Particle の in this sentence

Question

Here is the sentence from ドラゴンボール, :

全世界注目の地球の運命を賭けたセルゲームが始まろうとしています。

(the Cell Game is a martials arts tournament for those who don't know the manga)

I'm not sure of what the first の means here :

Is it the の equivalent to が in subordinate clauses? But then I don't really get why 注目 would be used :

The Cell Game, on which the (attention of the) entire world stakes the future of the earth, is about to begin.

My guess is it's the same の as in :

兄のジョンだ。 This is John, my brother.

Then a translation would be :

The Cell game, center of the entire world's attention, and on which we bet the destiny of the earth, is about to begin.

Or is it something else?

Thanks for your time.

Answer 1

There's something interesting going on here. The の in 注目の選手 can be easily explained as a standard の used to string nouns together, like "of" in "the player of attention".

However, in 全世界注目の選手, it gets harder to defend this standpoint. 全世界注目 is not really one word, it occurs almost exclusively with の after it (Google gave me very few examples with を and が, and they seem a bit strange, at least to me). Also, the intonation, 全世↓界注目の, not 全世界ちゅ↓うもく, hints that we're not talking about a compound noun here.

It seems more natural to treat this as a relative clause, i.e. 全世界注目の選手 = 全世界が注目する選手. This is a productive pattern, e.g. 大統領推薦の○○ = 大統領が推薦する○○, although it seems restricted to formal contexts. There's also a parallel without a Sino-japanese する-verb, e.g. 大統領率いる社会党, but here the only surface difference is the missing subject marker.

It seems obvious that this syntax could come from Chinese/kanbun influence, e.g. Mandarin 全世界注目的公司, but others would probably be better at filling in the details. Also if anybody has better examples, feel free to comment or edit.

Answer 2

I think you can parse it this way:

全世界注目の　[　[地球の運命を賭けた]　セルゲーム　]

The first phrase, 全世界注目の〜, means the whole world's attention is on something—see Weblio for more examples of 注目の. I think the key to understanding this is that it relates to the following head noun セルゲーム and not to 地球.

The second phrase, 地球の運命を賭けた, I think you understand already. I don't think the earlier phrase is acting as a subject here.

Answer 3

Your intuition is correct in that this の is the same as the の in 兄の佐藤.

Similarly to the explanation in the similar question How does the の work in 「日本人の知らない日本語」? 全世界注目の is a relative clause that is modifying the noun セルゲーム.

A pretty good example of this rule is here: http://www.japaneseprofessor.com/lessons/beginning/modifying-particle-no/

The relevant part is:

まほうの　とびら mahou no tobira a magical door

Mahou (magic) is a noun, but it's being used like the adjective magical, which doesn't exist in Japanese. And while "mahou no hon" could be "a book of magic" (filled with spells) or "a magic book" (itself enchanted), the "of" interpretation for no does not exist in every case. So while "of" is a possible translation of no, it's not always the best translation.