Yuzo’s Generation Game
|Image: Anita Milas
2011 was quite a year for Japanese football. Their women’s team won the World Cup in Germany; Kobe Leonessa, Homare Sawa, won FIFA Women’s World Player of the Year while their coach Norio Sasaki picked up the silverware for Women’s Coach of the Year; and Japan’s Street Soccer team competed to their credit at Homeless World Cup Paris.
Meanwhile, in his native country, Yuzo Yamada was enjoying his career as chef in a popular family restaurant and the thought of kicking a football had never crossed his mind.
Just a few months later, however, life was to change drastically for Yuzo. His mother fell seriously ill and he had to leave his job to care for her. Then things took a further tumble, as he continues:
“After she died, I couldn’t find another job, so I had no money and then I lost my home. I was 53.”
Yuzo had worked in the hospitality industry for over 40 years, since he was a teenager, with his mother the centre of his family support structure and, he freely admits, “I was frightened, I was nervous about how I was going to get food, and I was sleeping between a 24-hour internet café and on the street.”
Through other homeless people he encountered he began selling Japan’s Big Issue, struck up conversation with his customers, enjoyed meeting more people and started to love life again. In due course that gave him the confidence to take up street soccer with some of the other local vendors, though he was unfamiliar with the round ball.
“I was not a footballer when I was younger,” he laughs, “in fact I’d never touched a football before. My sport was baseball, although I was an average player, at best.
“I found football really difficult to learn but slowly I got better and began to really enjoy it.”
Any chance to display his newly-learned skills at a subsequent Homeless World Cup were scuppered however, with Japan not involved in the event after 2011 – until this year when, aged 65, Yuzo has the distinction of being the oldest player at the tournament.
“I had been practising for a number of years, so I had some skills, and I think that’s why I was chosen for the 2024 team,” he explains. “Also, the average age of the vendors is quite old so there weren’t many of us competing for places.
“I was very excited when I heard I’d been chosen for the team and I’m loving being here. I wouldn’t say the younger players look up to me, but they are respectful and have good manners, and that’s the most important thing.
“It’s great to be able to communicate with so many people from all over the world. I especially enjoy speaking with Sweden, Mexico and Switzerland, who are staying in the same accommodation – we are bus buddies.
“I already feel I am becoming more socialised and making more chances for myself to enjoy life.”
This week is also opening Yuzo’s eyes to other possibilities and inspiring ambitions after Seoul.
“I want to create a community where older and younger age groups can live together and exchange ideas.”
Sounds like Yuzo’s cooking up quite the generational recipe for success.
Words: Isobel Irvine
Photo: Anita Milas
