Failed Wonderkid #16- Takayuki Morimoto

Biodata

Full Name: Takayuki Morimoto

Nationality: Japanese

Date of Birth: 7 May 1988

Position: Forward

Current Club: Avispa Fukuoka

Current Market Price: 150k Euro (Updated on Dec 2019)

Highest Market Price: 4.00mil Euro (Jan 2010)

Former Clubs:

2004- 2006 Tokyo Verdy

2006- 2011 Catania

2011- 2012 Novara

2012 Catania

2013 Al-Nasr Dubai

2013- 2015 JEF United Chiba

2015- 2018 Kawasaki Frontale

International Career:

2009- 2012 Japan

Achievement:

Tokyo Verdy

2004 Emperor’s Cup

2005 Japanese Super Cup

Kawasaki Frontale

2017 J1 League

Career

When someone needs to spot the Asian football talent, Japan is often the country that they always investigate. In fact, they did produce a lot of world-class players that really shone in the footballing world such as Hidetoshi Nakata, Shunsuke Nakamura, Shinji Kagawa and Takumi Minamino. However, there are also players who showed a promising start but eventually fade away in the limelight of the footballing world. Takayuki Morimoto is the football player that we are discussing in this article.

Takayuki Morimoto began his footballing career in his hometown based club, Tsudayama FC at the age of 7. His performance in the youth team certainly attracted the attention of the other clubs and transferred to Verdy Junior three years later. Three years after he joined Verdy Junior, Morimoto was moved to Verdy Junior Youth and remained until 2004. At the age of 15, Morimoto was promoted to Tokyo Verdy senior side and made his debut on March 2004 against Jubilo Iwata. He had set a record for the youngest player to debut in the process. Two months later, he set another record for the youngest goalscorer in the J League. Morimoto was described as the brightest future star in Japanese football. In his short career in Tokyo Verdy, he scored 7 goals in just around 2000 minutes played in all competition as a teenager. This caught a lot of attention from various clubs around Europe.

On July 2006, Morimoto was announced to join Italian Serie A side, Catania Calcio on a one-year loan deal. He only made his debut on January 2007 during a game against Atalanta as a sub and scored his first goal abroad after just five minutes on the pitch. Unfortunately, Morimoto ruptured his Anterior Cruciate Ligament (ACL) on his left knee on March 2007 and ruled him out of the remainder of the season. Despite the serious injury, Catania acknowledged his potential and signed him permanently on June 2007. He came back from injury on August 2007 where he scored and assisted once in the match against Parma. Morimoto’s true breakout season for Catania was during the 2008/2009 season, where he scored 10 goals in all competitions. Even Alexandre Pato claimed that Morimoto is the best young player in the league.

However, Morimoto was never really lived up his expectation in the Sicily based club and he was always overshadowed by his teammates like Giuseppe Mascara and Maxi Lopez. He transferred to the newly promoted Serie A side, Novara to gain more game time on July 2011. Morimoto’s time in Novara wasn’t particularly memorable too. His season was hampered by injuries and this had limited his playing time to just 18 league appearances, scoring four goals in the process. He returned to Catania when Novara was relegated to Serie B at the end of the season. Since then, Morimoto’s career was in the downward spiral ever since. On January 2013, Morimoto was loaned to Al-Nasr to link up with his former coach, Walter Zenga for six months. However, he didn’t play much over there either. After three goals in six appearances in all competition, Morimoto returned to Italy.

On August 2013, Morimoto returned to Japan after seven years away to Europe and signed for J2 League side, JEF United Chiba. He was finally gaining his playing time that he wanted for quite some time. In his most prolific season, Morimoto scored 12 goals in all competitions for JEF United Chiba. Two years later, he signed for J1 League side, Kawasaki Frontale. Where his form dropped again in his two years stay in Kawasaki. In his two seasons stay in Kawasaki Frontale, Morimoto only scored 11 goals in all competition. This is not the goal scoring ratio that most of the football fans expected a striker to do so. Morimoto is currently playing in J2 League side, Avispa Fukuoka. He is still rediscovering the performance that convinced the European club to notice him. However, he still needs to work hard in order to do so.

Verdict

Disappointment Rate: 7.5/10. A typical football player who failed to realise his full potential and early promises. It is quite sad to realise that Morimoto is not even playing in the top flight club in his country. At the age of 31, there is not much time for him to even match his early expectation from the Japanese football fans.

#Morimoto #Japan #Catania #Novara #Striker