This article is part of an introduction to the policies and activities of each Prefectural Football Association divided into 12 categories: ‘Seniors’, ‘Class 1’, ‘Class 2’, ‘Class 3’, ‘Class 4’, ‘Kids’, ‘Women’, ‘Futsal’, ‘Beach Soccer’, ‘Referees Committee’, ‘Facilities Committee (Environmental Maintenance)’ and ‘Technical Committee’. We hope you read this article through and become familiar with the various activities held across the country.
This is the third article, in which we introduce activities of “Class 3’.

*This article has been published in ‘REGIONAL NEWS‘ in the June issue of JFA news.

Activities of ‘Class 2’ (Hyogo Football Association)

KAGINO Takekazu, Chairman of Class 2 Committee of Hyogo Prefectural Football Association

‘10 years of the Hyogo League’

Recently, U-18 leagues, such as the Prince Takamado Trophy U-18 Football League Premier League at the top, have developed greatly. In Hyogo prefecture the U-17 league started in 2005. Before that each branch of the All Japan High School Athletic Federation had its own league depending on its particular circumstances. Since there were already so many official matches for the third year of high school, including the freshmen’s championship, the Inter-high school Championships, the National Sports Festival of Japan (U-18) and the All Japan High School Soccer Tournament, we held our league as an U-17 championship (two blocks with eight teams). Then we changed it to U-18 (two blocks with eight teams) in 2009, because the league format became more common. After a great deal of consideration in the committee, we introduced two divisions with 10 teams each to our league, playing on a home-and-away two leg basis. The third tier and other divisions are held in each district, such as Hanshin, Kobe, Toban, Seiban, Tanyuu, Tajima and Awaji, rather than held as prefectural leagues, due to geographic difficulties. (There are some problems with transportation between Tajima district, which is located on the Sea of Japan side, and Awaji district on Seto Inland Sea.)

Managing leagues contributes to the development not only of the teams and the individual players, but also many other related roles, including staff and referees. It’s essential to train all those associated with football as football becomes more and more popular. The class 2 generation is an ideal age for learning the fact that the tournaments are managed with a lot of support and help by other people. Under the mentorship of the Referees Committee, we encourage youth referees to act as main referees in the matches of the prefectural league.

The second division of the Kansai Prince League was suspended in 2014 and all the teams in the league downgraded to join the prefectural league. Although we were happy to have them as the first division of our league could become more competitive, we felt disappointed to have only Vissel Kobe in the Prince Takamado Trophy U-18 Football League Premier League and Kobe Koryo Gakuen High School in the Prince League. We would like to build stronger teams through the competitive league.