Article 88 — Hidetoshi Nakata, the Asian David Beckham
Hidetoshi Nakata was the first Asian superstar in the world of football and probably sports. I can’t think of someone from Asia who played football and was more famous in the late 90s to mid 00s. I don’t want to commit to the same sentence when I talk about the world of sports but considering the fact that football is the most popular sport in the world, it could be true.
He first came to prominence for me when he was signed by Italian club Perugia in 1998. Before signing for Perugia, he played in his country, Japan’s first-ever World Cup finals appearance in France. At the time of the tournament, Kazuyoshi Miura was the biggest Japanese name in the team as he had played in Italy for Genoa. However, Miura couldn’t make the impact that Asians and Japanese in particular hope he would make in his time in Italy.
When Nakata joined Perugia, the idea was met with scepticism as it was thought to be a marketing ploy by the Italian club to gain a following in Asia and boost the sale of their kit. As a fan of Serie A, I had the opportunity to take a closer look at Nakata during his time at Perugia. After a slow and difficult start, I was pleased to see that he was coming into his own and held his own in Serie A, at that time, the best league in Europe.
Before moving to Italy, he played for Bellmare Hiratsuka in his native Japan. He helped them win the Asian Cup Winners’ Cup in 1995, a tournament that has been abolished since 2002. He was also named Japanese Footballer of the Year in 1997 which was also the year he won the Asian Footballer of the Year award. A year later, he won the Asian Footballer of the Year award for the second and final time.
As a player, he was an attacking midfielder. In his role, he displayed creativity with a keen eye for laying on the right pass for the forwards and for his explosive shots from long range. He always displayed his full commitment towards the team that he was playing for. Unlike a traditional number 10 at that time who is seen as this mercurial, creative talent in the team, pulling the strings and scoring goals who wasn’t really burdened by defensive work, Nakata showed his commitment to the defensive cause as well. He was always more than willing to track back and close down his opponent.
After one and a half very good seasons with Perugia, he made a big move to one of Italy’s big teams, AS Roma in 2000. He joined the team in the heat of a title challenge and ended it with his first silverware in Italian football, the Scudetto. He played a part in helping Roma towards the league title alongside star players and legends like Francesco Totti, Gabriel Batistuta, Vicenzo Montella, Cafu, Walter Samuel, Vincent Candela and Emerson. He scored two Serie A goals in that season including a crucial goal against title challengers, Juventus on the way to a come from behind 2–2 draw.
He left at the end of the Scudetto winning season to join Parma in the summer of 2001 for a world record fee of 28.4 million euros for an Asian player. In his first season there, he won the Coppa Italia. He scored a crucial away goal in the first leg which paved the way towards Parma winning the Coppa Italia. That would be his last silverware in Italy and moved to Bologna on loan in the winter of 2004. His time in Italy ended a season after at Fiorentina. His latter two spells in Italy were largely forgettable.
After a season at Fiorentina, he joined Bolton Wanderers in 2005. Bolton under Sam Allardyce was making a name for themselves punching above their weight in England. He combined a direct approach with getting the best out of players in the twilight of their career. These players played for big clubs at Champions Leagues and played at World Cups and European Championships. Players like Fernando Hierro, Ivan Campo, Jay Jay Okocha, Youri Djorkaeff and El Hadji Diouf. Nakata stayed one season at Bolton before a shock announcement of his retirement from professional football at a relatively young age of 29 years old citing a loss of joy from playing professional football after the 2006 World Cup.
For his native Japan, he was a superstar. He represented the country at three World Cups, 1998, 2002 and 2006. The 2002 edition was co-hosted by Japan and he was a key component of the team that gave Japan the best-ever finish, reaching the 2nd Round.
Besides the World Cup, he helped Japan reach the final of the 2001 Confederations Cup which was also co-hosted in Japan and South Korea as a dress rehearsal ahead of the 2002 World Cup in the same venue. He didn’t play the final of the Confederations Cup as he returned to Italy to lend a hand to Roma’s Scudetto charge but finished the tournament as the winner of the Bronze Ball.
He also represented Japan at two Olympic Games in 1996 and 2000. In 1996, he was part of the team that shocked Brazil 1–0 in the opening game but they exited the tournament in the group stage. In 2000, Japan went one step better exiting the tournament in the quarter-final stage after losing to the United States on penalties.
It is rather amazing though that he was not selected in the 2000 and 2004 Asian Cup-winning teams despite being his team’s star man and being an ever-present in all other tournaments. He was likened to David Beckham due to the attention and fanfare he got for his physical appearance and fashion sense. Like Beckham too, in some ways, his ability as a footballer was overshadowed for his off-the-pitch activities and like Beckham he has never let the national team or any of his clubs down due to lack of discipline or focus during training and matches.
Nakata was a trailblazer in his time because before him it was rare to see Asian players playing for European clubs and doing well. There were about a handful of good examples before him. When he came through, he showed that he was there not just to help increase the sale of merchandise to the Asian market, he showed he had the quality as well to cut it with the best of his time. Besides his performances on the pitch, he brought out his glamour and X-Factor as well to be the full package of looks, talent and marketability.
The example of Nakata, as well as the performances of Japan and South Korea at the 2002 World Cup, opened the door to more Asian players in the subsequent years making their mark in Europe. This article is dedicated to Asia’s first glamour boy in world football, the trailblazer, history-maker, one of the best Japanese and Asian footballers of all time and one of the greatest imports from Japan to the world of football.
