It’s a game you may never have heard of. I certainly hadn’t until I saw the news about it. But gateball has been popular in Japan since the end of World War II. However, new reports say the sport, invented in Hokkaido and a favorite national pastime for decades, is on its deathbed. What happened?
The emergence of a post-war pastime
Gateball made its initial appearance in Japan in 1947. Suzuki Kazunobu (previously Suzuki Eiji) invented the game as a variation on croquet. Rubber was scarce at the time, but wood was plentiful, and croquet is played with wooden balls and mallets. It became popular in Kumamoto in the 1950s and spread nationwide in the 1970s.
Gateball has since spread to multiple countries across Asia, including China, South Korea, and Indonesia. There is an Asian as well as a World tournament, the latter of which was last hosted in Japan in Niigata in 2018.
The game is played on a 20 by 15 meter court containing three gates and a goal pole. Two teams of five face off, earning points for balls that go through a goal or hit the pole. At the end of 30 minutes, the team with the highest score is the winner. It is reportedly a fast-paced and strategic game that anyone of any age can play.
From over 10,000 players to 138 in Yamaguchi
Despite its pan-Asian popularity, the sport appears to be falling on hard times.
The decline is especially marked in Yamaguchi Prefecture. At its peak in the 1980s, it’s estimated that the prefecture’s Gateball Association had over 10,000 members. Its largest number of recorded members stands at 5,764 in 1997.
Today, however, the association has a scant 138 members remaining. As a consequence, many of the prefecture’s 72 gateball courts have fallen into disrepair.
Handa Toshio, the co-chair of the association and the leader of the team that won last year’s national playoffs, says he’s still playing with friends. However, the team can’t attend this year’s tournaments due to a lack of members who can commit to the competition.
This trend isn’t limited to Yamaguchi. The Japan Gateball Union reported 680,000 members in 1998. Today, that number stands at a mere 35,000.
What explains the plummet?
So why has gateball fallen out of fashion?
Nakada Noriaki, who heads Yamaguchi Prefecture’s Gateball Association, says the sport has suffered from its reputation as being “a game for senior citizens.” That’s resulted in two negative effects.
First, it means that young people aren’t picking up the sport. That’s leading to a loss of awareness and enthusiasm around gateball in general. Second, even though Japan’s elderly population is increasing rapidly, many seniors in their 60s and 70s are finding they have to keep working in order to make ends meet in today’s rough economy. That’s cutting into their time for recreational activities like gateball.
“This is our last chance to bolster the community,” Handa said. He says gateball enthusiasts need to spark more interest among kids and youth, pitching it as an easy-to-play and fun game even for those who don’t feel they’re good at sports. Handa is proposing that gateball associations target middle schools and school boards to boost the fortunes of the home-grown game.
Will that be enough to save it, however? Some experts differ. In a comment on Yahoo! News JP, aging expert Saitō Tōru says many are moving away from gateball because the rules are overly complex and the game is too competitive, which can damage instead of strengthen personal relationships. Saitō argues that ground golf, another Japanese invention from Akita Prefecture, is gaining popularity as a low-less, low-competition alternative.
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Sources
ゲートボール人口が激減 山口県で全盛期1万人超が138人に なぜ？ Chūgoku Shimbun
Gateball. Wikipedia
