-soccer\/","title":{"rendered":"For Japan’s ageing soccer players, 80 is the new 50"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Kim Kyung-Hoon, Satoshi Sugiyama and Tom Bateman<\/p>\n

TOKYO (Reuters) – Mutsuhiko Nomura’s soccer career has spanned 18 World Cups, or 70 years, to be exact.<\/p>\n

Now the silver-maned former Japanese national team player is a member of the brand new over-80 division of Tokyo’s “Soccer For Life” (SFL) league, which played its first match this month.<\/p>\n

The sprightly 83-year-old and his teammates are among a growing number of seniors pushing the boundaries of active living in Japan, one of the world’s fastest-greying societies.<\/p>\n

“When I was a kid, men in their 50s and 60s were considered ‘grandpas’,” Nomura, already a member of several amateur teams, said after a pre-season practice match in February.<\/p>\n

“And now, we’re all still at it in our 80s. It’s shocking.”<\/p>\n

(For photo essay, please click on )<\/p>\n

As Japan’s average lifespan inches up, people aged 65 and more form nearly a third of its population of 126 million, with life expectancy, now at 85, ranking among the world’s highest.<\/p>\n

That has brought societal changes, too: about a fifth of those older than 70 are employed, and the government encourages pensioners to start collecting later, by holding out the promise of larger deferred payments.<\/p>\n

Elderly security guards and shopkeepers have become a common sight.<\/p>\n

“I think the formation of the 0-80 division is a reflection of what we’re seeing in Japanese society, where the elderly demographic can be active like this,” said Yutaka Ito, the secretary general of the SFL league.<\/p>\n

It was only two decades ago that Tokyo created a division for the 0-60 age group. In 2012, the 0-70 division followed, and five years later, the 0-75 category. At that rate, 0-80 was simply a matter of time.<\/p>\n

ROLE MODEL<\/p>\n

If his more “mature” teammates are something to go by, Nomura may easily have another decade on the pitch: the oldest player, Shingo Shiozawa, is 93.<\/p>\n

“If I hadn’t played soccer, I’d have been dead by now,” said the former designer of racing cars, who plays goalie.<\/p>\n

He credits the sport with motivating him to quit smoking and helping to speed his recovery after treatment for spinal stenosis. <\/p>\n

With an average age of 83-1\/2, however, stiff backs, creaky knees and laboured breathing were often on display as the players of the three SFL teams slogged through inaugural matches under a blazing sun last Wednesday. <\/p>\n

A ball propelled forward by a player failed to reach his slow-moving teammate, while a few stumbled and wobbled on the pitch. An 89-year-old who ran out of breath asked to be substituted about 10 minutes into a match, unable to play the rest of the 15-minute half.<\/p>\n

After the game, Nomura and his teammates toasted their prowess with cans of beer, in a ritual familiar to many younger players.<\/p>\n

Despite decades of watching Nomura play soccer, his wife, Junko, says she’s not concerned about injuries – only his high blood pressure, which she logs everyday in a notebook, along with his activities and meals.<\/p>\n

“He likes to eat meat, so I try to get him to eat vegetables,” she said of Nomura, who started playing soccer in middle school and won the national tournament three times in university.<\/p>\n

“I think soccer is the best thing for his health.”<\/p>\n

Far from slowing down, Nomura has also taken to kicking the ball around with his daughter and grand-daughter on weekends, teaching them tricks and building their love of the game.<\/p>\n

“I sometimes go to watch the seniors play, and it makes me feel I should work hard,” said his 48-year-old daughter, Yuriko. <\/p>\n

“I really admire him. I hope to be like him, and continue playing when I’m older.”<\/p>\n

\n

(Reporting by Kim Kyung-Hoon, Satoshi Sugiyama and Tom Bateman; Editing by Chang-Ran Kim and Clarence Fernandez)<\/p>\n

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By Kim Kyung-Hoon, Satoshi Sugiyama and Tom Bateman TOKYO (Reuters) – Mutsuhiko Nomura’s soccer career has spanned 18 World Cups, or 70 years, to be exact. Now the silver-maned former Japanese national team player is a member of the brand new over-80 division of Tokyo’s “Soccer For Life” (SFL) league, which played its first match […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":15325,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1219],"tags":[1223],"class_list":["post-15324","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-u-s-sports","tag-updated"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-content\/uploads\/Reuters_Direct_Media\/USOnlineReportSportsNews\/tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ3H0YN-VIEWIMAGE.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15324","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15324"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15324\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15357,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15324\/revisions\/15357"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15325"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15324"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15324"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15324"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}