The 13th All Japan Women's futsal tournament is scheduled to start in Sapporo City, Hokkaido on Friday 28 October. ITO Masanori, a newly appointed coach of Japan Women’s Futsal National Team since March this year, talked about the attractiveness of Women’s futsal and key women’s futsal players to watch for the upcoming tournament.

――Please tell us about your impression on Women’s futsal, I suppose this is first time for you to get involved in.

ITO　A lot of smile in the players’ face, that’s the impression I had during my visit. In the beginning, I thought they are not that passionate enough for winning a game but I realized they are just having fun for playing futsal. Of course some men’s futsal players and teams with smiling face but they rather look serious contrary to Women. Women players really like futsal and it looks fresh to me. I would say that’s one thing what makes women’s futsal appealing.

――Do you want them to play like that, fun-to-play, in Japan National Team as well?

ITO　Speaking from my experience, I try not to forget about idea of “playing fun” when I do coaching. I think playing fun is something entitled to a player, you cannot take that out from them. But actually I give them a hard training once in a while to tell the truth (laugh). 

――What are characteristics when it comes to their play style?

ITO　They have a very high skill. Physically much inferior to a male player but they have almost same level of technical skill. I was surprised at their skill and I realized and reminded me of that’s distinctive strength of Japanese players.

――Tell us about current activities you are working on.

ITO　I go and visit every team in the regions in Japan to say hello and look for a good player for upcoming world championship in December. We will have AFC Women's Futsal Championship next year and I am going to pick up players who can clinch the Asian Queen’s title.

――The 13th All Japan Women's futsal tournament is scheduled to start on 28 October.

ITO　This is quite a big event for Women’s futsal and I look forward to watching the event because I am going to pick up players based on what I watch in this event. I believe up and outperforming player is a key to successful result in the tournament. I really hope a sort of “lucky lady” player come out on the stage of this event. Sometimes the tournament shed light on unknown teams and less- known players appear out of nowhere and make a splash. This is not a rare case to pick the player who showed good performance in Japan national championship and consequently selected as first Japan international cap. Let’s watch who will be the one like that.

――What are keys to win through short-term tournament?

ITO　It is important to understand what a futsal is all about. Absolutely they need to understand how to win and how to express on the pitch. This tournament gives them chance to show how much futsal intelligence they have, and it all comes down to it. At the same time, a mistake seemingly small and easily dismissed in regular season sometimes results in the shift in the whole course of the match. As only one team in the group can make it to the tournament, there will be a plenty of thrilling games, I really look forward to it. I would expect the futsal players show good play to catch attention of spectators.

13th All Japan Women's Futsal Tournament

2016-10-28(Fri.)～30(Sun.)
Hokkaido Prefectural Sports Center

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