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Heavy Security As Japanese Soccer Team Plays Match In China

A Japanese soccer team played against a Chinese soccer team in Beijing last night, and there was heavy security on hand to make sure nothing went wrong:

Japanese press reports prior to the game made a big deal out of how the Chinese authorities were taking extreme measures to prevent their nationalistic fans from causing any trouble:

2,000 Chinese policemen were mobilized to provide security.
Japanese fans were assigned seats in an area completely separate from where Chinese fans were assigned seats.
When the match ended, Japanese fans were not allowed to leave their seats until Chinese fans had left the stadium.

However, the Chinese team ended up winning the match 1-0, and there were no noteworthy disturbances during or after the game.

20 comments - What do you think? Posted by James - April 24, 2008 at 11:58 am

Categories: General Japan Tags: china, japan, nationalism, soccer, sports

http://pontasmemorandum.blogspot.com/ ponta

Congratulations !
Chinese team and Chinese soccer fans!!

試合終了後も日本人サポーターを最後に退席
When the match ended, Japanese fans were allowed to leave their seats after other fans left.

http://www.japanprobe.com James

Thanks for pointing out my error: just corrected the post.

folosa

If the Chinese police started attacking Japanese fans unprovoked then it would be just like Italy and their fascist police.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=iR4E7_V3ivs

Zaciroth

But with Chinese relations you can’t help but play on the safe side.

Lei

i really hate most mainland chinese especially the soccer fans. They’re ill mannered , undisciplined and rude. Just because they’re japanese doesnt mean they should take out all of their anger. You came to a soccer match to watch soccer not to make fun and beat up people of some race.

Because of them , some people like me are suffering from their behavior. I’m an overseas chinese and life is pretty hard in japan for a chinese because the mainlanders themselves tarnish their own name.

http://deleted parkmount

I feel sorry for you, seriously. For the westerner, people would know they could be British, American, New Zealander, Canadian or whatever. But, with Chinese, most people still associate any Chinese people with Red China because Red Chinese always insist that their racial origin is more important than origin of the country they are from. And, that’s how they identify themselves.

folosa

In Italy fans/thugs have large banners of racial slurrs of Jews/Africans enter ethnicty here …………

Each time an African player gets the ball they make monkey sounds on the stands. A while back Thuram who is French but African ethnicity flat out refused to play for a football team called Lazio because the fans are a bunch of fascists. It was Mussolinis team. I think some of you have seen Di Canio doing the fascist salute to Lazio fans. Then there was the incident with Eto who during a match just completely lost his cool picked up the ball and started walking off the pitch. The fans/thugs racist taunts had gotten inside his head. Compared to what is going on in parts of Europe this is nothing. Me being European think we Europeans are fairly stupid. We are arrogant and like to look down on others but I don’t think anyone is as stupid as we are when coming to sport culture.

http://deleted parkmount

Actually, Red Chinese have very much racist attitude in my observation. I almost always see their subtle attitude change in dealing with others depending on the complexion. They will get friendlier and a bit humble with the white, more aggressive and arrogant with the non-white and then become the master of the universe with the black.

http://sleepytako.blogspot.com David

If it takes 2000 police to cover one soccer match the Olympics are doomed which is good for me. I love watching a good disaster unfold.
Joshua Burns

Am I the only one who would want to go to one of these games wearing my Japan kit and try to provoke the Chinese?
BakaNewMexican

Why what short memories people have!!!

Doesn’t anyone remember watching the Asian Championships back in 2004 that were hosted by the PRC?

Everywhere the Japanese team played (Chungking, Beijing, etc), the Japanese National Team and Japanese fans were subjected to all kinds of abuse from Chinese fans. I remember incidents of taunting, throwing rocks at team bus, fights with fans, Chinese fans disrupting the playing of Kimigayo before each game, and, of course, burning flags.

As the tournament wore on, the PRC authorities started to implement many of the security measures mentioned in this post due in large part of international criticism that the PRC wasn’t doing anything to restrain the horrible behavior of the Chinese goons and thugs.

For the final match between Japan and the PRC, Japanese fans were made to sit in their own section of the stadium and weren’t allowed to leave the stadium until the PRCbots were gone.

In the end, it was A-OK since Zico’s boys successfully defended their Asian title with that memorable defeat of the PRC in front of such a hostile crowd.

And, yes, I know that Koji Nakata’s goal from a cornerkick against the PRC was a handball. However, the referees thought the ball went off his body and into the goal. No matter, Keiji Tamada’s goal at the end of the match was pretty sweet.

J-League teams need to get it up if they want to be successful when playing other Asian teams.

Katherine

Yep, and the hostile Chinese crowd even threw bottles and rocks at their own team just because of the loss. I’m not not sure if it was during teh match you mentioned but it did happen before.

BakaNewMexican

If my memory is correct, PRCbots even threw a couple of molotov cocktails outside some of the venues.

The behavior of Chinese fans was very deplorable durning the whole tournament.

I remember watching one of the games Japan played (I can’t remember against which country. It might have been Qatar or something like that.) where the Chinese fans were actively supporting the opposing team. The crowd got easily riled and very raucous and abusive. Fortunately, a headed goal by Yuji Nakazawa took the crowd out of the match before things got completely out of hand.

Is that kind of behavior a sign of things to come during the Olympics? Possibly. Maybe.

After all, the anti-Japan demonstrations that occurred in Shanghai and other places happened less than a year after the soccer tournament. It wouldn’t surprise me if it was the same people involved.

jjjtango

violence+football=damn good entertainment

Level3

If you mean “soccer”, I can’t agree.
Sure, violence is entertainment.

But a sport in which the typical game is a
0-0 tie decided by a friggin penalty kick at the end
is unwatchable, boring, and clearly frustrating to the fans too, as so many seem to go nuts and get violent.

The fact that the most important skill in soccer is pretending to be in agonizing pain until the opposing team gets a penalty, then jumping up and getting right back to kicking the ball around until the 0-0 tie and the penalty kicks. Not impressive.

Soccer = Yawn

kaito

I halfway agree. I like playing soccer more than watching. I can’t watch sports much. I can only watch part of a game unless I am actually there (not tv).
hadji

That isn’t a typical game because most draws never go to penalty kicks.

You don’t know what you are talking about.

jonske

opening vid image of that man looks like an asian michael jackson
AIB

Sounds like most football, from anywhere in the world really.
Rip

Oh ok please provide a link that shows Japanese football fans attacking other national teams thanks.

Heavy Security As Japanese Soccer Team Plays Match In China

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