Daisuke Higuchi's manga career began in 1992 when the artist was honored with third prize in the 43rd Osamu Tezuka Award. In that same year, Higuchi debuted as creator of a romantic action story titled Itaru. In 1998, Weekly Shonen Jump began serializing Whistle! Higuchi's realistic football manga became an instant hit with readers and eventually inspired an anime series, debuting on Japanese TV in May of 2002. The artist is currently working on yet-to-be-published new series.