Mito HollyHock

Mito Hollyhock
水戸ホーリーホック

Full name	Football Club Mito HollyHock Ibaraki
Nickname(s)	HollyHock, FC Mito
Founded	1990, 1994
Ground	K's denki Stadium Mito Mito, Ibaraki (Capacity: 12,000)
Chairman	Kunio Numata
Manager	Tetsuji Hashiratani (2011-)
League	J. League Division 2
2010	16th Place
Home colours Away colours

Mito HollyHock (水戸ホーリーホック, Mito Hōrīhokku^?) is a Japanese professional football (soccer) club, currently playing in the J. League Division 2. The team's hometown is located in Mito, Ibaraki Prefecture.

Its nickname "HollyHock" derives from the family crest of the Tokugawa clan who governed from Mito in the Edo period.

History

The club was founded in 1990 as Prima Aseno FC by the factory workers of Prima Ham (a food company) in Tsuchiura. It changed its name to Prima Ham FC Tsuchiura and gained promotion to the Japan Football League after finishing as runner-up in the 1996 Regional League play-off. It merged with FC Mito (founded in 1994) and re-branded itself as Mito HollyHock before the start of the 1997 season when Prima Ham decided to discontinue its financial support to the club.

Mito's application to play in the inaugural 1999 season of J. League Division 2 was initially turned down due to an unstable financial and fan base. However, after finishing 3rd in the Japan Football League in 1999 and gaining support, the club was invited into the J. League in 2000.

Strategy

Being a traditionally weak club in the league, Mito has tended to play a defensive game and has proven successful at it. This stinginess at the back is often referred to as "Mito-nachio" after the Catenaccio playing style, which is also a pun on the hometown's local specialty, Mito natto.

Recently, though, the team has been attempting implementation of stronger offensive tactics in an attempt to gain momentum for a promotion bid.

2011 Roster

As of July 26, 2011 Note: Flags indicate national team as has been defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Position Player 1 GK Koji Homma 2 DF Yuki Okada 3 DF Sunao Hozaki 4 DF Kei Omoto 5 DF Hiroki Kato 6 MF Kenta Nishioka 7 FW Junki Koike 8 MF Sho Murata 9 FW Kota Yoshihara 10 FW Keisuke Endo 11 FW Satoshi Tokiwa 13 FW Tatsuya Okamoto 14 MF Shota Otsuka 15 MF Yuki Shimada

No. Position Player 16 MF Masaya Suzuki 17 MF Sai Kanakubo 18 MF Taiki Tsuruno 19 FW Sho Kamimura 20 DF Tsukasa Shiotani 21 GK Takashi Kasahara 22 MF Jumpei Obata 23 GK Hironobu Ono 24 MF Romero Frank 25 DF Kenji Dai 26 MF Yuji Iida 28 MF Tsukasa Ozawa 30 FW Takayuki Suzuki 31 GK Shingo Takizawa

Record as J. League member

Season	Div.	Tms.	Pos.	Attendance/G	J. League Cup	Emperor's Cup
2000	J2	10	9	2,021	1st Round	3rd Round
2001	J2	12	11	1,559	1st Round	3rd Round
2002	J2	12	10	2,739	-	3rd Round
2003	J2	12	7	3,085	-	3rd Round
2004	J2	12	9	3,773	-	4th Round
2005	J2	12	10	3,334	-	4th Round
2006	J2	13	10	3,017	-	3rd Round
2007	J2	13	12	2,415	-	4th Round
2008	J2	15	11	3,044	-	4th Round
2009	J2	18	8	2,673	-	2nd Round
2010	J2	19	16	3,608	-	3rd Round

Key

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

Notable former players

• Anderson
• João Paulo
• Francisco Fernández
• Takafumi Akahoshi
• Nobuhisa Isono
• Jun Mizuno
• Shunta Nagai
• Shōhei Ogura
• Masanori Kizawa
• Yuichi Shibakoya
• Derlis Florentín

International Players

Japan Túlio Kota Yoshihara Takayuki Suzuki

AFC Park Joo-Ho Shin Byung-Ho

CONMEBOL João Paulo Francisco Fernández

Images (from the former home stadium)

• 

  Home side goal seat section

• 

  Home side A seat section, with supporters

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  Mito vs. Sapporo, November 18, 2006

External links

• Official Site (Japanese)
• English News Site