SOMETIMES the so-called minnows are content, after a one-off win against one of the big fish, to go back to the normal way of things. Not Japan. Not after Saturday’s outstanding victory over South Africa.

Having tasted that triumph, the Japanese, under the wily guidance of their coach, Eddie Jones, are intent on savouring more - beginning with Scotland on Wednesday. Jones told his team before the Rugby World Cup began that their aim had to be to reach the quarter-finals, and he sees no reason to revise that demand after their 34-32 win over the Springboks. He is confident his players can back up that achievement, and he began to prepare them for the midweek match in Gloucester just minutes after the end of Saturday’s sensational win.

“He just told us to take the moment in and remember it for the rest of our lives, but that we still have a job to do against Scotland,” the Japan No 8, Hendrik Tui, explained.

“It has been a beautiful start to the World Cup for us - we’re still floating in the air just now. It will take a few days for us to get over this one.”

The four-day break Japan have between games is the same as Scotland will have between the Kingsholm match and their meeting with the USA in Leeds on Sunday. It is a short turnaround, but Tui is confident his squad can recover on time.

“I’m sure we can,” he continued. “We’ve been having midweek games against club teams back in Japan just to prepare ourselves for this situation. The boys are ready.

“We’ll have a few beers to celebrate, but we’re not going to get too far ahead of ourselves. We’ve got a chance to get to the quarter-finals now, so we want to push on.

“I expect Scotland to be similar [to South Africa] in how high they carry the ball, and maybe their tackling as well. They tackle high. If we continue to do as we did against South Africa - low tackles and big drives - we can cause another upset.”

Luke Thompson, the second row, showed he had taken in Jones’ message by insisting there would have been no point to beating South Africa if his team could not go on to win again. “If we don’t back it up with more good performances I would consider it a lost opportunity,” he said. “We have to carry on, crank it up, and play well in the next three games.

“It still hasn’t sunk in properly what we’ve achieved, but just to win this game and then knock off and not get any more results would be very disappointing. We have to carry on.

“We probably blindsided South Africa a wee bit. Scotland will be pumped up for their first game.

“We’re professional rugby players, so we have to realise we’ve got a job to do. If we don’t back this up in the next three games then this win would be a waste. We’ve given ourselves an opportunity to possibly qualify for the quarter-finals,and we want to take it.

“We’ve been preparing for this for four years and [before the game] Eddie just talked about creating history for Japanese rugby and making the country proud. We wanted to show that we’re a serious nation in a rugby sense. We wanted to put pride into Japanese rugby and hopefully we’ve taken a first step to doing that.”

If the win over the Springboks counted as a first step, it only came after a lot of preparation. Two things were necessary, according to Thompson: to address the squad’s physical limitations when compared to many of the leading teams, and to deal with the perception, implicit in the nickname ‘Brave Blossoms’ by which the squad are known, that Japan always try their best but generally fail against superior forces.

“It has good and bad connotations,” he said of that nom de guerre. “We want to be a winning team, not a brave team.

“In the past we’ve tried really hard, but then we’d just get nailed at the end. That happened in the last 20 against France in 2011 [at the last Rugby World Cup].

“We stuck with them and stuck with them - and then let it go. [Against South Africa] we placed a lot of emphasis on not doing that. Mentally, we were playing for the 80.

“We know we’re not the biggest team in the world. I’m a lock and I’m standing there looking at their locks who are a head taller than me. We have to realise our strengths, because there’s no point trying to wrestle with guys who are way bigger and stronger.

“We have to work with what we’ve got. We’ve worked really hard on our fitness and speed.”

The speed was evident from the start against the Springboks, as it surely will be against Scotland. The fitness, of course, stood out most at the other end of the game - the stage of proceedings when, as Thompson said, the Japanese succumbed to mental and physical fatigue.

That fitness will be tested to the limit - and perhaps beyond - on Wednesday because of the brevity of the break between games. But Scotland will also be tested as they never have been before by Japan. Now that Jones has convinced his squad that they can make more history by reaching the last eight of the competition, they will take a lot of dissuading.