Posted this in the other thread before I spotted this one, guess it would sit better here.
I was at the game today. It was packed. 25,000 fans who were very enthusiastic if not so knowledgeable. Game was really exciting, so much so that there was none of the usual looking over the wall at the score of the baseball game next door.
It really was a very hot day today and probably very difficult for the Welsh boys. We're in the middle of the rainy season and today was the only sunny day we've had this week.
There were water breaks in both halves, but Japan benefited as much as Wales. Looking at my girlfriend and the crowd around us the locals were suffering with the heat and humidity just as much as the Welsh boys.
There was a few times I thought that Wales would exploit the fact that Japan had a very narrow defensive line and also committing a lot more players to the breakdown. But either poor handling from the Welsh or timely turnovers and intervention from the Japanese meant they couldn't exploit the space out wide.
Overall Japan were excellent and were very good value for this historic win. It was great to see that afterwards the players stayed out for at least 30-40 minutes signing autographs and about 3-4,000 people stayed behind for that long.
It's strange but also great to see Japanese people get so excited about what is a minor sport over here. There were plenty of kids running around with signed rugby balls after the game, who could be the future for Japanese Rugby. Plus the bars were really buzzing after the game.
It was also nice to see that they brought a group of kids from the Tohoku prefecture (area badly affected by the 2011 earthquake) out after the game and they did a lap of honour.
