Japan national football team
The Japanese team is commonly known by the fans and media as , , or as abbreviated expressions. Although the team does not have an official nickname as such, it is often known by the name of the manager. For example, under Takeshi Okada, the team was known as . Recently, the team has been known or nicknamed as the "Samurai Blue", while Japanese news media during the 2018 FIFA World Cup still referred it to by the recently departed manager's (Akira Nishino) last name, as .
Tetsuro Kiyooka
Kiyooka firmly believed that the Japan national football team needed players who had experiences playing for clubs in European leagues to develop the national team. In 2006, he passed the FIFA Players' Agent exam and registered with The Football Association (England), the Royal Dutch Football Association (Netherlands) and the Japan Football Association as an official agent. After that, he represented top Japanese players such as Keisuke Honda, Maya Yoshida and led them to the football clubs in European leagues.