The Prince Takamado Trophy U-18 Football League will restart its season on Sunday 29 June. The EAST division will have five Week 6 matches on that day.

Leading the league with their 5-0 record, Shimizu S-Pulse Youth (Shizuoka) will take on Ryutsu Keizai University Kashiwa High School (Chiba) at home. Since Shimizu experienced a blowout loss of 0-7 against RKU Kashiwa last season, they have been waiting for an opportunity of revenge for a year. Mizutani Takuma says “I want to win and I want to forget the nightmare.” Meanwhile RKU Kashiwa played an Inter-High School Championship’s Chiba qualifier during the break and lost in the semi-final to Narashino High School, which ended RKU Kashiwa’s 11-year streak of appearing in the national championship. It remains to be seen whether they can come back from the loss in time for the restart of the season. 

Kashima Antlers Youth (Ibaraki) and Consadole Sapporo U-18 (Hokkaido) both finished the first half of the season with a loss. They will play against each other both looking for a spark to move up in the standings. Kashima needs to “close out a match” as they lost multiple goals late in the last match. Sapporo, having allowed the league-worst 16 goals so far, must “start off both halves” well to seize the momentum.

Tokyo Verdy Youth (Tokyo) and Kashiwa Reysol U-18 (Chiba) will play go head to head. Although Mikasa Kento of Tokyo Verdy says “this year’s team is different from last years in our ability to move around the ball”, Kashiwa is also very keen on possessing the ball in recent matches. Persistency will be a key for both clubs to win another three points.

Ichiritsu Funabashi High School will look to win three league matches in a row when they play against Mitsubishi Yowa SC Youth (Tokyo). Ichiritsu Funabashi maintains their winning momentum during the break by clinching a spot in the Inter-High School National Championship during this break. Meanwhile Mitsubishi Yowa want to improve their defence as they have lost eight goals in the last two matches. Their head coach, Yamamoto Nobuo, says “first of all we have to finish a match without any goals allowed” and the team look to follow the coach’s instruction to gain more points. 

Pick-up match of EAST Week 6
Aomori Yamada High School vs JFA Academy Fukushima

For both Aomori Yamada High School (Aomori) now placed at 6th in the standings and JFA Academy Fukushima (Fukushima) at 10th, the next match will be very important as both look to move up in the standings. Aomori Yamada got the first win of the season in the last match by defeating Sapporo 5-1. Although Kuroda Tsuyoshi, head coach, still warns the team by saying "We are not good at closing matches out yet", the win certainly was a big step forward to their goal of completing the team development by autumn. Meanwhile Academy Fukushima's record has two draws and three losses and still lacks a win. This season they have neither scored more than one goal in a single match nor held the opponent scoreless. Their head coach Nakata Yasuto says "We have so many new players since the last season. We expected to struggle early in the season", but they also want to start turning it around now. Getting out of the bottom of the standings will be within their reach once they win the first match after the break.

■Aomori Yamada High School vs JFA Academy Fukushima
Date and Time:Sunday 29 June Kick-off at 13:00
Venue: Aomori Yamada High School Field
Access:7-minute walk from “SANWADO Chuo” city bus stop, 20-minute ride from Aomori Airport or Shin-Aomori Station, 5-minute ride from Aomori Chuo IC