Pick-up Match

Ryutsukeizaidai Kashiwa High School   1-3 (0-1, 1-2)   JFA Academy Fukushima

Prince Takamado Trophy U-18 Premier League EAST had its 13th matchday on Saturday 5 and Sunday 6 September as JFA  Academy Fukushima (Shizuoka), who have slumped for the bottom place, beat placed Ryutsukeizaidai Kashiwa High School (Chiba) 3-1 in a square-off of the relegation battle.

Academy Fukushima picked up their pace early on. In the 9th minute, captain MAKINO Jun scored the opening goal through a right corner kick. Ryutsukeizaidai Kashiwa aggressively replaced players in the first half but struggled to create openings. Even so, in the early second half, forward KANETA Atomu tapped in an equaliser in a goalmouth scramble.

On the other hand, Academy Fukushima broke through the right flank in the 56th minute. After receiving a pass from midfielder TANIGUCHI Shoto, defender MIYAMOTO Eiji cut into the centre and fired a left-footed shot for his team's go-ahead goal. Ryutsukeizaidai Kashiwa defender HONMURA Takeaki met a right corner kick in the 63rd minute, but his effort was blocked by the opponents. In the 65th minute, midfielder SHIMIZU Hayato made a right side attack and set up a goal, when Taniguchi turned around and blasted a shot into the net for decisive third goal.

Ryutsukeizaidai Kashiwa changed their formation more offensively in the later stage of the match. Yet midfielder HONDA Kenya's last-gasp effort from the edge of the box was saved by the opposing goalkeeper as the Chiba side were not able to grab a chance for a comeback before ending the match.

Academy Fukushima had been struggling as they had six straight losses from the season opening. Coach MANAKA Mikio said, "Each player tries out our game, positioning well and playing with passes to break through the opponents. But in spring, we ended up playing a game depending on how our opponents play.

Then, I said to them that we wouldn't put up a good result if we play depending on opponents when we don't have our style. And we have built up our style of football that we are aiming for." Manaka pointed out that their improvement was derived from their work – going back to the starting point.

There is only one point apart from Ryutsukeizaidai Kashiwa, who dropped to the bottom, to seventh placed Kashiwa Reysol U-18 (Chiba), which creates a sense of urgency in the relegation battle. On the next matchday, Ryutsukeizaidai Kashiwa and Kashiwa Reysol go head-to-head. As the season has five matches remaining, the relegation battle appears to be getting fiercer.

Coach and Players' Comments

MANAKA Mikio, Coach (JFA Academy Fukushima)
I acknowledge it is one of the relegation battle matches, but the most important thing for the players is to develop to one or two steps higher through this match. So before the match, I didn't give a talk like "We need to get points in this match." The players were showing their attitude to take on aggressive challenges during training, so I was hoping to get a good result, and they actually got it done.

TANIGUCHI Shoto (JFA Academy Fukushima)
We hadn’t won at all, so our goal was to play a game that helps us win the match. That's a big win. In the opening goal situation, I first tried to shoot at the far-side, but I found Miyamoto was unmarked and passed to him. I was thinking to take a lot of shots, and I actually did it without hesitation when I scored our team's third goal.

Because our coach was replaced and we had lots of injured players, we didn't have confidence as a team in the early stage of the season. But now we've got a real feeling we are moving forward to our goal.

KURISHIMA Kenta (Ryutsukeizaidai Kashiwa High School)
That's a match where we wanted to extend the lead in the table. We wanted to create our rhythm with defence. I think the early goal we conceded was the reason why we collapsed. On offence, we wanted to break through on sides, but struggled to do so, and our offence was not something collective enough and ended up in a one-off attack. Our work rate was also decreasing and we weren't able to outrun.

SUGAWARA Shunpei (Ryutsukeizaidai Kashiwa High School)
In the last match, we had some improvement on defence, but today it didn't work at all. I wasn't able to win the ball at my position, and we were outplayed by the opponents who went on attacks taking advantage of their speed. We will have matches against Chiba teams from now on. We will work hard to win them.

Other Matches

Aomori Yamada High School　2-1 (0-0, 2-1)　Ichiritsu Funabashi High School
Consadole Sapporo U-18　1-0 (0-0, 1-0)　Shimizu S-Pulse Youth
Kashima Antlers Youth　1-2 (1-1, 0-1)　Omiya Ardija Youth
F.C. Tokyo U-18　2-0 (2-0, 0-0)　Kashiwa Reysol U-18

Omiya Ardija Youth (Saitama) kept the top spot as they beat 3rd placed Kashima Antlers Youth (Ibaraki) in the title race battle.

2nd placed Aomori Yamada High School (Aomori) also edged 4th placed Ichiritsu Funabashi High School (Chiba) 2-1 and remained at the current place with points levelled with Omiya.

5th placed F.C. Tokyo U-18 (Tokyo) defeated Kashiwa Reysol U-18 with a brace by SATO Ryo, who is running away in the top scorer race. Sato extended the total number of goals to 14.

8th placed Consadole Sapporo U-18 (Hokkaido) saw off Shimizu S-Pulse Youth (Shizuoka) with a 1-0 win to expand the possibility of staying in the league. The late stage of the season appears to draw attention as both top places and lower places are scrambled.