F.C. Tokyo

For volleyball club, see F.C. Tokyo (volleyball).

F.C. Tokyo
FC東京

logo
Full name	Football Club Tokyo
Founded	1999 (1999) as F.C. Tokyo 1935 as Tokyo Gas F.C.
Ground	Ajinomoto Stadium Chōfu, Tokyo
Ground Capacity	49,970
Chairman	Naoki Ogane
Manager	Massimo Ficcadenti
League	J. League Division 1
2015	J. League Division 1, 6th
Website	Club home page
Home colours Away colours

F.C. Tokyo (FC東京, Efushī Tōkyō) is a Japanese association football club playing in J. League Division 1. Its hometown is Tokyo prefecture. The team is one of only four in the J. League to be simply called Football Club without an extended name.

History

File:TokyoGasFC.png

Tokyo Gas F.C.

The team started as a company team, Tokyo Gas Football Club (東京ガスFC) Their first appearance in the national leagues was in 1991, the last season of the old Japan Soccer League. With addition of the Brazilian football player Amaral and the manager Kiyoshi Okuma at the helm, the team gradually became competitive and in 1997, the team finished second, winning the JFL championship the next year. However, at the time the team lacked the necessary qualifications for a promotion to the J1 league and so stayed in J2.

Following this, on October 1, 1998, companies like Tokyo Gas, TEPCO, ampm, TV Tokyo, and Culture Convenience Club, set up a joint company Tokyo Football Club Company with the aim of making the team eligible for joining the J. League. In 1999, the same year the team became eligible, they finished second in the J2 league and were automatically promoted to J1 beginning in the 2000 season. Despite a widespread belief that the team would barely win enough to stay in the J1, the team won four games in a row since its opening game and managed to finish at the 7th spot.

Tokyo Dorompa, the club's mascot

Helped by its winning record, the attendance shot up and it is still above that of well-known Tokyo Verdy 1969 that moved its home town from Kawasaki, Kanagawa in 2001. Since 2002, the team welcomed Hiromi Hara as its manager and aimed for a championship with a strong offense. The 2003 season had the team finish in 4th, its highest ever. In August of the same year, it held a friendly match against one of the greatest football clubs, Real Madrid losing 3–0 but gaining valuable experiences both on and off the field for what it takes to be a great football club.

Long-time leader Amaral, nicknamed The King of Tokyo by his fans, departed the team to join Shonan Bellmare in 2004. He was replaced by Athens Olympics national football team player Yasuyuki Konno from Consadole Sapporo. In November of the same year, it won the J. League Yamazaki Nabisco Cup for its first major title since joining the J. League.

After 10 years of participation in the J. League without a mascot character, the team adopted Tokyo Dorompa, a tanuki-like figure, as its mascot in January, 2009.

On December 4, 2010 FC Tokyo had to win their final game of the season away to already relegated Kyoto Sanga FC. FC Tokyo lost 2-0 and went back down to the second tier for the first time in 11 years. Nevertheless, they bounced back at the first attempt, winning the J2 title in November 2011.

Before their 2011 Emperor's Cup win, FC Tokyo reached the semifinals of the competition three times: in 1997 (as Tokyo Gas), 2008, and 2010. Their 2011 win was remarkable in that the club was a second division team during the season. They became the first J2 champions, and third second-tier champions overall (after NKK S.C. in 1981 and Júbilo Iwata in 1982), to accomplish the feat.

Stadium

Main article: Ajinomoto Stadium

F.C. Tokyo uses Ajinomoto Stadium as its home ground (the official name of this stadium is Tokyo Stadium). For a long time it did not have a home stadium of its own and played at various football fields such as the National Yoyogi Stadium, the National Nishigaoka Football Field, Edogawa Special Ward Stadium, and the Komazawa Olympic Park Stadium, but in 2001 it finally found a permanent home. Club's training grounds are Sarue Ground in Koto, Tokyo and Kodaira Ground in Kodaira, Tokyo.

Players

Current squad

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Position Player 2 DF Yuhei Tokunaga 3 DF Masato Morishige (captain) 4 MF Hideto Takahashi 5 DF Yuichi Maruyama 6 DF Kosuke Ota 7 MF Takuji Yonemoto 8 MF Hirotaka Mita 9 FW Sota Hirayama 10 MF Yohei Kajiyama 13 GK Tatsuya Enomoto 16 FW Nathan Burns 17 MF Hiroki Kawano 18 MF Naohiro Ishikawa 19 MF Tasuka Hiraoka 20 FW Ryoichi Maeda

No. Position Player 21 FW Francisco Sandaza 22 MF Naotake Hanyu 23 FW Yohei Hayashi 24 DF Wataru Sasaki 25 DF Ryota Ogawa 27 MF Sotan Tanabe 28 MF Shuto Kono 29 DF Kazunori Yoshimoto 31 GK Kentaro Kakoi 33 MF Tatsuki Nara 34 MF Hideyuki Nozawa 37 MF Kento Hashimoto 38 MF Keigo Higashi 39 MF Shoya Nakajima 46 GK Vlada Avramov 50 DF Riku Matsuda MF Yoo In-Soo MF Ha Dae-Sung

Out on loan

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Position Player GK Ryotaro Hironaga (at Kataller Toyama)

International Players

Japan Yoichi Doi Takashi Fukunishi Shuichi Gonda Naotake Hanyu Sota Hirayama Naohiro Ishikawa Akira Kaji Yasuyuki Konno Wagner Lopes Teruyuki Moniwa Yuto Nagatomo Masashi Oguro Yuhei Tokunaga Takuji Yonemoto

AFC/CAF/OFC Jade North Nathan Burns Jang Hyun-soo Kim Young-Gwon Kwak Hee-Ju Oh Jang-eun Seo Yong-duk Lassad Nouioui

UEFA Michele Canini Nemanja Vučićević

CONCACAF Paulo Wanchope

CONMEBOL Almir Amaral Bruno Quadros Edmilson Cabore Danilo Gomes Edu Emerson Evaldo Jean Júlio Kelly Lucas Marcelo Mattos Matheus Oliveira Pedro Júnior Ricardinho Roberto César Rychely Sandro Tuto Washington Santiago Salcedo

World Cup players

World Cup 2006

• Paulo Wanchope
• Yoichi Doi
• Teruyuki Moniwa

World Cup 2010

• Yasuyuki Konno
• Yuto Nagatomo

World Cup 2014

• Shuichi Gonda
• Masato Morishige

Managers

Manager	Nat.	Tenure
Kiyoshi Okuma	Japan	Jan 1, 1995–Dec 31, 2001
Tahseen Jabbary	Netherlands	1998
Hiromi Hara	Japan	Jan 1, 2002–Dec 19, 2005
Alexandre Gallo	Brazil	Dec 20, 2005–Aug 14, 2006
Hisao Kuramata	Japan	Aug 15, 2006–Dec 6, 2006
Hiromi Hara	Japan	Dec 7, 2006–Dec 31, 2007
Hiroshi Jofuku	Japan	Jan 1, 2008–Sept 19, 2010
Kiyoshi Okuma	Japan	Sept 20, 2010–Jan 2, 2011
Ranko Popović	Serbia	Jan 2, 2012–Dec 31, 2013
Massimo Ficcadenti	Italy	Jan 2, 2014–present

Record as J. League member

Season	Div.	Tms.	Pos.	Attendance/G	J. League Cup	Emperor's Cup	Asia
1999	J2	10	2	3,498	Semi-final	4th Round	-	-
2000	J1	16	7	11,807	2nd Round	3rd Round	-	-
2001	J1	16	8	22,313	2nd Round	3rd Round	-	-
2002	J1	16	9	22,173	Quarter-final	3rd Round	-	-
2003	J1	16	4	24,932	Quarter-final	4th Round	-	-
2004	J1	16	8	25,438	Winner	Quarter-final	-	-
2005	J1	18	10	27,101	Group Stage	5th Round	-	-
2006	J1	18	13	24,096	Group Stage	5th Round	-	-
2007	J1	18	12	25,290	Group Stage	Quarter-final	-	-
2008	J1	18	6	25,716	Quarter-final	Semi-final	-	-
2009	J1	18	5	25,884	Winner	4th Round	-	-
2010	J1	18	16	25,112	Quarter-final	Semi-final	-	-
2011	J2	20	1	17,562	-	Winner	-	-
2012	J1	18	10	23,955	Semi-final	2nd Round	CL	Round of 16
2013	J1	18	8	25,073	Group Stage	Semi-final	-	-
2014	J1	18	9	25,187	Group Stage	Round of 16	-	-
2015	J1	18	4	28,784	Quarter-final		-	-

Key

• Tms. = Number of teams
• Pos. = Position in league
• Attendance/G = Average league attendance

Honours

• Regional Promotion Series (as Tokyo Gas Football Club)
  • Winners (1) : 1990
• (Old) Japan Football League (as Tokyo Gas Football Club)
  • Winners (1) : 1998
• J. League Cup
  • Winners (2) : 2004, 2009
• Suruga Bank Championship
  • Winners (1) : 2010
• J.League Division 2
  • Winners (1) : 2011
• Emperor's Cup
  • Winners (1) : 2011

See also

• F.C. Tokyo (volleyball)

External links

• (English) F.C. Tokyo Official Site
• (Japanese) F.C. Tokyo Official Site