Never seen such a chaos, neither for Kaka and Balotelli. I've seen people (both journalists and normal people) falling to the groud ad got injured. I was always close to Keisuke, I tried to grab an autograph for Bigsoccer community and give him a Milan scarf, but he didn't accept anything from anyone. The problem was Milan Channel had a full exclusive interview, so if he stopped for autographs and photos, other journalists would have asked him their questions and the exclusive interview wouldn't be respected. My brother made a video, anyway Honda is not clearly visible, you can just see the huge crowd around him. At the end people were disappointed and journalists pissed off after hours of wait for having nothing.
Wouldn't it be awkward if he speak English with Balotelli first then switch over to speaking Italian with him when he mastered Italian, maybe even when he mastered Italian, he still continuing speaking to Balotelli in English while speaking to others in Italian.
He supposedly speaks passable Spanish, so the transition should be OK. Maybe he can teach Mario some Japanese. Keisuke's English was a bit robotic on Milan Channel...maybe the crowd and the lady reporter made him nervous? Either that or he spent all of his time at CSKA speaking Japanese with Doumbia.
Funny I noticed the same but thought maybe it has always been like that. He seemed... nervous. Anyway, here's him with the shirt (video). http://instagram.com/p/ixFD02NjJA/#
I watched excerpts from the interview having never seen Honda speak English before. I was fairly impressed. I know many, many Japanese people who have lived in English-speaking countries for many years (Honda has never lived in one) and have not reached that level. Including many who work for the government and big companies and whose job it is to speak English all the time. He also did not seem especially nervous to me. It was a stupid shallow interview but that is not really his fault. Combination of bad interviewer and the firm Japanese sports tradition of boring interviews at work there.
I am a native English speaker and I didn't think he sounded nervous either. His fluency and pronunciation is pretty good. He has always spoken English very well and you can tell he always tries to answer very carefully with a lot of thought. He speaks that way in Japanese too of course.
well the article in korean media mentioned that honda has been studying italian in preparation for his new team and refused to ask for interpreter. how can you not like a person like that? more and more stories of honda does get mentioned in korea. and now, i see a lot of people in korea hoping honda to kickass in italy. i am too.
Well, learning English quickly helped Honda earn the respect of his teammates at VVV and become a leader in the locker room, for which he deserves credit. Many Japanese players' language skills are quite poor - Nakamura and Kagawa come to mind - and hopefully the mentality of simply hiring an interpreter to take care of things will change. This isn't simply a matter of language - more players should consciously seek to lead within the team. 419850526428102656 is not a valid tweet id 419850387856707585 is not a valid tweet id
He is indeed doing light training and meeting his new mates right now coach: Honda? He’s eager to show what he can do, he’s good for the club. Unfortunately he won’t be available for the Champions League but he’ll play in the league and the Italian cup. He’s a technical player who’ll fill a gap up in attack. He has a lot of personality and the most important thing is that he has a lot of enthusiasm and wants to show his quality in Italian football. Japanese football is one the rise and I remember the contribution that Nakata made to the title winning Roma side. Nagatomo is doing well at Inter and in terms of the characteristics that he has, Honda is a player that we’ve been missing. The number 10 jersey is a heavy one and has always been worn by great players from Rivera to Boban, to Rui Costa, Seedorf and Boateng who was the last one even if he a slightly different kind of player. Honda won’t play tomorrow. We’ll see what kind of shape he’s in in the next few days. I think he’ll be available for selection against Sassuolo. He seems like an intelligent guy who wants to help the team and this is very important.”