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'I only have enough competitive will and physical strength left for this one last season': Japan's first World Cup hero announces upcoming retirement

(Photo by Steve Bardens - World Rugby via Getty Images/World Rugby via Getty Images)

Japan’s first World Cup hero Ayumu Goromaru has announced the next Japanese Top League season will be his last, confirming that he will retire after Yamaha Jubilo finishes the season.

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Goromaru was the star of Japan’s 2015 Rugby World Cup side where he scored a try and kicked seven goals for a total of 24 points in the Brave Blossoms historic pool stage win over the Springboks in Brighton.

The miraculous performance catapulted Goromaru to stardom, particularly in his home nation of Japan where he became the face of the Rugby. Goromaru’s World Cup form led to interest overseas, where the fullback landed with the Queensland Reds in 2016 for one Super Rugby season before joining with the French glamour club Toulon.

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    Goromaru wasn’t able to replicate the success he had with the Japan national side with those clubs, although it could be said he pioneered the pathway for Japan’s players to sign outside of the Top League. Japan’s latest World Cup star, Kotaro Matsushima, is currently at French club Clermont ASM in the Top 14.

    “I’m sad to finish my time as a player but I’ve been running with all of my strength for 32 years (since starting rugby),” Goromaru told a press conference in Japan.

    “I only have enough competitive will and physical strength left for this one last season.”

    “In the season I have left, I will play for all I’m worth and with a sense of gratitude in my heart.”

    The former Japanese fullback said he did not have enough ‘spirit’ left despite having the physical strength to keep playing, which he explained an athlete needs to remain playing at the top level.

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    “If I don’t have my emotions, I can probably play,” he said. “But an athlete needs spirit, not just physical strength. I feel my spirit has declined and thought it would be best for myself and those who are associated with me to step aside.”

    The 34-year-old fullback will turn 35 during the season in March, and said he had always planned to retire at that age from the day he originally joined the Yamaha club as a 22-year-old.

    “I signed a professional contract with a great team like Yamaha Jubilo when I was 22 and at that moment, I made up my mind about this,” Goromaru said.

    “Ever since that day, I knew this day was coming. So it wasn’t the last few months or few years that I came to the decision, I’ve planned this over a much longer period.”

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    Soliloquin 1 hour ago
    Competing interests and rotated squads: What the 'player welfare summer' is really telling us

    I don’t know the financial story behind the changes that were implemented, but I guess clubs started to lose money, Mourad Boudjellal won it all with Toulon, got tired and wanted to invest in football , the French national team was at its lowest with the QF humiliation in 2015 and the FFR needed to transform the model where no French talent could thrive. Interestingly enough, the JIFF rule came in during the 2009/2010 season, so before the Toulon dynasty, but it was only 40% of the players that to be from trained in French academies. But the crops came a few years later, when they passed it at the current level of 70%.

    Again, I’m not a huge fan of under 18 players being scouted and signed. I’d rather have French clubs create sub-academies in French territories like Wallis and Futuna, New Caledonia and other places that are culturally closer to RU and geographically closer to rugby lands. Mauvaka, Moefana, Taofifenua bros, Tolofua bros, Falatea - they all came to mainland after starting their rugby adventure back home.

    They’re French, they come from economically struggling areas, and rugby can help locally, instead of lumping foreign talents.

    And even though many national teams benefit from their players training and playing in France, there are cases where they could avoid trying to get them in the French national team (Tatafu).

    In other cases, I feel less shame when the country doesn’t believe in the player like in Meafou’s case.

    And there are players that never consider switching to the French national team like Niniashvili, Merckler or even Capuozzo, who is French and doesn’t really speak Italian.

    We’ll see with Jacques Willis 🥲


    But hey, it’s nothing new to Australia and NZ with PI!

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