Asahi TV's 'Sacred Dirt' draws Koshien cheers in stadium soil — One Show Gold

Every summer, Japan's national high-school baseball championship — played at Koshien Stadium and broadcast nationwide — stirs more passion than professional baseball. Top teams from 49 districts meet there, and many players will retire from the sport forever if their team loses. The intensity of supporters can tip into aggression, adding pressure to teenagers playing the most important games of their lives.

Asahi Television Broadcasting, whose nightly programme covered the 105th memorial tournament in 2023, wanted to foster a supportive atmosphere. With Dentsu Tokyo it made three B1 cheer posters drawn entirely in soil — 10kg of earth mixed to the same formula as the stadium's own ground, with more than 100 test prints and two months of handwork. The messages are written from the players' perspective: 'there are people who believed in me', 'people I want to make happy', 'people who entrusted me'.

On 1 August 2023 the three posters went on display at Hanshin Koshien Station, the stop where players and spectators arrive. The soil is the same 'sacred dirt' ballplayers traditionally carry home as a memento after their last game, so the posters linked the tournament's 105-year history and the athletes' effort to the role of the crowd — a reminder that supporters were there to help, not to heckle.