Team handball, the figurative water boy of sports, is suddenly in the game and earning the roaring approval of fans in Japan.
TV shows have devoted countless hours to it, both in game coverage and as a topic of discussion; tickets to recent matches in Tokyo have sold out in minutes. Dozens of people line up overnight outside stadiums for the matches.
The turnaround is thanks to a remedy to a problem that has long plagued the Japanese national teams: allegedly unfair judges that Japan claims have favored teams from the Middle East.