◆ Youth score on an unmanned stage
[Review]Fumihiro Manzono (sports journalist)
This is a “special summer” youth group image drawn by TV people by switching their cameras and microphones to pens. Anchorman’s “three-dimensional” works, all seventeen episodes, which read the voices of TVmen scattered at the interview site, will be developed one after another in an omnibus style.
Following the spring Senbatsu, the summer Koshien will also be cancelled. The story of 2020, when the title “Disappearing Koshien” became a reality, was to be left as a book by the hands of TVmen and others. I have been pilgrimage to Koshien every spring and summer, and have been writing columns for Tokyo Chunichi Sports and Chunichi Sports every day. The unexpected sad news sank, but his (or) TVmen stood up with a pen. It must have been their pride as a recorder to leave the youth group image of a special year.
It is composed of short stories, but if you introduce each story, the space will run out. So, here is one of the most memorable ones in my mind. The “Thoughts entrusted to the gloves of Obihiro Agricultural Ace” written in a space of only five pages is a gem.
A youth record that begins with “Hokkaido, Tokachi. The Obihiro Agricultural Baseball Club is in the endless sky and the vast land.” In the summer of 1982, he made his long-cherished first appearance in Koshien and lost in the first match for 40 years. In the 21st century frame, I was shooting spring senbatsu. The captain and ace Imura base was holding a glove that his older brother, who is also an OB of the school’s baseball club, earned a part-time job while farming in the family business. It was made of Tokachi cow leather.
August. Takano Ren gathered the teams selected by Senbatsu in the dream Koshien and played an “exchange game”. Imura Shonen said that he would use this glove to win his first victory at Koshien at his alma mater. I want to write more about what the boy said and what his brother thought, but I dare to stop here. I want to listen to the “voice” spoken by the ball children who chased the ball in the land of Hokkaido and fought in the almost unmanned Koshien.
Youth can be seen from the works written by the filmmakers.
(Shueisha, 1540 yen)
We produced a TV program “Our Summer” that follows high school baseball players in 2020 when the Koshien tournament was canceled.
◆ Another book
Takahiro Kikuchi, “Shimojojo Kyuji Mie Prefectural Hakusan High School, Miracle to Koshien” (Kanzen)
