The opposite 21-year-old also has a huge tattoo of Kyojuro Rengoku, a character from the manga and anime series “Demon Slayer”
Up front Darlan Souza came off the bench at Maracanãzinho on Sunday to score 23 points and lead the team. Brazil in the 3 sets to 2 victory (22/25, 25/16, 25/20, 21/15 and 16/14) over the Czech Republic in pre-Olympic volleyball. At every point scored and before serving, the 21-year-old made gestures that seem strange to the layman, but which are known throughout the world among fans of anime, a typical Japanese cartoon genre.
The movements performed by Darlan with his hands are ‘jutsu’, a ninja technique used by the characters of “Naruto”, a very popular anime in Brazil and one of the favorites of the athlete, who is completely fascinated by Japanese culture. The charm is also evident on his right arm, where he has a huge tattoo of Kyojuro Rengoku, a character from the manga and anime series “Demon Slayer”.
In July last year, when he was summoned to the League of Nations, held in Japan, he was ecstatic. “When I learned that I would be going to Japan with the men’s team it was an immense joy. I immediately told my brothers and my parents. I was excited and a little anxious. The focus here is the Nations League, the training and games, but experiencing a bit of culture is already an incredible experience,” he said at the time, already on Japanese soil.
Celebration in the form of ‘jutsu’ has long been a trademark of Darlan, both in the national team and in Sesi-Bauru, to the point of becoming a topic of discussion among Naruto voice actors in Brazil. Úrsula Bezerra, Tati Keplmair and Robson Kumode published a video, before the 2022 Volleyball World Cup, in which they play their respective characters, to wish them good luck in reverse.
Naruto is CULTURE and volleyball player Darlan gave us proof of it!pic.twitter.com/xPXtulBJKo
— Boruto Brazil Portal (@portalborutobr) October 1, 2023
DISPUTE WITH HIS BROTHER
For the opportunity to showcase his charismatic celebration, Darlan is in a positional dispute with his older brother, Alan Souza, 29, World Cup and Nations League champion in 2019 and 2021 respectively, as both they are opposites. It was in Alan’s place that he came on Sunday, against the Czech Republic, to decide Brazil’s match.
“I know it’s hard for me to get in because he (Alan) Plays most games well. But man, they’re there. Little by little I will conquer my space, I will demonstrate it in the training sessions and in the matches I play. So it’s time to keep working so that maybe one day we can go to the Olympics and be a member of the national team,” Darlan said after the win.
Alan, in turn, praised his younger brother’s performance. “The collective was very important today, many pieces coming in and out of place. Darlan came in and played an extraordinary game. There’s no denying that. The Brazilian team is a collective. We still have a lot to improve on some things”, but that’s the point. The spirit. What matters is the victory, regardless of the score.”
Darlan’s first call-up to the adult team came at the age of 19, for the Bulgarian and Japanese phases of the 2022 Nations League, when he got a starting opportunity due to an injury to his brother, who broke his Achilles tendon. . Today, the dispute between the two is one of the fiercest. On Saturday, the day before Darlan starred in the triumph against the Czechs, Alan played the same role and was the top scorer in the 3 sets to 0 victory over Qatar, with 14 points.
The brothers grew up in Nilópolis, a city in the Baixada Fluminense, Rio de Janeiro, so the pre-Olympic competition in the capital of Rio made it easier for family members to be in the stands. Dona Aparecida, the couple’s mother, watched the games at the Maracanãzinho. At the end of Sunday’s game, her children jumped over the billboards and ran to hug her.
Source: Terra
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