Japan Women

It stuck. Since then the team has played as Orihime Japan.

They had been on the international mat long before that, entering the International Handball Federation in 1952 and making their championship debut a decade later at the second IHF World Women's Handball Championship, finishing ninth. Seventh at the 1965 World Championship remains the high point there, and their best Olympic finish came in Montreal in 1976, fifth place. Tokyo 2020, played out in 2021 with Japan in as host, brought a 12th-place finish instead.

Asia has been friendlier ground. Japan won the Asian Women's Handball Championship in 2004 and again in 2024, twenty years apart, and took gold at the 2023 Asian Games by beating South Korea in the final — the team they measure themselves against more than any other in the region. A bronze at the 2006 Asian Games sits earlier in that run.

The squad trains at the Ajinomoto National Training Center in Tokyo and turns out for its biggest matches at the Yoyogi National Gymnasium. Ulrik Kirkely took over as head coach in 2017 and steered the team through qualification for the Tokyo Games, succeeding Masamichi Kuriyama, who had held the post since 2012. Among the current squad, left back Haruno Sasaki plays her club handball in Germany with Frisch Auf Göppingen — one of the players carrying Orihime Japan's name furthest from home.