J3 League often saw a tight ending. Besides 2014 season – the inaugural one –, all was set to be decided on the last Matchday. It didn’t happen this year, since two Kyushu forces practically dominated the context, being promoted before the last game. But this isn’t the only fact that we’ll remember from 2018 season.
BEST TEAM – FC Ryukyu (92%)
2. Gainare Tottori
3. Kagoshima United FC
No doubts. This huge approval for FC Ryukyu was solid and motivated. The club won the championship with some games still to play and they did with their own brand of football. You would say that the manager and a couple of players already left in this Winter, so… who knows what this debut in J2 will hold for them.
FLOP TEAM – Giravanz Kitakyushu (73%)
2. Nagano Parceiro
3. Kataller Toyama
I think we’ll have a further chance of talking about this on Regista, but Nagano and especially Giravanz are a huge disappointment for the category. In Kitakyushu they were hoping to be already back in J2 and instead they closed the line in the table for 2018. The last place should be a point to restart, but we don’t know what will happen in 2019.
MVP – Yu Tomidokoro, FC Ryukyu (40%)
2-tied. Leonardo & Fernandinho (Gainare Tottori)
Underrated and probably overlooked too many times, Yu Tomidokoro has been one of the stars of this tier. Yet, some names were celebrated more than him: he’s going to take his revenge in J2?
BEST GOALKEEPER (tied) – Shuhei Matsubara, Thespakusatsu Gunma & Park Iru-gyu, FC Ryukyu (40%)
2. Ayumi Niekawa (Azul Claro Numazu)
It was actually a good year for J3 goalkeepers. In this table there are some names missing, like Gainare’s Inoue or Nagano’s Tanaka, but those three keepers did a solid job this year. In the end, the winners are tied.
Niekawa raised his profile after a terrible year at Thespa, where Matsubara instead established himself as the 1st choice. About Park, there’s nothing to say: he’s going to Marinos and that’s already a good recognition of his work.
MIP (tied) – Kazaki Nakagawa & Yuta Togashi, FC Ryukyu (50%)
2. Taishi Nishioka (FC Ryukyu)
All Ryukyu candidates and a tied couple of Ryukyu players to win. Nakagawa especially did IMHO a solid job, but also Togashi was impressive (Gifu noticed and they signed him).
BEST ROOKIE – Kaito Taniguchi, Grulla Morioka (56%)
2. Shuhei Tokumoto (FC Ryukyu)
3. Norimasa Atsukawa (Azul Claro Numazu)
By an absolute mile, Kaito Taniguchi hasn’t been only the best rookie of all, but also one of the players in the league. It’s not a case if Grulla Morioka lived a better season than 2017. The kid has some moves.
BEST SIGNING (no loans) – Leonardo: from Santos to Gainare Tottori (89%)
2. Yuichiro Edamoto (from Fujieda MYFC to FC Ryukyu)
No doubt. If he couldn’t win the MVP, at least Leonardo got the top-scorer title and this recognition by us at Regista. Who knows if the other Santos youngster – Vitor Gabriel – will be more consistent in J3 next year.
BEST GOAL – Ken Hisatomi v Cerezo Osaka U-23 (72%)
2-tied. Joao Gabriel @ Kataller Toyama & Ryuta Otake v Grulla Morioka
All good for me. Hisatomi with a hell of a goal… and they lost that game 4-1!
BEST MANAGER – Kim Jong-song, FC Ryukyu (86%)
2. Daisuke Sudo (Gainare Tottori)
3. Yasutoshi Miura (Kagoshima United FC)
We’ve already talked about Kim Jong-song’s amusement park in Okinawa, but you have to wonder if he’ll be able to replicate that in Kagoshima and in an upper category than J3. If he will, then nothing can stop him.
MOMENT OF THE YEAR (tied) – The retirements & The great Kyushu rise (44%)
3. Ryoichi Maeda better in J3 than J1
It was a tough year. We said goodbye to Kazuto Ishido, Norihiro Yamagishi, Yoshikatsu Kawaguchi and many other J3 heroes. We’ll certainly miss them.
I wanna thank who participated in this panel, from @Michael_Master to @GifuRichy, passing through @ConDrei and @smntcsilverfox. Follow them on Twitter, because J3 League is a wonderful and rising division.
See you next week, when we’ll close 2018 season with J1!
