Second to None

28. top woman

In that same week, Mayu was unexpectedly pulled into an emergency meeting for the national tryouts. 

When she entered, the conference room was filled with an intimidating circle of executive directors she'd only heard of. Unsurprisingly, as the chair and co-chairs of this year's national tryouts, Tezuka and Ryoma were also present and the youngest men in the room. At the head of the table sat a graying man puffing at a cigarette with his eyes squinted. He had neither a name tag nor a notebook like everybody else yet he appeared to be the one in charge.

Unfortunate for Mayu, the only empty seat was adjacent to the chain-smoking man. She bowed timidly to senior executives and sat down without a noise, all the while trying to take the shallowest breaths possible.

"I appreciate you all joining on short notice," Director Yanagi began when the room was filled up and the door closed. Nodding to the man at the head of the table, he said, "I'd especially like to thank Minister Yazawa for attending. Thank you for making time in your schedule."

Director Yanagi's announcement made Mayu look at the smoking man with renewed interest. From past conversations with the parents of Aomachi, she knew that he was the current Minister of Foreign Affairs.

"I think it's important that I come here to highlight a few critical points," said Minister Yazawa, crushing his cigarette butt in the ashtray. "Recent reports suggest a downward trend in Japanese athletic performance, tennis being one of the categories. Director Yanagi kindly reached out to let me know that the national tryouts will be happening soon and I also had a chance to review the tryout plan. I'd like an open-table discussion on how we can make improvements."

"Improvements in which areas?" asked Ryoma. His undiplomatic outburst drew several glares around the table.

"The tryout design," replied the Minister. "I'm no sports expert, but I've seen a fair number of foreign tryouts and the association's evaluation process looks one-dimensional to me. It's internal staff-driven: either coach panels are doing assessments or high-performance department analysts are dissecting data from fitness tests. Isn't there a more external method?"

Tezuka raised his hand to signal he was about to speak. "Excuse me for pushing back, Minister Yazawa, but we require expert evaluations to make sure those joining the national team are the country's best players. There are no better experts than those already at the association. Not to mention, the tryout is an internal process that can't be broadcasted to outsiders."

"I understand that. But isn't there a way to realistically mimic how these players will fare against foreign athletes?"

"We could consider additional match processes by asking candidates to play against former or current national team players," one executive director suggested.

"Using national team members is still keeps things internal, only in a different form."

"How about adding simulation exercises as a part of the fitness testing?" asked another. "We could research parameters from foreign teams and—"

"That's merely collecting more technical data points."

"How about branching out to include international players in the tryout?" Mayu piped up after scrutinizing her events calendar. 

When the table fell dead silent, she realized she'd spoken her thoughts out loud and now all eyes at the table were on her, including Minster Yazawa.

He lit up another cigarette. "Keep talking."

Mayu clenched her fingers under the table to steady her breathing. "There will be visiting players from Germany—backups from their national team, but by no means unsophisticated athletes. Their visit coincides with the tryout timeline, so why don't we invite them to play against our national team candidates? It'd be somewhat equivalent to international competitions and a real test for how these candidates would fare in future tournaments."