Troussier revels in cultural tinkering

Rise of the upstarts

The next week could be the making of Philippe Troussier, the maverick Frenchman who has taken Japan, the co-hosts, a step closer to the promised land. The making of Japan, too.

Troussier's Japan have already won their first World Cup point, in a 2-2 draw against Belgium which owed something to the traditional Japanese virtues of organisation and pace, but much more to the European character instilled into the team by their coach over the past four years. To lose a goal is no disgrace, Troussier has taught, but only in Saitama did he know whether the lessons had been heeded, whether the sense of democracy and teamwork which had been at the centre of his philosophy for Japan's football had become second nature. One-nil down to a goal by Marc Wilmots, initially overwhelmed by the physical presence of the Belgians, the co-hosts braced themselves for a repeat of the 1998 World Cup. At least those three defeats came on foreign soil, ignored by the majority of Japanese, who are still grasping for a handhold on the rest of the world's passion. But, in Japan, there could be no hiding.

In his corner of the dug-out, hands clasped over crossed knees, or out on the touchline, with his interpreter almost identically dressed in a dark suit mirroring the bespectacled professorial image, Troussier could not possibly have anticipated the atomic reaction of his team to adversity. Nor would he readily have identified the player whose finger pressed the button. Maybe he had looked to Hidetoshi Nakata for orchestration, the playmaker whose love of a solo lead had led Troussier to term him Japan's Jimi Hendrix, or to his experienced centre-back, his captain, Ryuzu Morioka. Instead, Junichi Inamoto, the forgotten man of Highbury, stepped forward, putting his own interpretation on Troussier's mantra of shared responsibility.

Once Takayuki Suzuki had profited from a defensive lapse to set Saitama ablaze, Inamoto broke up another Belgian attack, played a swift one-two with Brazilian-born Alex Santos and drove into the heart of the Belgian penalty area. There was not much need for ornament then. With a flail of his left boot, Inamoto dispatched a rising shot past a helpless Geert de Vlieger to give Japan a precious and historic lead. More significantly, he showed to a nation that the team were worthy of the attention. The following day, sports stores all over the country ran out of Inamoto shirts. The Highbury shop might have a few spare.

The whole drama took no more than 10 minutes; the Belgians equalised later. Inamoto's strike took a few seconds, but the foundations for the recovery had been laid much earlier, in Troussier's insistence on overseeing every level of the national team, from Under-20 to the seniors, in encouraging a community between older and younger players where there had been only a feudal hierarchy, in promoting team spirit through touch, feel and hug, in showing his players that it was fine to celebrate goals with full emotional regalia. Like Guus Hiddink in South Korea, Troussier found that changing a way of football needed a shift of cultural attitude.

"Liberty, equality, fraternity," wrote Troussier grandly in a message to the Japanese and international media to mark the start of the World Cup. "Four years ago, those were the values of the champions, France, now they are the colours of Japan. Have faith in your values, from there success will come."

We will see today, in Yokohama, whether Troussier's values will outlast his revolutionary and controversial four-year tenure as Japan's national coach. The opponents are Russia, champions of underachievement, brilliant one moment, dispirited the next, capable of beautiful attacking football and defence which would shame a school team. Victory over a footballing powerhouse like Russia would propel Japan into a new era, not just acceptance into the wider world of football, but a cloak of respectability.

Troussier's path has not been easy, but then his itinerant career from a mediocre player with Angoulême, Rouen and Rheims in the French league to a post subject to such scrutiny he has already written two autobiographies in Japanese suggests a man of ambition and singular purpose. Troussier has been helped by the current fashion for French coaches, but his route to the top has been far from designer-chic. He was recommended for the Japan job by Arsène Wenger – and has a similar scholarly style – but his reputation was built turning around down-at-heel national teams in Africa. The Ivory Coast, Burkino Faso, Nigeria (briefly), the White Witch Doctor, as he became known, finally gained his break as the coach of the South African side at France 98.

Troussier boasts the restless CV of the maverick, the outsider, the coach who does things his own way or not at all. "He is a stubborn and a proud man," says Kumi Kinohara, football writer for the Japan Times. "He thought the Japanese team needed to become tougher physically and mentally, so he's adopted a very psychological approach to his coaching. He let the whole team compete with each other by calling up new players, he encouraged the younger players to express themselves and he laid down quite early the system he wanted to play."

Not only did Troussier identify a core of young talent from the 1999 Japan side which finished runners-up in the world youth team championships, players like Shinji Ono and Inamoto and the left-sided defender Koji Nakata, he challenged them to take on their elders and to realise that, in football, age was not necessarily to be revered. Often, Troussier found, the younger players found it disrespectful not to pass to their elders. Troussier took his team abroad, not to Asia to trounce minnows, but to Europe.

The policy has brought him into conflict with the press, officials and, more recently, with Hidetoshi Nakata, his most recognised star. Troussier's vision of team did not allow Nakata the licence he had previously enjoyed. At one time, it seemed the Frenchman might even do the unthinkable and leave the Parma midfielder out of his World Cup squad altogether. Instead, the axe fell on Nakamura, one of the most popular figures in Japanese football. His faith in Nakata was more than repaid in Saitama.

Troussier will leave at the end of Japan's World Cup, going back most probably to a French club. He has not gone out of his way to absorb the culture of his adopted country, speaking very little Japanese. He announced his World Cup squad, then headed straight to Europe, leaving his assistant to explain some of his selections, a dishonour in the eyes of the local press. Japan's opening game has heightened expectations in the host country. Now, for his final trick, the 47-year-old Frenchman has to bring fulfilment.