Japan

The Story

Japan walks into 2026 as the team that beat Germany and Spain at the same World Cup and still went home in the Round of 16. That is the entire story of modern Japanese soccer in one sentence: a national team that has clearly figured out how to play a top European side in a one-off match, and has not yet figured out how to do it twice in a row when the stakes are highest.

Hajime Moriyasu — soft-spoken, methodical, the longest-tenured manager in Japanese national team history — gets to try again. The squad is the most talented Japan has ever produced. Mitoma and Kubo on the wings, both starring in Europe. Kamada in midfield. Tanaka pulling strings at Leeds. A defense built around Tomiyasu when he's fit and Endo when he plays. A goalkeeper situation that Moriyasu still hasn't quite settled. They qualified out of Asia without losing a match.

The 2022 storyline was the comebacks — down a goal to Germany, then scoring twice in eight minutes; down to Spain, same trick. They proved they belong on this stage. The 2026 question is whether they can finally win the second knockout match — the one Japanese soccer has been chasing since 2002, when Asia's only modern semifinalists were South Korea, on home soil. Group B with Spain and Brazil and Iran will not make it easy.

3 Players to Know

Kaoru Mitoma

From Kawasaki, turned down a professional contract at 16 to attend the University of Tsukuba, where he wrote his thesis on dribbling — a study involving a GoPro strapped to his forehead, analyzing where the best dribblers in the world look while moving with the ball. He concluded that the great ones never look at their feet. He went pro after graduation, transferred to Brighton in 2021, and is now one of the best left wingers in the Premier League. The thesis was real. The science worked.

Takefusa Kubo

Born in Kawasaki the same year as Mitoma. Won the MVP at a Barcelona youth camp at age eight, moved to La Masia at ten, was famously released when FIFA caught Barça violating youth-transfer rules. Returned to Japan, broke into the J-League at 15, eventually landed at Real Sociedad in 2022 where he's been their best player for three straight seasons. Plays right wing, cuts inside on his left, and has a 7+ rating average across La Liga this season — the kind of statistical consistency that suggests he's about to break out at this tournament.

Daichi Kamada

From Hyōgo, made his name at Eintracht Frankfurt where he won the Europa League in 2022, now at Crystal Palace in the Premier League. Plays as the attacking-midfield link between Endo's defensive base and the Mitoma/Kubo wide threat — basically the player who makes the Japanese system actually function. With Wataru Endo missing recent camps for fitness reasons, Kamada is increasingly the most important midfielder in this team.

The Food

Signature Dish

Sushi is the export, but the Japan you'd want to eat in Japan is ramen at midnight at a counter that seats nine: tonkotsu broth that's been simmering for 18 hours, a slick of fragrant oil, a soft-boiled egg with a jammy yolk, slices of pork belly that fall apart in the spoon. Then izakaya plates with a beer — yakitori (chicken thigh, scallion, the cartilage cuts the menu doesn't translate), karaage fried chicken, agedashi tofu, edamame with sea salt. Nothing on the table is more than $9 and somehow you've spent two hours.

Where to Eat in DFW

WAYA Japanese Izakaya on Gaston Avenue in East Dallas — a quiet residential block, the kind of place you walk past three times before finding. The ramen is the best in the city by most reckonings (the broth has the depth that comes from someone caring), and the small-plates menu reads like an actual Tokyo izakaya. For Plano, Yatai Ramen does the made-to-order bowls and serves a casual, family-friendly version of the same idea.

Fan Culture

Japanese supporters are the politest, most organized, and most emotionally controlled fans you will ever sit near at a sporting event — and then they will absolutely lose their minds when Japan scores. The famous post-match ritual: every Japanese fan stays after the final whistle and picks up trash from their own section. The players do the same in the dressing room. It is the soccer experience of the same culture that produces shinkansen trains arriving on the second. Expect blue replica shirts in coordinated rows, drumming that's surprisingly heavy when it gets going, and a "Nippon!" chant that builds for ten minutes before kickoff and doesn't stop until the whistle.