On 6 and 7 July, Ambassador Nenad Glisic visited the city of Kashiwazaki in the Japanese Niigata Prefecture at the invitation of the city's Mayor Masahiro Sakurai where our senior water polo team players are on practice training for the World Championship to be held in Gwangju. Kashiwazaki is the first city in Japan that formed its water polo team and was designated by the Government of Japan to be the host-city for the Serbian national team ahead of the Tokyo Olympics 2020.

During the visit to Kashiwazaki from 5 through 11 July, the Serbian national team had two training matches with the Japanese national team. The Japanese team won the first game, scoring16:13 and were defeated by the Serbian team 10:1 in the second match. The admission to both matches was free. The city authorities prepared various promotional materials and distributed T-shirts and shirts with "Come on Serbia" in the colours of the Serbian flag, fans adorned with Serbian emblems and basic information on Serbia and badges. An exhibition featuring information on Serbia was mounted in the sports stadium. Huge welcome posters in support of our water polo team were displayed around the city. The visit of our national water polo team was widely covered in the Japanese media.



At a ceremony following the first match held in the Aqua Park Arena in his welcome remarks Mayor Sakurai pointed out that this was an outstanding opportunity for the Japanese water polo players to compete with and learn from the world champions while the Japanese citizens could directly watch top-notch water polo matches. He expressed the hope that our national team would again visit Kashiwazaki next year before the Olympics. Ambassador Glisic greeted the audience, wishing the national teams of Serbia and Japan luck in their forthcoming competitions in Korea and expressed his hope that these two teams would meet again in the final in Tokyo. He expressed special thanks for the warm hospitality extended to our team by the citizens and participants in Kashiwazaki and for the excellent training conditions.



During his stay in Kashiwazaki, Ambassador met with Mayor Masahiro Sakurai in the City Hall as well as with Jasushi Yoshida, President of Bourbon Corp., one of the largest confectionary manufacturers in Japan which sponsors the Kashiwazaki team.