Shin Tennis no Ouji-sama: U-17 World Cup Episode 4 Discussion

Hmm. I'm actually late today but seems like the series is so obscure not many people are watching.

Anyway. Kind of a slow ep today. So atobe's adventures continue(?), but I wasnt expecting there to be a full on brawl, man. Is this the first time they had actual contact violence? Hmm. The rest of the ep was taken up by ryoma vs the prince dude. Well the other teams have to have middle schoolers as well, but uh. Its kind of jarring, since I think in the whole series there have only been three first years, ryoma, kentarou, and kintaro. And ryoma and kintaro are both really short so I was surprised that chardard was a first year, though maybe the angle since he was on the horse the whole time made it hard to compare. I find it funny that sakuno is still wearing her school uniform all the way in australia. Draws are rare/impossible in tennis so I forgor, but the last time there was a "one point" match back in ryoma vs kintaro it also ended in a draw I guess.

Otherwise, it seems atobe has finished his uh, evolution thingy? That was kinda quick and abrupt, not sure. Hmm.
The other main part is that we Finally get the format talk. So basically there's a total of 32 countries, eight groups of four.
Number 2 swiss is in the same group as japan, they didnt say if top two proceeds or if only the top of the group proceeds though. Otherwise we got almost all the info, round robin, its three singles and two doubles (the usual*) format, seven players each with at least 3 middle schoolers, and each player can only play once. so 21 players required in total with at least 9 middle schoolers.

It could go either way really.
1: we get the 9 middle schooler matches for the rest of the season, 1 cour
2: we get all 21 matches, 2 cour.

Japan vs swiss (2), greece, and australia. USA might face france somewhere else, though uh. USA is 5th so unless its top four seeds only 5th wouldnt normally face 4th.
Additionally usa only has 5 members revealed so far, so I'm getting the feeling they're either gonna totally skip the usa games or just briefly skim over them. For the round robin stage each country needs at least 21 players so, probably some matches are gonna get skipped.

Its interesting that prince dude is the "face" of france, probably this means we're only(?) going to see ryoma vs him, assuming they're even in the same group.
Swiss captain features quite prominently, I wonder who japan is going to send against him.

Looks like next episode we're playing against greece, and it's oishi in doubles with the tall dude. Really feels kind of weird that oishi isnt with kikumaru but alas.

I've been wondering if people are watching it enough. I know PoT is niche so I hope the anime does well.

This ep was entertaining in ridiculousness lol

Prince of tennis is old, its been a decade since the last tv anime (which is basically like an eternity), the manga itself started in like what, Twenty years ago?
Plus the main anime itself was over a hundred eps long (and also 20 years old), then you have the nationals ova, new prince, and then genius 10 ova.
I'm only halfway through the main anime itself and I didnt know genius 10 existed for a few years. The pacing in new prince of tennis has been kinda awkward so far as well.
Not terrible, just not like the main series or nationals where it was just consecutive tournament games.

I really wonder if oishi can actually win, its doubles, but considering in genius 10 the middle schoolers all got annihilated by the high schoolers, oof.

I think it’s safe to assume the fans old enough to continue following this may have left the ‘fandom’ internet stage, but I think the series is still popular enough to Japan to keep it going. What with all the musicals and CDs and movies etc it must still be a massive cash cow, having long term fans with a disposable income is good. At this point I’ve almost given up on serious matches and more focused on relationships between the characters themselves haha

LoL that's true. I know Japan fandom is still there. I gave up serious matches in the U17 camp. Now it's about how ridiculous can their powers get in a match?

play a game of tennis while riding a horse? Well, when Spain touches them, they will go on a bull!!!! kekeke