Tomoki Iwata followed EVERY Celtic game before transfer as he reveals how Angeball kickstarted his career
The Japanese star can't say he wasn't warned by his Parkhead compatriots about the Scottish weather.
It was hosing it down in Glasgow on Tuesday. Much as it has since Tomoki Iwata touched down in the city to begin his new career as a Celtic player at the tail end of last week.
So when you ask Ange Postecoglou’ s latest signing what he has been told by his countrymen Daizen Maeda, Kyogo Furuhashi, Hatate, Yusuki Ideguchi and Yuki Kobayashi to expect as the biggest difference between Japan and Scotland, it’s no surprise when Iwata breaks into a grin and says: “The weather!”
Yes, Glasgow East End was as grey and dreich as it was possible to be as Celtic ’s latest recruit from the Far East spoke to the media but he was beaming brightly enough to cut through the clouds and rain. Gloom? Definitely. But doom? Not a bit of it. Iwata, signed by Postecoglou from his former J-League club Yokohama Marinos, looks like a man in a rush to get started.
Although Japan’s Player of the Year hasn’t played since November, he can’t wait to feel the grass under his feet as he tries to repay the faith shown in him by the Celtic boss. The 25-year-old credits the Australian with transforming his career after switching him from central defence to a sitting midfield role where smuggling the ball off the opposition before setting attacks in motion has become his speciality.
He credits that spell under Postecoglou in season 20/21, where he was a team-mate of Maeda, as being pivotal in his development and he is looking forward to showing his gaffer that he has improved even more in the 18 months since the Parkhead boss left Japan.
“Because Daizen was my teammate, I started to follow every Celtic game,” he said. “Of course, I also worked under the manager at Yokohama F. Marinos, so I was very interested to see if that style of football can bring good results here in Scotland and in Europe.
“So, it has been exciting for me. I couldn’t watch all of the games, but I was always checking the highlights and keeping up with the scores.
“Since I started my professional career, the manager was the first foreign manager that I have had. The things I have learned especially is to have passion and a good attitude towards football. This is where I can learn a lot of things.
“So, I will keep learning from him and here in Scotland I will be looking to improve myself further. I will be putting 100 percent into each training session and thinking about how I can improve more. My focus will be on how I can express the football of the manager on the pitch.
“I feel grateful, thanks to him for picking me and playing me as a number six so I managed to find a new version of myself and another possibility for myself. I feel very grateful for him.
“I would like to play as a number six (for Celtic) but the most important thing is the victory of the team, so that is independent from which position I play. But the most important thing is how we can get the victory and this is what I will try to help my team to do.”
Coming to a new country, different culture and another style can be a daunting experience, but Iwata, who has been capped four times for Japan will have no trouble settling into his new surroundings, with so many of his countrymen already in the building.
“That decision to come here was very easy for me,” he insisted. “I have been dreaming of playing abroad and so I feel very thankful to Celtic and the manager.
“In terms of my family and friends, probably things are not easy for them. But we will have great experiences here that we cannot have in Japan as a family. We would like to just enjoy this stage of our life.
“The biggest difference? The weather - firstly that’s the biggest thing to begin with!
“There is a different type of football here, I have heard, but I feel very comfortable coming to Scotland. To have my countrymen here makes it easier too and I hope to fit in as quickly as possible.”
Iwata appears to have an easy-going nature, but that doesn’t camouflage a burning desire to become as big a success as Kyogo, Hatate and Maeda have been. He said: “Since Kyogo, Reo and Daizen have been playing here they have been brilliant, so the Japanese fans have started to follow the club.
“They have been playing for the national team too, and the club has a lot of popularity because of that in Japan. I was in contact with Daizen during the World Cup. I was sending text messages to him in Qatar when he played in the starting eleven and scored.
“The Japan results were very exciting for me. I do hope playing for Celtic boosts my chances, but just coming here doesn’t mean I will be called up for the Japan national team.
“First I need to play matches and play well. This is one of the fundamentals of football.
“Right now it’s too soon to think about the next World Cup in four year’s time. For now I just want to concentrate on getting good results at Celtic. I will put all my effort into playing for Celtic and see what happens.”
Postecoglou has no doubt he’s found another gem in Japan, seeing recently: “He’ll need a bit of work, but knowing the player and the person well, he’ll be working really hard to be ready as quickly as possible.
“The first thing is getting him settled in here and I’m sure he’ll be contributing before long. He’s a really intelligent footballer. He takes in information really well and is very disciplined. We’ll let him grow into it here.”
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