The Vermont Cup 25th All Japan U-12 Futsal Tournament went into the second day on 14 August and had each team play the last match of the group stage. The results determined the 16 teams to advance to the final round, who also played the round of 16 on the same day. Consequently the list got shortened to only eight teams.

Among all 48 participating teams, only top teams from each group and best four teams among second-placed teams, two each from two different match venues, made up the 16 teams advancing to the final round. The battles for the next round turned out to be very competitive.

In Group H, Aomori FC U-12 (Aomori) with six points after two games took on Dioluce Takamatsu FC (Kagawa) with four points. The Aomori side scored four goals in the first eight minutes, including ODAGIRI Takashi’s hat trick in the first four minutes. Later on Dioluce from Kagawa tried to came back, led by SASAKI Kota’s goal, but Aomori FC held on to the lead they made in the first half and got out of the first round atop with 4-3 win.

Group J had two clubs tied with six points go head to head in the final match. Both of Malva Ibaraki fc U-12 (Ibaraki) and Solnino (Saga) did not give up to their opponents and finished the match with 2-2 draw. As the result of both earning one point, Malva Ibaraki fc U-12 went on to the next round atop on goal difference while Solnino took the wildcard spot to survive out of the group stage as well.

The champions of three years ago FC Tucano (Tokyo) in Group L faced FC Re:Star (Gifu). FC Re:Star’s SAITO Yota showed his tremendous scoring ability to achieve double hat trick, six goals, and led his side to 8-4 win, bun the Gifu side just fell short to advance to the final round on goal difference.

From the round of 16 until the end, every match is “win or go home”, which makes the sense of urgency increase even further. In Ota General Gymnasium, Cerezo Osaka U-12 (Osaka) collided with Club F.Three who barely clinched their final round spot with a wild card.

Cerezo’s SHIMOKAWA Haruki, who scored in every match in the group stage but never scored multiple goals in one, this time scored hat trick to help his side move on to the final eight with 4-1 win. Shimokawa promised to earn more goals tomorrow 16 August, saying “My role is to score goals. Scoring three gave me more confidence. I want to keep scoring down the road.”

At Komazawa Olympic Park Gymnasium, another wild card holder Brincar FC (Aichi) took on Pivo (Shizuoka). Despite being listed as a title favourite, Brincar could not play to their potential on the first day. On this day, however, their offence exploded to score 10 goals, including TSUBOTANI Syu’s five goals and OKUNO Shintaro’s three, and they grabbed 10-2 win to advance to the next match.

Brincar will match up against Malva Ibaraki fc U-12 in the quarter-final, which must be one of the most exciting fixtures of the round. Other teams in the final eight are Malva Chiba fc U-12 (Chiba), FC Unzen Estieall (Nagasaki), Tomozo SC (Tochigi), FC Valentia (Wakayama), and Kurosawajirihigashi FC (Iwate). The last day of the tournament will finally see the champions in this generation’s futsal.

Coach and Players' Comments

DOI Shohei, Coach (Oshu Hiroshima F Do Junior)
This year I came to this tournament for the first time as a coach, and this experience convinced me that it is very difficult to win through a national tournament. There are no easy matches and even small mistakes of ours allowed the opponents to beat us. Our top team is an associate member club of F.League, so we wanted to leave a good result.

But there was a unique atmosphere here and it was difficult. Our result turned out to be unsatisfactory as a representative from Hiroshima. So if we get another chance next year, we will make sure to take advantage of this year’s experience, both our losses and the preparation phase, and advance out of the first round, which has always been the dead end for Hiroshima teams. 

UCHINO Yusuke, Coach (FC Tucano)
There were some aspects where we could show what we had worked on, and there were other aspects where our opponents were even better than us. It’s up to our players whether they come back from this bitter experience and take advantage of it.

That’s what experiencing a big tournament like this is all about. So it’s disappointing to lose, but I want them to utilise this for future improvements and I want to help them do it. We all are disappointed including myself, but this is not the end of their futsal and football career, so I want them to come back up from this.

TAKAHASHI Naoki (Cerezo Osaka U-12)
They were the type of opponents who tend to kick it forward, so I tried to intercept their vertical passes and feed it to my teammates up front. It was good that (SHIMOKAWA) Haruki scored from our good defence. Haruki is in the same grade as I, even though I am much shorter than he. (Laughing) I had played for Malva Ibaraki until last year.

There are some players on Malva Chiba team who I played together at Malva’s training centre, and there are also coaches who coached me for many years. So I’m looking forward to tomorrow’s match up. It has been my goal in this tournament to play against Malva. I really want to win against such a good team, but most of all I want to enjoy playing.

MATSUBARA Arihiro, Coach (Club F.Three)
We have tried nine times, and this year finally we came to the national tournament for the first time. The level of teams in Niigata is going higher and higher. As even surviving through the qualifiers is difficult, we really wanted to get to Komazawa as the Niigata representative. But we fell one win short.

I realised our play style can match up well against teams here, but at the same time we couldn’t score when matches became very close. So I want to develop this team to be able to score in those situations. We take advantage of this experience and work hard to be the Niigata representative again.

JFA-TV (Japanese version Only)

Day 2 round 16 Highlight (8/15) in Komaba Olympic Park Gymnasium

Day 2 round 16 Highlight (8/15) in Ota-City General Gymnasium

Vermont Cup All Japan U-12 Futsal Championship

Fri. 14 August - Sun. 16 August
Tokyo/Komazawa Olympic Park Gymnasium、Ota-City General Gymnasium
Match information

Live Broadcast Schedueles
Sun. 16 August 14:30 kick-off (scheduled)
More information (Japanese version only)