Factors Affecting the Migration of J.League Players

Abstract

This study deals with factors affecting the migration of J.League players. The purpose of this study is to describe the reasons why J.League players transfer to foreign football clubs. The data of this study were collected from Internet websites, magazines, newspapers, books that the players published, and statistical reports. In this study, 107 cases were gathered. First in this study, the history of the migration of Japanese football players during 1975-2003 is described and the numbers of cases and the destinations of the players are explained. The pattern of the migration is divided into three periods. The first period is from 1975 to 1992. This period was before the launching of the J.League. In Japan, there had not been any professional football players before 1986. Therefore, small numbers of migration, just 20 cases were found. The second period was from 1993 to 1997. In this period, J.League was started, however because the Japanese national team had never qualified for the World Cup, the reputation of Japanese players was not so high. The last period was after 1998. In this period, the Japanese national team could qualify for the France World Cup and Nakata, Hidetoshi succeeded in playing for the Italian club, 'Perugia'. In this period, the numbers of the migrations of the J.League players greatly increased. This study also shows some factors affecting the migration of the J.League players. The factors were divided into psychological factors, skill and adaptation factors, and socioinstitutional factors. Moreover, our findings regarding these factors support McGovern's paper of 2002.