The third day of the 2nd All Japan Youth (U-18) Futsal Tournament on Saturday 22 August saw six matches - the quarterfinals and the semi-finals. Out of these competitive games, Hokkaido Kushiro Hokuyo High School (Hokkaido 3/Hokkaido) and Sakuyo High School (Chugoku/Okayama) became the finalists.

In the final round, the games were fiercely contested. The first match of the quarterfinals held at the Xebio Arena was an exciting see-saw game. IWAHASHI Naoki from Espaco U-18 (Tokai/Shizuoka) struck the opener against FC Seiwa Gakuen (Tohoku 1/Miyagi) , who were the previous champions.

After 18 minutes, however, Iwahashi handled the ball in the penalty area to prevent the opponent’s goal-scoring opportunity, and was sent off.

Although the game was levelled through the ensuing penalty kick, Espaco U-18 won the game in the end 6-5 with a hat trick from Ichikawa Sora, and they got through to the semi-final.

In the second game of the quarterfinals, Hokkaido Kushiro Hokuyo took the initiative against Teikyo Nagaoka High School (Hokushinetsu/Niigata) , winning the game 4-3.

In the semi-final, Hokkaido Kushiro Hokuyo, who had scored 15 goals in total, did not let Ichikawa Sora of Espaco U-18 score any goals at all, and won the match 5-2.

As ITO Keita later commented: “although we were tired, the opponent was more exhausted after their game against Seiwa Gakuen”, the team showed off their physical prowess and their strength in depth to get through to the final.

At the Sendai City Gymnasium, Sakuyo won a high-scoring game in the end 10-4 against Kumiyama High School (Kansai 1/Kyoto) . Pstc Londrina U-18（Kanto１/Kanagawa) , the development team of Shonan Bellmare from the F League, on the other hand, beat Sapporo Otani High School (Hokkaido 2/Hokkaido)  3-2, becoming the last semi-finalists.

In the semi-final, although Sakuyo let Londrina strike the opener, they levelled the game through an own goal in the sixth minute, and scored three goals in total in the first half.

Sakuyo continued taking the initiative, but Londrina attacked back and struck three goals towards the end of the game. Sakuyo held on to their lead and managed to win the game 6-5 to book a place in the final.

The third-place playoff will be between Espaco U-18 and Londrina, and the final will be between Kushiro Hokuyo and Sakuyo, which will kick-off at 13:30 on Sunday 23 August.

Coach and Players' Comments

ITO Keita (Hokkaido Kushiro Hokuyo)
We took the initiative from the beginning of the match, and kept possession. It was good that I could score a goal and I’m over the moon that we got to the final. We were confident we could defend against Ichikawa Sora.

We didn’t have a specific strategy, but just defend systematically as a team to get this result. Although we didn’t expect to be able to come this far, now that we’re in the final, we’d like to win one more game. I know we haven’t got a single chance of beating Sakuyo in football, but I bet there is some hope in futsal. So we’ll do our best.

KOBAYASHI Takumu (Teikyo Nagaoka)
We didn’t have enough strength. I couldn’t move enough due to the consecutive matches. I think we focused on tomorrow’s game rather than today’s. If we don’t focus on the coming match, this is the result we get. I think we learned a good lesson. I’d like to play each match well from now on.

I couldn’t move my legs well in yesterday’s game and let the opponent take shots. If we had built a good atmosphere in the first half, we could have moved the ball around better, just like we did in the second half. We didn’t play well in the first half either, when we lost in the Inter-high school championships. I’d like to be able to play better in the first half.

HANDA Yoshihide, Coach (FC Seiwa Gakuen)
I believe we showed Seiwa’s best by pressing Espaco with each player’s strength. So I’d like to give credit to each player. The reason we lost our two-goal lead and let the opponent turn the game around was our weakness. We’d like to work on it.

After the opponent closed the gap to one-goal, we pressed forward more and more, even though we were still leading. If we had stayed calmer to control the game, the result might have been different. I hope the players will learn from this frustration for their future in both football and futsal.

JFA-TV (Japanese Version Only)

Quarterfinals

Semi-finals

The 2nd All Japan Youth (U-18) Futsal Tournament

Thu. 20 August – Sun. 23 August 2015
XEBIO ARENA SENDAI, Sendai City Gymnasium / Miyagi
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