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 second article, in which we introduce ‘Futsal’ activities.

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

Activities of 'Futsal' (Fukui Football Association)

‘To make Sundome Fukui the home of Futsal’
YAMAMOTO Seiichi, Chairman of Futsal Committee of Fukui Football Association

In Fukui, we have been holding leagues in three categories - adults, women and boys (U-10 and U-9) for ten years. Many of the futsal teams in the league have also played football since they started, and we have been struggling to increase the number of the participating teams.

In order to spread and improve futsal in Fukui, the Futsal Committee started to host the ‘Fukui Futsal Championship’ in 2006. This championship consists of eight categories, including U-9, U-10, U-11, U-12, U-15, U-18, O-19 and MIX, and the finals are shown on Fukui TV, who co-host this event. There is an exhibition match before the finals, in which the local team JOGARBORA or Maruoka RUCK Ladies from the Hokushinetsu Football League play, so that many people can enjoy the real thrill of futsal. We do try to appeal in a different way every year. Last year 133 teams participated in the championship and Kogure Kenichiro, the former captain of the Japan futsal national team, joined to host a clinic and to comment on the finals, which made the event even more exciting. Kogure mentioned it was ‘a wonderful championship.’

We used to have an issue - the futsal activities for elementary and junior high school students would not necessarily have effective influence for high school students. However, this year Hokuriku High School established a futsal club team, which is the first one in this prefecture. This team took part in the 1st All Japan Youth Futsal Championship Hokushinetsu (U-18) in July and the players continue practicing hard every day, which is great news for us.

Last year the Fukui squads consecutively participated in the All Japan Women's futsal tournament and acquired a remarkable result, coming third in the championship at their second attempt. Maruoka RUCK Ladies also have took part in and got a great result at the All Japan Women’s Youth Futsal Championship (U-15) and the All Japan Women’s Futsal Tournament.　

Fukui has an excellent facility called ‘Sundome Fukui’. We have hosted some futsal festivals there. The Futsal Committee has an ambition to make the ‘Sundome Fukui’ the home of Futsal, just like the ‘Koshien Stadium’ for High School Baseball and the ‘National Stadium’ for High School Football. We would like to do whatever we can now piece by piece in order to make the foundation firmer, and the futsal more well-acknowledged and popular, thinking of the future of Japan’s futsal.