It's been a while, but just before the start of the fifth week of VNL2021, the 12 athletes who have been selected for the Tokyo Olympics were suddenly announced. The US and French teams had also announced their Olympic members before Japan, but it was a complete surprise that Japan would also announce their members during the tournament.
The players are as follows.
1. Kunihiro Shimizu (OP) Panasonic Panthers
2. Onodera Futoshi (MB) JT Hiroshima
3. Naonori Fujii (S) Toray Arrows
6. Akihiro Yamauchi (MB) Panasonic Panthers
11. Nishida Yuji (OP) JTEKT STINGS
12. Seita Sekita (S) Sakai Blazers
14. Yuki Ishikawa (OH, Captain) Milan
15. Li Bo (MB) Toray Arrows
17. Kenta Takanashi (OH) Wolf Dogs Nagoya
19. Tatsunori Otsuka (OH/OP) Waseda University student
20. Tomohiro Yamamoto (L) Sakai Blazers
twenty one. Ai Takahashi (OH) Currently studying at Nippon Sport Science University
Now, let's start by commenting on the 12 players by position. Let's start with the setters.
#3 Naonobu Fujii
He was selected for the Japanese national team in 2017 as the setter who led Toray to victory in the 2016/17 V.League season. Setters from Toray such as Abe Yuta, Kondo Shigeru, and Wang Kongo had the image of not being very impressive on the national team (lol), but Fujii has completely overturned that and established himself on the national team. He is good at using quick and pipe attacks from the middle, and he actively uses the middle even from a distance (sometimes he is too aggressive and can be read (lol)). Even when watching the VNL, the "Toray combination" with Lee is really satisfying! In recent years, he has also started to hit hybrid serves, and his serving power has improved. Setters often have the opportunity to serve when the opponent is in S1 rotation, so teams with strong setter serves have a great advantage. He also expresses joy and has a loud voice, so he seems to play the role of a mood maker for the national team. He is my favorite Japanese male setter that I have seen in real time.
This is just my personal opinion, but I feel a certain emotion that only Fujii, who was almost unknown at the time, remained in the Tokyo Olympics among the 1991 class, which was in some sense a golden generation with many V-Leaguers, including players who were expected to have a promising future from junior high and high school, such as Dekita and Fushimi. Of course, there were many promising setters in this generation, and among them, Kuboyama (JTEKT) and Maeda (WD Nagoya) were selected to represent Japan in their generation, and Arata (Panasonic) was also highly rated in college. In fact, Fujii was not ranked in the top five in the best setter rankings voted by players at the All-Japan Intercollegiate Championships in his fourth year. At the time, Juntendo University, where Fujii belonged, often used two-setters (sometimes three-setters), so a setter-specialist like Fujii did not have many opportunities to play, and I think he finally started to play in his fourth year. So to be honest, when I saw his name on the list of Toray's prospective players that year, I wondered, "Who?" (laughs). Sorry, Fujii. But he took that chance and went to the V League, where he got a chance to play from his first year due to Toray's lack of setters, and with hard work he never lost his regular spot, winning the league in his third year. This coincided with a generational change in the Japanese national team, and he was called up to the national team for the first time, which is where he is today. He must have worked really hard after entering university and going to the V League. As a result, he's not only the number one of his generation, but has now become the starting setter for the Japanese national team. We're looking forward to seeing his aggressive tossing in Ariake!
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