The 11th Sec. of the Prince Takamado Trophy JFA U-18 Football Premier League 2019 EAST took place at various locations on Saturday 24 and Sunday 15 August. Kashiwa Reysol U-18 (Chiba) and Shimizu S-Pulse Youth (Shizuoka) clashed at Sankyo Frontier Kashiwa Stadium, where they showcased a heated battle that ended in a 1-1 draw to share a point apiece.

Pick-up Match

Kashiwa Reysol U-18 1-1 (0-1, 1-0) Shimizu S-Pulse Youth

On this day, in a match played prior to this fixture, the undefeated streak of the league leader Aomori Yamada High School came to an end when they suffered a loss to Jubilo Iwata U-18. This result left a great opportunity for the second place Kashiwa and third place Shimizu to close the gap in the leader board, especially for Shimizu, who were 11 points behind the top place, as their midfielder IGARASHI Kaito (#10) shared his aspiration ahead of the match, “we are committed to win all the remaining matches.”

It was the Shimizu side who showed more intensity in the early minutes to take the initiative of the match. They applied aggressive pressure from the frontline to give no room for Kashiwa to build-up their plays, as Kashiwa’s coach YAMANAKA Shin later mentioned, “we couldn’t do anything against them.” Through their aggressive approach, Shimizu managed to score the opening goal in the 27th minute. The goal came from a corner kick delivered by NARUOKA Hikaru (#12), where CHIBA Kanta (#30) headed the ball into the mix to allow NORIEGA Erick (#4) to head the ball into the net.

Following the opening goal, Shimizu continued to showcase their dominance to threaten the opposing goal, but led by their goalkeeper SASAKI Masato (#16), the Kashiwa defence displayed a persistent effort to limit the damage to the minimum before entering halftime, as Shimizu’s coach HIRAOKA Hiroaki later reflected, “the fact that we couldn’t score our second and third goal in the first half had a huge impact on the outcome.”

The second half continued to see Shimizu take control of the match, but Kashiwa made the necessary adjustments to limit the opponent’s opportunities to take shots. With the match entering a deadlock, coach Yamanaka made the decision to take the risk and utilise his substitutions to add more layers to his offence.

Kashiwa’s long-awaited moment came during additional time of the second half, when TAMURA Soki (#14) was fouled inside the penalty area to earn a penalty kick. The spot kick was calmly converted by the game captain, OKUDA Hiryu (#9), as Kashiwa secured a point in the final play of this highly anticipated match.

Coaches and Players' Comments

YAMANAKA Shin, Coach (Kashiwa Reysol U-18)
We had to endure a tough 90 minutes today. In terms of the overall performance, I feel like we had completely lost the match. We weren’t able to build-up our plays with confidence and made too many easy mistakes. The fact that I wasn’t able to provide the players with more ideas had a huge impact on this result. However, despite the quality of our performance, the players did not give up and fought tenaciously until the end to earn this point.

FW #9 OKUDA Hiryu (Kashiwa Reysol U-18)
After learning that Aomori Yamada High School had lost their match, we really wanted to close down the gap by winning today’s match. It felt like this was our only opportunity to catch up. (Regarding the equalising penalty kick) Tamura did a great job to earn that penalty. Although there were plenty of pressure, I struck the ball with a strong intention to contribute for the team as the game captain.

HIRAOKA Hiroaki, Coach (Shimizu S-Pulse Youth)
This is a result of us not capitalising on our opportunities. Our inability to convert our chances was the biggest issue today. Of course, we must give credit to Kashiwa’s goalkeeper, but we lacked quality to score goals from the flow of the game and it made us realise that we must be more detail oriented.

MF #10 IGARASHI Kaito (Shimizu S-Pulse Youth)
We were told during halftime that we were playing our best match of the season, and we felt like we were showcasing a good performance. We knew how Kashiwa was going to play and we managed to make the necessary adjustments against them. However, we ended up with a draw. Our inability to score goals was exposed in the first half, and we feel like this has become a bad habit for us this season, so we must improve on our performance to fix this issue.

Results of other matches

Omiya Ardija U18 0-0 (0-0, 0-0) Funabashi Municipal High School
Jubilo Iwata U-18 3-2 (0-2, 3-0) Aomori Yamada High School
Shoshi High School 1-1 (0-1, 1-0) Ryutsu Keizai University Kashiwa High School
Urawa Red Diamonds Youth 0-0 (0-0, 0-0) Kashima Antlers Youth

Despite giving up a two goal lead to the league leader Aomori Yamada High School (Aomori), Jubilo Iwata U-18 (Shizuoka) managed to score three goals in the second half to earn a come from behind victory. Shoshi High School (Fukushima) and Ryutsu Keizai University Kashiwa High School (Chiba) scored a goal apiece to share a point. The fixtures between Omiya Ardija U18 (Saitama) and Funabashi Municipal High School (Chiba), Urawa Red Diamonds Youth (Saitama) and Kashima Antlers Youth (Ibaraki), both ended in a scoreless draw to share a point apiece.

Prince Takamado Trophy JFA U-18 Football Premier League 2019

League Duration: Sat. 6 April - Sun. 8 December 2019

League Information