The Japanese Men’s National soccer team is coming to town. Known as the Samurai Blue, the team has hand selected Nashville as their Base Camp City.
The players will eat, sleep and train in Nashville for their upcoming run at the 2026 FIFA World Cup. They arrive here June 8 and could stay until July 17.
More: WPLN coverage of World Cup 2026
Are they good?
“ Absolutely!” says Mikek Woitalla, the Executive Editor of Soccer America, and husband of WPLN’s CEO.
“They play an attractive type of soccer. The Japanese always attack, and they play with flair, and a lot of that has to do with that they’ve been emulating the Brazilian style of soccer as they’ve risen in the game over the last 30-40 years. The Japanese play to win, they’re not playing not to lose.”
Japan’s team has a couple players to cheer for. Wataru Endo is the team captain and a defensive midfielder who plays for Liverpool in the British Premiere League. But the star is Takefusa Kubo, who was labeled the “Japanese Messi” early on in his career when he signed for Real Madrid at the age of 18 in 2019.
But injuries are inevitable in sports and both star players have had recent health issues. Endo with a foot injury and Kubo with a hamstring making the team’s run a bit of a wildcard.
FILE – Japan players pose for a team photo before an international friendly soccer match between Scotland and Japan in Glasgow, Scotland, Saturday, March 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Scott Heppell, File)
So, anything could happen. The big question is, can the Japanese team win the World Cup?
Woitalla says yes. ”I think Japan is the favorite among those teams who have never won it before.”
Nashville’s unconventional path to becoming a Base Camp city
Nashville is what’s known as a Base Camp for the Japanese team. Every team had to choose one city in the Americas to call home for their run. Initially, FIFA published a list of 46 approved Base Camp cities for countries to choose from, and Nashville was not included.
Japan did a bit of a daring thing by going off book and choosing Music City. And it all may have come down to one metro employee: Mayor Freddie O’Connell’s Chief of Staff, Masami Tyson.
Masami Tyson, Nashville Mayor Freddie O’Connell’s Chief of Staff on WPLN’s This is Nashville
She is a Japanese native and last year, while in Japan, Tyson met with the Japanese Football Association and pitched them on Nashville while speaking Japanese.
“It made a big difference that, you know, someone who is a senior official in a city government is a Japanese native. So that in and of itself showed them that the relationship with Japan is super strong” she said.
A personal nudge from President Jimmy Carter
The Japan/Nashville relationship is one that goes back to the late 1960’s. At the time there was a trade war between Japan and the United States. Japan was producing high quality products for affordable prices and American’s wanted them. But Japanese manufacturers feared tariffs from the US and racial backlash. President Carter met with Japanese Prime Minister Takeo Fukuda and gave him a message.
“Basically the US government said, ‘Hey, if you wanna sell Japanese products in the US, you have to manufacture them here’,” Masami explained.
The first company to arrive was Toshiba. Governor Ray Blanton literally rolled out a red carpet on the tarmac of BNA and told the executives, “If you decide to invest here, you could really change the history of Tennessee. Because if you, a global company, well-known brand, came here, other companies will follow.”
The next Governor, Lamar Alexander, went further to build the relationship. He flew to Japan eight times in his first term. He carried a tool of persuasion with him: a photo of the United States at night. In it, each coast was bright with activity.
“I showed it to Mr. Kawamata, the Japanese Nissan chairman,” says Alexander. “When he asked me, ‘Where is Tennessee?’ And I said, ‘Right in the middle of the lights’.”
Satellite of the U.S. at night
Nissan went in. They opened the almost $6.6 billion dollar (almost $23 billion in today’s dollars) factory in Smyrna.
Today, Japan is the single largest foreign investor in Tennessee and has created over 600,000 jobs. The relationship between Japan and Nashville is as strong as any American city in the country of Japan.
When Masami Tyson gave her pitch to the Japanese Football Association she told them about this relationship. And eventually, the team chose Nashville.
Watch a practice
The Samurai Blue get to town on June 8th and there will be an Open Training Day. Anyone can go to Geodis Park and watch. Teresa Tatlonghari, VP of Marketing & Comms at Nashville SC, says it’s free.
“It’s a training session on the pitch, and hopefully fans will get an opportunity to interact, and we’ll have an emcee there and have some fun things for fans.”
Other than that, we don’t really know what the Japanese team will be up to in the city; maybe going to Bolton’s or Broadway. Tatlonghari says “Hopefully, we’ll get to show them around with some hot chicken and some Southern hospitality.”
One thing is known: more than 150 journalists are coming in from Japan to report on Samurai Blue every day back in Japan.
Samurai Blue’s first game is on June 14, where they play a real contender, the Netherlands. And if they survive all the way to the end, they will call Nashville home until mid-July.
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