2022 Regista Awards: J1 League

J1 League have still to decide their own champion, and we’re 48 hours away to know what’s going to happen. Even the relegation race is pretty much open! For the fourth year in a row (solidifying this tradition for our readers), J. League Regista assigned its awards. To do that, we summed up a small panel to pick the possible options, then saw the votes coming through polls by our readers and followers:

• @FRsoccerSam
• @GunnerTNB
• @BlogGamba
• @JSoccerMagazine

With Urawa Red Diamonds waiting until February 2023 if they’re going to be crowned continental champions (although without their manager: Ricardo Rodriguez has been let go by the end of this season), most of the verdicts will soon be established. For now, let’s just see how the whole season was judged by our readers.

Best Team | Sanfrecce Hiroshima (57,3%)

It’s incredible how things can change in one year. From the bleak ending of the stint with Hiroshi Jofuku, Sanfrecce started something new. We can’t hide the fact we forecasted Hiroshima to be involved in the relegation dogfight, looking behind their back all year long. Instead, from the first third of the season, it was clear how their 2022 would have looked a bit different.

The 3-4-2-1 stayed, but the interpreters are changing. Most of all, Hiroshima have done what other struggled to do: transitioning towards new heroes. 18 different players scored a goal. Yes, Kashiwa, Shibasaki, Hayashi, and Sasaki are all there, but there are new players coming through and more resources to be exploited. Even Gakuto Notsuda – coming back from a loan to Ventforet Kofu – became the Xabi Alonso of the Purple Arch.

Flop Team | Vissel Kobe (56,2%)

It’s nothing new. 2021 became a testament to the work done by Atsuhiro Miura, who was then thrown away with the belief that more could have been done. In the end, it was a mirage. Yes, Takayuki Yoshida saved the club from relegation – and he did it with four games to go –, but that was not the target hoped. Kobe wanted to retain their ACL spot, and instead found themselves in turbulent waters.

Take their average position over the 2022 season: Kobe spent 25 matchdays in the relegation zone, 26 if you count once as the 16-placed team. They deserved to go down at a certain point, but their firepower was too important to let that happen. Yuya Osako and Yuki Kobayashi were probably their MVPs, and they’ll have to rethink everything from scratch if they want to come back to the ACL.

MVP | Akihiro Ienaga, Kawasaki Frontale (54,5%)

The MVP Award stayed with Kawasaki Frontale, who are still in the run to win their third title in a row and the fifth in six years. If they’ve become a dynasty, credit goes as well to Akihiro Ienaga, who’s 36 and he’s still playing at a high level. It’s incredible how evolved into this fine player, although the class was always there from 15 years ago. We wrote a piece about the “Godwinger” in April 2021: you can read it here.

Best Goalkeeper | Yohei Takaoka, Yokohama F. Marinos (39,5%)

Author’s note: we would have expected Park Iru-gyu to be in the conversation, but evidently it worked better for the other part of that strange exchange in 2019 between Sagan Tosu and Yokohama F. Marinos. Back then, Park was the no. 1 of the defending champions, helped by the former FC Ryukyu captain to win the title (after winning J3 League the year before).

On the other hand of that exchange, Marinos acquired from Tosu an interesting keeper, capable of great saves, but who could struggle a bit with building the play from behind. They got basically a less random Hiroki Iikura. Instead, Takaoka not only retained his no. 1 spot from Obinna Powell Obi (a young prospect who was loaned to Tochigi SC a couple of times), but he even won this award.

MIP | Shuto Machino, Shonan Bellmare (68,3%)

Just to give a perspective: only nine players scored a goal for Shonan in J1 until Matchday 34. It’s the lowest number of scorers, and Machino scored 12 of the 28 goals racked up by Bellmare until now. Read here why his growth looked incredible.

Best Rookie | Makoto Mitsuta, Sanfrecce Hiroshima (65,9%)

Even in this case, not too much to discuss: Makoto Mitsuta won by a landslide and there’s nothing to argue about. Surely his opponents in this category – Kuryu Matsuki from FC Tokyo and Reon Yamahara from Shimizu S-Pulse – will be two to watch, but they couldn’t match Mitsuta’s performance. Read here why the no. 39 from Sanfrecce Hiroshima was even more impressive than Kaoru Mitoma in 2020.

Best Signing | Takuma Nishimura – Vegalta Sendai » Yokohama F. Marinos (52,9%)

Head-to-head with Yuma Suzuki’s move from Belgium, Nishimura changed the course of his career this year. He already tried Europe one time, he went back to Sendai, and then found himself with this Marinos’ side, capable of playing at a great level in the offensive build-up. Nishimura is having already his best season ever and you can read here why he made a difference for Muscat.

Best Wish | Taisei Miyashiro – Kawasaki Frontale » Sagan Tosu (58,5%)

It’s time for Taisei Miyashiro to understand what he wants to do as a grown-up. In the usual change that Sagan Tosu faces every winter, his profile became important for Kenta Kawai to have better options up front. Especially when paired with Yuki Kakita, Miyashiro looked like an interesting player. So interesting that you have to wonder if staying on loan throughout the whole country makes actually a point.

Miyashiro is 22 years old. He jumped straight away from high school to the pro-world, and Kawasaki rightfully loaned him to several realities. He scored two goals with Renofa Yamaguchi when he was just 19. He came back to Frontale in the 2020 season, where there was no space at all for him. He was loaned to Vortis again in 2021, scoring seven goals and providing some options for Dani Poyatos and Tokushima.

He went through the same test this season: relegation dogfight-contender, huge shifts into the club, and new setups to adapt to. He scored another seven goals plus two in the J. League Cup. At this point, it’s “make it or break it” for Miyashiro: do Frontale really need him or is it time to look somewhere else? Will the winner against Vissel Kobe in 2020 stay his only goal in J1 with Kawasaki? Next Winter will tell us something about it.

Best Foreign Player | Mateus Castro, Nagoya Grampus (43,5%)

Another Brazilian won this award, but there were some clear favorites. Marcinho was extraordinary for Kawasaki and he’s going to leave for Egypt next Winter (congrats to Frontale for gaining €3M for a player who was nowhere in China). Without Thiago Santana, Shimizu S-Pulse would have been already relegated last year and they wouldn’t have stood a chance in 2022. But there’s more.

Mateus has been always an exciting player since the times when he was playing with Omiya Ardija. He came there as a bet from EC Bahia: his first Japanese match was an Emperor’s Cup game back in 2014 (!), 12 minutes as a sub against Gamba Osaka. But the bet worked out pretty well with Ataru Esaka, Akihiro Ienaga, and Jin Izumisawa. Omiya kept him around until 2018, even in J2 League (12 goals and 9 assists in his last year).

When it was clear that Mateus belonged to a higher standard, Nagoya Grampus brought him in, but his experiment in Nagoya wasn’t working. Yahiro Kazama didn’t see him, he was then loaned to Marinos (he won a J1 title), then he came back when Massimo Ficcadenti made him the centerpiece of his offense. Even with Kenta Hasegawa, the script didn’t change that much: without Mateus, Grampus’ season would have been much different.

Best Goal | Everaldo, Kashima Antlers v. Cerezo Osaka (MD20 – 65,8%)

Mateus’ strike against Jubilo was a strong contender, but another Brazilian brought home the award this time. It’s even tough to condense in a few words what the goal meant for Everaldo. After a wonderful 2020, his star faded. He got near to a Chinese transfer, then he stayed. When Yuma Suzuki came back and with Ayase Ueda flourishing, no more space for him, especially if the form was the one seen in 2021.

But this goal wrapped up the Japanese experience of Everaldo in one shot: the bold thinking of having this play, the crucial moment to achieve it (Antlers snatched a point), and the rainbow trajectory to beat Kim Jin-hyeon. Majestic. And we hope the Puskas Award will finally land in Japan.

Best Manager | Michael Skibbe, Sanfrecce Hiroshima (62,4%)

As we said in the part about Sanfrecce Hiroshima, it wasn’t easy to turn it around. Skibbe did just that: he kept the overall structure, but he gave many young players – Higashi, Araki, Fujii, Mitsuta – a chance to properly shine. Now Sanfrecce have a direction for the future: if the stadium will come in 2024, then this could turn theoretically the club into a stable Top 8 club without any fuss.

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That’s it for the 2022 Regista Awards for J1 League. In a few days, we’ll catch up as well with the J3 League, which is going longer this season. If you want to catch up with the J2 League, you can read the awards here. Thanks for reading and following our activity throughout the whole year!