Japanese Women Looking to Prove Their World Cup Win Wasn’t a
FlukeS  Women's soccer had long-struggled to find an audience in
Japan, a fact that made the Japanese team's win against the
United States' perennial juggernaut of a women's team at last
July's Women's World Cup that much more significant. With the
win, Japan had snapped a 26-game losing streak against the
Americans and simultaneously bellowed that it was an athletic
force to be reckoned with in international competition.  The New
York Times recounts the long fight for legitimacy that women's
soccer has had in order to attain even a tenuous level of
prominence in Japan. Though the World Cup win was big for the
Japanese women, — especially as it came in wake of the Fukushima
disaster — the record attendance at Nadeshiko League (the
women's league) games as well as international matches is always
a losing streak away from evaporating. According to Tamotsu
Suzuki, the coach of the women's team two decades past, the
women, despite signing endorsement de