JEF
United Ichihara is a J. League team. On February 1, 2005, the team is
scheduled to change its name to JEF United Ichihara, Chiba. The team name
JEF is taken from JR East and Furukawa Electric and United shows the unity
of the team and its home town.
The team's hometown is Ichihara, Chiba and from 2003, Chiba, Chiba. It plays
at Ichihara Seaside Stadium. It had initially practiced at Urayasu, Chiba
planning to base itself on Narashino, Chiba before opposition by those
living around Akitsu Soccer Stadium forced it to be based based in Ichihara.
From 2000, the team practices at Footpark Anesaki in Ichihara.
The team started out as the company team, Furukawa Electric Soccer Club on
1946. Since its conception, the team has always played at the top league in
Japan and is the only team to do so. As the company team, it has won Japan
Soccer League twice, Tenno cup four times, JSL Cup three times. On 1986 and
1987, the team played at the Asia Club Championship Tournament as the
representative of Japan to win both championship.
In 1991, it merged with the JR East's company team to become East Japan JR
Furukawa Football Club. The team initially built itself around the former
Germany national football team player Pierre Littbarski. From 1998 to 2000,
the team struggled to stay in the J1 league and it began a series of efforts
to be a competitive team. |
