- Kensuke Iwabuchi
Kensuke "Kenny" Iwabuchi (岩渕健輔 いわぶちけんすけ) born on December 30, 1975 in
Tokyo is a Japanese rugby player and coach. He plays at stand off, and has 20 caps for theJapan national rugby union team . He also captained the Japan sevens team in the third sevens World Cup and was the first Japanese player to play professional rugby in England.Player
Very quick and good at initiating backline moves, Iwabuchi's achilles heel at the top level was his kicking ability, which he himself acknowledged was inferior to that of his excellent contemporary
Keiji Hirose who was a very reliable kicker, both of conversions and in open play. (He was the backup to Hirose in the Rugby World Cup 1999.) Iwabuchi was also very unlucky with persistent serious injuries.Career
Player
In 1998 he graduated from
Aoyama Gakuin University in Tokyo, enteredKobe Steel and joinedKobelco Steelers . In October he proceeded to study overseas atCambridge University where he won a Blue and much praise for his efforts in theThe Varsity Match .In July 2000 he graduated from Cambridge and left Kobe Steel at the same time. In August he became the first Japanese player to join an English premiership team when he signed up with
Saracens F.C. .In 2002 he suffered a severe knee injury playing sevens rugby at the Pusan Asian tournament.
Coach
In 2004 he was strategy controller at
Fukuoka Sanix Blues , on secondment from Saracens. In 2005 he was registered at Sanix as a player-coach. The following year he moved toUS Colomiers in France.In 2007 he was registered as player-coach of
Secom Rugguts . He also works part-time as a guest commentator for J Sports and did so for theRugby World Cup 2007 .On February 28, 2008 he was announced as coach of the Japan national sevens team, working with
Wataru Murata as head coach.External links
* [http://sport.independent.co.uk/rugby_union/article169793.ece Japan's Iwabuchi signs for Saracens] ("Independent", August 10, 2000)
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