Taiyo Watanabe loses hair but not heart, as he leads Japan’s water polo revival

SINGAPORE – Bearing a passing resemblance to Hollywood star Vin Diesel, Japan water polo driver Taiyo Watanabe is just as fast and furious in the pool.

While the American actor shaves his head to maintain his trademark look, Watanabe has alopecia, an autoimmune disease that causes complete loss of hair on the scalp and body.

Although he shared with The Sunday Times that he was never bullied because of his condition, he was still perturbed when it first surfaced when he was eight, which was when he started playing water polo.

The cheery 23-year-old said: “I hated being seen by other people at the time and I was so negative. But as I became better in water polo, I started having more confidence in myself.

“I hope others in a similar situation can find something they enjoy doing. I felt it was important to show what I can do, and for me it is through water polo.

“At age eight, I enjoyed being able to throw a ball in the water, and I still do, and my success in the sport really cheered me up. I have met great teammates and feel great joy when I score. I realised that playing with energy is a lot of fun and I want people to see me doing well.”

In and out of the pool, Watanabe is hard to miss.

As his team lined up for the national anthem at the OCBC Aquatic Centre ahead of their World Aquatics Championships (WCH) opener against World Cup winners Spain, he stood out among his teammates, who all have full heads of black hair.

In the water, he was equally eye-catching, winning two sprints to help his 12th-ranked team start the first and third quarters with ball possession. He finished the match with four goals in their 22-16 loss to world No. 2 Spain. In the other Group B match, world No. 3 Hungary beat 11th-ranked Australia 18-6.

In an earlier interview with World Aquatics, Japan coach Yoshinori Shiota said: “Taiyo is one of the most talented water polo players in the world.

“He has a super-fast swimming speed and a brilliant shooting sense that no one can imitate. I believe he will lead Japan to the top of the world.”

After becoming a national team regular at 21, Watanabe has used his qualities to help Japan regain the Asian Games gold in 2023 after a 53-year wait. They also posted an eighth-placed finish at the Men’s Water Polo World Cup in January.

The five-time Asian Games champions’ re-emergence has led to several Japanese players being picked up by professional European teams, with captain Yusuke Inaba playing in Romania and Italy before returning to Montenegro to sign for Primorac Kotor.

Watanabe is also making waves in Europe, signing for Spain’s Barcelona after helping French side Pays d’Aix finish third and second in the last two seasons.

He said: “In Japan, we have just a three-day national championship and don’t have a national league. In the European leagues, we learn how to defend and control the match better, and this is good for the players and the national team.”

Aptly, his first name is the Japanese word for sun, and Watanabe noted that it is time for the Land of the Rising Sun to shine as the gap between Japan and the world’s elite has narrowed.

“Everyone knows Japanese players are not tall, but we have good speed and defend well,” he said.

“At the Paris 2024 Olympics group stage, we lost 15-16 to champions Serbia and 13-14 to France in matches we could have won. Against Spain here, we tried to be more aggressive.

“Personally, I want to shine brightly as Japan’s top player and top scorer.

“As a team, we have never made the top eight at the world championships, so that’s our goal here.”

Earlier in the day, Olympic champions and world No. 5 Serbia trounced South Africa 27-3 in Group A, while Italy beat Romania 17-5.

In Group D, defending champions and world No. 1 Croatia also eased to a 25-6 win over China, before world No. 8 Montenegro upset Greece (fourth) 10-9.

In Group C, the United States comfortably beat Canada 18-9, while hosts Singapore (38th) were defeated 19-8 by Brazil in their championship debut.

A mix of nerves and wanting “very badly to score the first goal” saw the hosts trail 0-8 before they finally got on the scoreboard late in the second quarter. They eventually put on a more organised display in the second half, notching a scoreline of 7-10.

Rating the team’s performance a four out of 10, Singapore coach Kan Aoyagi said: “We were playing quite aggressively, but we made some wrong decisions in the first half.

“Once we got our confidence back and started to understand how to play against players who are 2m and 100kg, we played well. We needed time to adapt, but once they got used to it, it was too late. I hope we can do better in our next game against Canada (on July 14).”

Sanjiv Rajandra, 23, who scored a joint game-high three goals, shared that their coach had prepared them for their opponents during training sessions, but that “when nerves and fatigue set in, that slipped out of our mind”.

He added: “We made individual mistakes we don’t usually make. Over the next few games, it’s our duty to stop them from happening again and make sure the improvement will be there.”