Japan did well on the field in the Confederations Cup, finishing as the runnerup of the eight-nation tournament, but how smoothly did things go off the field in the test-run for next year's World Cup?

On the night of May 31 in Niigata, hundreds of people could be seen dashing to the gates of the 42,300-seater Big Swan Stadium as soon as they got off the shuttle buses at the terminal near the stadium. They could hear the noise of the crowd from inside the stadium as it was well past kickoff time in Japan's game against Canada. Some 2,000 people reportedly couldn't get inside before the kickoff.

A lot of people went to the shuttle bus stop at JR Niigata Station between 5 p.m. and 6 p.m., which caused a long queue and a certain amount of frustration. The local organizers, who were dealing with such a big crowd for the first time, failed to get their act together.

On their way home, thousands of fans converged on the shuttle bus stop at the stadium, but they had to wait for a long time in constant rain.

The situation in Niigata was improved for the second game on June 2 when Japan played Cameroon. But on that occasion, many people opted to walk the 4 km from the JR station to the stadium.

The congestion around the 41,800-seater Kashima Stadium on June 4 after Japan's game against Brazil was automative rather than pedestrian, although the pace was definitely pedestrian. It took hours for people to travel the small roads from the stadium to the expressway.

At both venues, travel information -- where and when to catch the bus, directions to the station, etc. -- were not clear enough. Even in Japanese the service was poor; in other languages, it was pathetic. Unfortunately, we've seen this problem before at the 1998 Nagano Winter Olympics and at last year's Kirin Cup in Miyagi Stadium.

In Nagano, many people were stuck in a traffic jam for hours and some of them missed the ski jumping event in Hakuba. One of the "victims" even sued for compensation after failing to attend the Olympic event. Miyagi Stadium is so far from Sendai, even walking isn't an option. In fact, the options are very limited.

If the local organizers for the Confederations Cup games had learned the lessons from Nagano and Miyagi, perhaps the service in Niigata and Kashima would have been better.

Can't the local governments and organizers share this kind of information to make for a smoother operation at these events?

It seems that the typical, vertically divided structure of Japanese society doesn't help in the organization of big events like the World Cup.

On a larger scale, FIFA president Sepp Blatter also asked for help from the governments of the two cohosts to improve the frequency of international flights between the two countries. Chikage Ogi, Japan's Land Infrastructure and Transport Minister, has indicated that Haneda airport could be used to improve international services during the World Cup.

The Canadian team, meanwhile, complained of small beds and the smell of cigarettes at their hotel in Niigata. In addition, no games except the Japan games were available on TV at most of the hotels as they don't have the special tuner to access SkyPerfect TV, which held the rights to the games (and also have the rights to the World Cup).

That was a big blow for organizers attempting to boost the tournament in the smaller venue towns. Decent exposure is essential to drawing in crowds. Over the two weeks of the Confederations Cup, the Japanese organizing committee was able to check various organizational aspects, such as transportation, accommodation and security, but there were some things they couldn't check.

Their computer system was one of them as the World Cup didn't have an IT sponsor until halfway through the Confederations Cup.

FIFA, soccer's world governing body, managed to announce sponsorship deals with Avaya, Toshiba and NTT, which should go a long way to solving this problem, but the signing came pretty late in the day.

Blatter is confident all preparations are on schedule for next year, but the local organizers will have to do without a test run for IT and other crucial aspects.

One of these is the volunteer service.

Some 1,000 volunteers helped during the Confederations Cup at three venues in Japan, but many of them appear to be unsure if they will sign up again next year.

JAWOC is struggling to recruit volunteers for the World Cup. Around 7,000 have applied to work as volunteers so far, but that is less than half of what JAWOC needs.

The question of whether to sell alcohol at the stadiums also remains unanswered. Beer was sold at the venues of the Confederations Cup and FIFA is keen to retain beer sales at the stadiums next year. But the majority of the crowds were Japanese this time and JAWOC is taking a prudent attitude to the issue, considering possible hooligan problems.

"We've learned a lot from this rehearsal tournament for the World Cup," Japan Football Association president Shunichiro Okano said on the final day of the Confederations Cup. "We'll make an analysis of this tournament to improve our preparations for the 2002 event."

The World Cup will be here in less than 12 months; JAWOC's analysis and resolution had better be good.