The second phase of the JFA Elite Program U-13 women's began in Imabari on Friday 4 September. 23 players selected from clubs all over the nation assembled and started training at newly-opened JFA Academy Imabari.

The first day had a series of 20-minute scrimmages after working on fundamental passing and heading drills. The scrimmages were played between the three groups, two from the camp squad and the other consisted of JFA Academy Imabari players who are as old as the camp participants.

Although some level of fatigue were apparent in the players due to their long trip from their respective hometown to the camp site earlier on the same day, they mostly showed crisp performance.

In the meeting in the evening, they reviewed the topic “What is Elite ?” which was included in the Canon Girls Camp in May, the first phase of the program. The players looked deep into the questions such as “What is technique?” and “What is ball situation?”

On 5 September, another full set of training is scheduled for the young girls such as communications skills activities and other lectures in addition to two-a-day sessions on the pitch.

Assistant Coach Comment

NISHIMURA Yosuke, Assistant Coach (JFA National Training Centre Coach)

For the first day, we had a training match in the evening against Academy Imabari players. For the warm-up, we did body core training, which makes up the foundation of your physical movement, and we worked on passes and headers as technical drills.

Then the match against Academy Imabari had three 20-minute periods. We could confirm with coaching staff and players what we have improved such as how to get involved in both offence and defence, transition between those two ends of the game and quality of each play and also what we need to work on down the road.

The slogans of the Elite Program is “Observe, feel and act” and “Be aggressive without being afraid of making mistakes.” I want the 23 players who gathered here to follow these slogans and act on them individually and as a team during this three nights and four days training camp. We have two-a-day training scheduled starting from the second day, so all of the players and us coaching staff will do our best.

Players' Comments

ISHIDA Kokona (Mashiki Renaissance Kumamoto FC Phoenix)
My goals in this camp are taking a leadership role and actively keep challenging both on and off the pitch. In the last camp, I couldn’t speak up my opinion actively. So I could learn from other players’ plays, but I couldn’t showcase my own plays.

Until the time this camp started, I kept practising with my own club with the reflection of the last camp. This time I keep playing for three days to achieve my goals, and I want to work hard, being proud of representing my club here.

MATSUBARA Sera (JFA Academy Fukushima)
In this Elite Program, I want to keep working hard especially on not being afraid of making mistakes and on being active both offensively and defensively. Rather than getting hesitated by being afraid of making mistakes, I want to play aggressively even if I end up making a mistake.

In order to be active offensively and defensively, it’s important to keep being at good positions. So I need to pay attention to meals and rest that I take as well. At first, I didn’t have many friends and couldn’t communicate much with others, but after training got started, I started taking to them and getting talked by them.

So I could communicate with them a lot. I will keep working hard tomorrow and the rest of the days to make this a fun and meaningful camp.

ABE Ayane (Albirex Niigata Ladies U-15)
When I came out to this Elite Program, my goals were showing my strength on the pitch and winning the first place in anything off the pitch. Today we had a match. I tried to show my strong defence, which is my strength.

I think I was able to take many balls away from the opponents. But there were some situations where I got the ball but I couldn’t connect it to my teammate. So from tomorrow, I want to keep training to improve that.

Schedule