His hair has gone gray and his playing time is scant, his dancing scarce. As September ended, Miura had made only eight appearances in Yokohama F.C.’s first 35 matches in the J2 League, all off the bench, and none since late July. And there has not been a single goal to leave him shaking his hips as if at Carnival.

“When you are 51 years old, you lose power; fitness is very complicated,” said Edson Tavares, Yokohama’s Brazilian manager. “I have to be honest with him. When it’s possible, I use him.”

Even on the bench, though, Miura still brings value, Tavares said, to a small club unaccustomed to big expectations. He maintains an ebullient attitude. He trains fastidiously. And he eats — well, everyone has a favorite story about the way he supposedly eats.

He is up at 5 in the morning for breakfast, prepared by a personal nutritionist. If his iron levels are low, he finds a restaurant and eats liver. After training, he dips his legs in an ice bath and drinks what some say is a large amount of orange juice. Only it is not orange juice; it is special carbonated water from Italy.