Mike Galbraith's history of Western Sport in Japan
The Yokohama Cricket Club
In 1974 the YC&AC rugby section went on tour to Seoul and played to matches. This appears to be the first overseas tour made by any YC&AC sports team and is one of the first rugby tour to Korea by any team. Alex Russell allowed me to copy his rugby photos displayed before he left Japan. The text is from the YC&AC magazine.
An email out of the blue containing two photos reveals the true start of Yokohama’s first kids rugby school.
BEST YC&AC RUGBY PLAYER IN 1930s Background: As explained in the story about Bill Salter’s reminiscences, in 1989 I decided to track down and interview the ex-YC&AC rugby player living in Japan who had first played for the club before anyone else. I thought I might be looking for someone who had played in the late … Read more
Background Only a handful of “open” rugby clubs in the world can trace their history back 150 years. The Yokohama Country and Athletic Club (YC&AC) in the port of Yokohama is one of them as one of four sports clubs which merged in 1884 to form the current multi-sport club was originally established as the … Read more
Background At the end of the 19th century the two leading international trading ports in Japan were Yokohama and Kobe and they were both home to foreign sports clubs, the largest of which were the Yokohama Cricket and Athletic Club (YC&AC) and the Kobe Regatta and Athletic Club. (KR&AC). Not long after the latter was … Read more
EARLY MITSUBISHI vs YC&AC RUGBY MATCH REPORTS The All Mitsubishi Rugby Club was founded in 1928 and claims to be the oldest “club” team in Japan. This is because Japan has a very unique way of classifying and counting its teams and clubs. In fact, its basic unit for counting is ‘teams’ and not ‘clubs.’ … Read more
Play rugby in Japan. If you are looking for a great rugby club, check out the YC&AC whose rugby team’s establishment preceded that of the the RFU by five years. The club is one of the very few clubs in Japan to have its own ground on a hill with a great view of Mt. Fuji and has a special sports bar for after-match receptions yards from the pitch ….
The annual rugby interport match played between Yokohama (YC&AC) and Kobe (KR&AC) started on Xmas day 1902 and was Japan’s longest running rugby fixture. Kobe hasn’t been able to field a team for more than 10 years. Here is a report on the 1972 match that was published in the club’s monthly in-house magazine and forwarded to me by John Quin, who played for the YC&AC that day.
HOW I ENJOYED RUGBY WITH THE YC&AC (1979-1986) (Editor’s note: I would like to encourage other old sporting Japan hands to follow Chris’ path and use lockdown to record their memories and send them to me.) By Chris Baker The beginning During February 1979 whilst working for British Leyland as a Senior Instructor at their … Read more
1866 and all that: the untold early history of rugby in Japan Article written by JMG for The Japan Times published in March 2014 before Tokyo International 7s The history of rugby in Japan is arguably longer than that of every major rugby-playing country in the world outside of the British Isles and Australia. Very … Read more
The YC&AC grounds and sports facilities at Yaguchidai have been enjoyed by the club’s sporting members for just over 100 years and those of no other “open” club in Japan’s major cities come anywhere near matching them. Many members over those years happily played field sports at the YC&AC for ten or even twenty years … Read more
GLIMPSES OF YC&AC AND RUGBY IN JAPAN ON AND OFF THE FIELD IN 1920s & 1930s – BILL SALTER’S REMINISCENCES
Messages mostly from descendants of players and also from living ex-players involved in rugby in Yokohama history – 1860s, 1870s, 1880s, 1950s to 1980, 1971, 1979, and 1980s
CHURCH WAS NOT SO-CALLED EX-PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL PLAYER HIRAM CHURCH BUT 18-YEAR OLD ERNEST FISHER CHURCH FROM RHODE ISLAND
The evidence that the first baseball club in Japan was not the Shimbashi Athletic Clud allegedly founded by Hiroshi Hiraoka in 1878 but the Yokohama Base Ball Club and not the Shimbashi Athletic Club!
Playing SquadYoshi Amano, Bill Baker, Masahiko Ikeda, Fumitaka Katakura “The Cherry”, Junji Kikkawa, Michael King, Kats Matsuo, Yoshio Nike, “Caviar Ken“ Noguchi, Masa Nozaki, Hiroyuki Nozawa, Nao Obata, Daisuke Okada, Ryosuke Okawara, Scott Sizemore, Simon Tross Youle (captain), Shunichi Tsushima, Masafumi Uchiyama, Yasufumi Uchiyama The post YCAC Over 35s Tournament – Saturday 21st March appeared … Read more