PLAYER SUPPORTERS

At Iwaki FC home games this season, we will be implementing a system called “Pre-Support” to solicit support for players for each game. The support amount will be used for the players themselves and their team training costs. Thank you for all your support this season!

MATCH PREVIEW

2024 Meiji Yasuda J2 League Round 36. Iwaki FC will host Mito HolyHock at Hawaiians Stadium Iwaki on Saturday, October 26th. Let’s explain the highlights of this match.

Points & Reviews

This season’s opponent, Mito HolyHock, is a club whose hometowns include Mito City, Hitachi City, and Hitachinaka City, Ibaraki Prefecture. The club’s name, “Holyhock”, means “hollyhock” and is taken from the family crest of the Mito Tokugawa family (Mito domain).

The origin of the club is “Football Club Mito”, which was founded in 1994. In 1997, the company merged with Prima Ham Football Club Tsuchiura, a corporate team from Prima Ham Tsuchiura Factory based in Tsuchiura City, to establish Football Club Mito Holyhock Co., Ltd. The current team will participate in the former JFL.

After that, the team applied to join J2, which started in 1999, but was postponed and joined the Japan Football League (JFL). He finished third in the 1999 season and entered J2 in 2000. Since then, they have continued to compete in J2 without ever being promoted or relegated.

The 2023 season started with a draw in the first three games. Although they finally got their first win in round 7, they lost three consecutive games from round 16 to 18, and were unable to increase their winning points as expected. After that, he recovered in 10 games without losing, including 6 consecutive draws, but lost in the final stages, finishing in 17th place with 11 wins, 14 draws, and 17 losses.

A painful loss on the way to reaching the playoffs.

J2 Round 35 on October 20th will be a 6-point match between 8th place with 51 points and 6th place with 55 points. Iwaki FC entered an away field and faced Fagiano Okayama.

DF Hitoshi Ikoma returned for the first time in about two months and joined the center of the back three, while FW Naoki Kumada entered the starting lineup. FW Umina Tanimura and Kotaro Arima in the shadows. Midfielder Sosuke Shibata and Daiki Yamaguchi formed a double midfielder, and Iwaki formed a flank lineup with Masaki Igarashi on the right and Yuto Yamashita on the left. The match was a 3-4-2-1 mirror game.

Okayama gained the upper hand by pressing intensely from the start. Iwaki were forced into their own half due to competitive play and were given away a series of set plays. In the 14th minute, a loose ball from a CK from the left side was kicked into Okayama FW Hiroto Iwabuchi, giving Okayama the lead.

Furthermore, in the 21st minute, Okayama scored a direct free kick. GK Kotaro Tachikawa made a good save, but the loose ball was pushed again by Iwabuchi, giving up his second goal. Iwabuchi, who transferred from Iwaki to Okayama this season, scored a career-high 11th goal. He proved against his old club that the scoring sense he had cultivated during his four years at Iwaki was genuine.

“Rather than thinking about the opponent, we want to reevaluate our strengths” Coach Yuzo Tamura

“In the match against Okayama, we weren’t able to do what we should have done. We didn’t play well including lowering the ball, poor angles of play, poor quality of support, and a fluttering of the back three.

Of course, there was a partner involved. Mr. Okayama was not able to do what he wanted to do because he had taken thorough measures, but we have to accept the reality. I try to do it, but it doesn’t connect well. Is it mental, condition, or tactics? I want to think about it from various directions and make corrections.

This match will be a mirror game, but Mito will change his form during the build-up, so we need to respond accordingly. However, we don’t want to think too deeply about our opponent and want to pursue our own style of play once again. Although Mito is lower in the ranking, he is aggressive and can switch between offense and defense quickly. But that is also our strength. We will reevaluate our strengths and express once again the style of play that we have been working on so far. We will continue to fight as hard as we have in the past so that we can get three points in front of our home audience.”

MATCH INFORMATION

The 2024 Meiji Yasuda J2 League Round 36 match against Mito Holyhock will kick off at Hawaiians Stadium Iwaki on Saturday, October 26th at 1:50 p.m. The match will be streamed live on DAZN.

Participate in the lottery by checking in at the J.League official app “Club J.LEAGUE” stadium!

You can participate in the lottery by registering Iwaki FC as your favorite club on Club J.LEAGUE and checking in to watch the game at the stadium.

Download Club J.LEAGUE

Exclusive to fan club members! Record your attendance and receive a sticker signed by the player!

If you record your attendance at the fan club booth, everyone will receive a random player-signed sticker!

Things to note:

・One bonus per game.

・Please have your membership card or member QR code ready.

・This is different from QR authentication at the entrance gate, ticket purchase, and stadium check-in through the check-in campaign.