Giravanz Kitakyushu
ギラヴァンツ北九州
Full nameGiravanz Kitakyushu
Nickname(s)Giravanz, Kita-Q
Founded1947; 77 years ago (1947)[1]
StadiumMikuni World Stadium Kitakyushu
Kokurakita-ku, Kitakyushu, Fukuoka Prefecture
Capacity15,300
ChairmanYukito Tamai
ManagerShinji Kobayashi
LeagueJ3 League
2023J3 League, 20th of 20
WebsiteClub website
Current season

Giravanz Kitakyushu (ギラヴァンツ北九州, Giravantsu Kitakyūshū) is a Japanese football club based in Kitakyushu, Fukuoka Prefecture. They currently play in J3 League, Japan's 3rd tier of professional league football.

History

Mitsubishi Chemical SC (1947–2000)

The club was formed in 1947 as part of Mitsubishi Chemical's Kurosaki factory. The club was a founding member of Kyushu regional league since 1973. Most of its career was spent in the regional and prefectural leagues, as Kitakyushu was represented in the Japan Soccer League by Yahata Steel F.C. Yahata was a founding member of the JSL in 1965, and finished as runner-up in its first two seasons in that league. Yahata was renamed New Nippon Steel F.C. in 1970, when Yahata Steel merged with Fuji Steel to form (New) Nippon Steel. It ultimately was relegated to the Second Division in 1982, then relegated from the Second Division to Kyushu regional league after 1990–91 season, and closed in 1999.

New Wave Kitakyushu (2001–2009)

In 2001, the club became a community-oriented club (New Wave) Kitakyushu F.C.

In 2007 New Wave took second place in the Regional League promotion series, and was promoted to the JFL for the 2008 season.

The club applied for J. League Associate Membership in January 2008, and the application was accepted at the J. League board meeting on February 19, 2008.

On 1 April 2009, the club made an announcement that they would be accepting suggestions for a new name. This was because the name "New Wave" may cause trademark or tradename disputes.[2] Therefore, the new name had to be something not yet registered as a trademark.

Giravanz Kitakyushu (2010–)

On 2 October 2009, they announced that the new club name for the 2010 season would be Giravanz Kitakyushu (ギラヴァンツ北九州, Giravantsu Kitakyūshū). According to the official news release, the name "Giravanz" is coined from two Italian words: "Girasole", which means "sunflower", and "Avanzare", which means "moving forward".[3] (The sunflower is one of Kitakyushu's symbol flowers.)

On 23 November 2009, after a 2–1 win away against Arte Takasaki, Kitakyushu secured a top four position in the JFL for the 2009 season, regardless of the result at the final week of 2009 JFL. This means they will play in J. League Division 2 for the 2010 season, something which was confirmed by the J.League board meeting on 30 November 2009.[4][5][6]

In its inaugural year in the pro ranks, despite attaining a large number of draw matches, Kitakyushu set new records for fewest wins and points in the season standings.

After several seasons in J2 League, on 20 November 2016 they suffered their first relegation to J3 League.

After the 2018 J3 League season when they eventually ranked bottom, they named Shinji Kobayashi as the new manager, who also took a role as the newly-established Sports Director position concurrently. In 2019 J3 League, Kobayashi led the club to become the champions & promoted to the 2020 J2 League. Although they are successful enough as far as ranked top at the end of the first half, and eventually ranked 5th at the end of the 2020 season, they had a dozen of key players, including Akira Silvano Disaro who scored 18 goals in 2020 season, transferred to other clubs after the season. In 2021, they have ranked at or near the bottom for the entire season, which resulted in suffering relegation to the 2022 J3 League, becoming the first J.-League club relegated to the J3 League a second time. The club played its 2nd consecutive season in the J3 on 2023, in which they ranked the bottom second time after 2018, although they were not relegated to the Japan Football League (JFL) as both Honda FC and Briobecca Urayasu, champions and runners-up of 2023 JFL, have not applied for J3 license, thus were not eligible to promote to the J3 League.

Stadium

Giravanz played in the Honjo Athletic Stadium from 2010 until 2016.

Giravanz moved to the Mikuni World Stadium Kitakyushu, having played at there since 2017.

League and cup record

Champions Runners-up Third place Promoted Relegated
League J. League Cup Emperor's
Cup
Season Div. Tier Teams Pos. P W (PKW) D L (PKL) F A GD Pts Attendance/G
New Wave Kitakyushu
2003 Kyushu
Soccer
League		 4 12 4th 22 12 (1) - 5 (4) 65 46 19 42 - Not eligible –
2004 10 6th 18 9 (0) - 8 (1) 41 39 2 28 - Did not qualify
2005 10 6th 18 10 (0) - 5 (3) 51 30 21 33 -
2006 9 3rd 16 11 (1) - 3 (1) 45 23 22 36 -
2007 11 1st 20 17 (1) - 1 (1) 53 7 46 54 -
2008 JFL 3 18 10th 34 13 10 11 49 48 1 49 1,149 3rd round
2009 18 4th 34 16 10 8 49 31 18 58 3,411 1st round
Giravanz Kitakyushu
2010 J2 2 19 19th 36 1 12 28 20 65 -45 15 4,189 Not eligible 3rd round
2011 20 8th 38 16 10 12 45 46 -1 58 4,051 3rd round
2012 22 9th 42 19 7 16 53 47 6 64 3,346 2nd round
2013 22 16th 42 13 10 19 50 60 -10 49 3,175 3rd round
2014 22 5th 42 18 11 13 50 50 0 65 3,622 Quarter finals
2015 22 7th 42 18 5 19 59 58 1 59 3,488 2nd round
2016 22 22nd 42 8 14 20 43 64 -21 38 3,224 2nd round
2017 J3 3 17 9th 32 13 7 12 44 37 7 46 5,939 2nd round
2018 17 17th 32 6 9 17 22 42 -20 27 4,501 Did not qualify
2019 18 1st 34 19 9 6 51 27 24 66 6,049 2nd round
2020 † J2 2 22 5th 42 19 8 15 59 51 8 65 3,352 Did not qualify
2021 † 22 21st 42 7 14 21 35 66 -31 35 2,974 2nd round
2022 J3 3 18 13th 34 11 7 16 41 45 -4 40 3,613 1st round
2023 20 20th 38 7 10 21 33 45 -12 31 3,857 2nd round
2024 20 TBD 38 TBC
Key

Honours

Giravanz Kitakyushu Honours
Honour No. Years
Kyushu Soccer League 8 1973, 1981, 1982, 1983, 1984, 1987, 1989, 2007
J3 League 1 2019

Players

Current squad

As of 8 February 2024.[8]

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Pos. Nation Player
1 GK Japan JPN Go Ito
3 DF Japan JPN Shinnosuke Ito
4 DF Japan JPN Koki Hasegawa
5 DF Japan JPN Takeaki Hommura
6 DF Japan JPN Kota Muramatsu (on loan from V-Varen Nagasaki)
7 MF Japan JPN Ryuki Hirahara
8 MF Japan JPN Takumi Wakaya
9 FW Japan JPN Shun Hirayama
10 FW Japan JPN Ryo Nagai
11 MF Japan JPN Kohei Kiyama
13 DF Japan JPN Kota Kudo (on loan from Urawa Red Diamonds)
14 MF Japan JPN Haruki Izawa (captain)
15 MF Japan JPN Riku Kobayashi
17 MF Japan JPN Rinpei Okano
18 FW Japan JPN Sota Watanabe
19 MF Japan JPN Bunta Ino
No. Pos. Nation Player
20 MF Japan JPN Asahi Yada
21 MF Japan JPN Taku Ushinohama
22 DF Japan JPN Kaoru Yamawaki
23 DF Japan JPN Kakeru Sakamoto
24 DF Japan JPN Hiroki Maeda
25 FW Japan JPN Raiki Tsubogo
27 GK Japan JPN Yuya Tanaka
29 FW South Korea KOR Koh Seung-jin
30 MF Japan JPN Ryuta Takahashi (on loan from Gamba Osaka)
32 GK Japan JPN Koki Otani
33 DF Japan JPN Takaya Inui
34 MF Japan JPN Shoma Takayoshi
39 GK Japan JPN Rissei Taniguchi (on loan from Fagiano Okayama)
40 MF Japan JPN Ryuta Kanzawa
50 DF Japan JPN Koji Sugiyama

Out on loan

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Pos. Nation Player
3 DF Japan JPN Shinnosuke Ito (at Fukuyama City)

Coaching staff

For the 2023 season.

Position Name
Manager Japan Shinji Kobayashi
Assistant manager Japan Hiroaki Nagashima
First-team coach Japan Takuma Deguchi
Goalkeeper coach Japan Tomoaki Ogami
Physical coach Japan Shojiro Ida
Trainer Japan Tatsuya Murakoshi
Japan Shinichi Todake
Japan Yuji Nakamura
Japan Kenichi Nasu
Manager Japan Tetsuya Tsuda
Japan Riku Namihira

Managerial history

Manager Nationality Tenure
Start Finish
Yoshinori Sembiki  Japan 1 February 2005 31 January 2007
George Yonashiro  Japan 1 February 2007 31 January 2011
Yasutoshi Miura  Japan 1 February 2011 31 January 2013
Kōichi Hashiratani  Japan 1 February 2013 31 January 2017
Takeo Harada  Japan 1 February 2017 31 January 2018
Hitoshi Morishita  Japan 1 February 2018 17 June 2018
Tetsuji Hashiratani  Japan 20 June 2018 31 January 2019
Shinji Kobayashi  Japan 1 February 2019 31 January 2022
Kenichi Amano  Japan 1 February 2022 31 January 2023
Kazuaki Tasaka  Japan 1 February 2023 5 September 2023
Shinji Kobayashi  Japan 6 September 2023 Current

Colour, sponsors and manufacturers

Season(s) Main Shirt Sponsor Collarbone Sponsor Additional Sponsor(s) Kit Manufacturer
2020 TOTO - - Yaskawa - Nafco Zenrin Penalty
2021 Yaskawa WingArc1st TOTO Aso Group
2022 WingArc1st dejiren
2023

Kit evolution

Home kit - 1st
2010 - 2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023 -
Away kit - 2nd
2010 - 2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023 -

References

  1. ^ Club Profile
  2. ^ Official website (Japanese only)[permanent dead link]
  3. ^ Announcement of the new team name and its emblem (新チーム名称・エンブレム発表) Archived 2009-10-07 at the Wayback Machine New Wave Kitakyushu official website news release : dated 2 October 2009
  4. ^ Official website (Japanese only) Archived 2009-12-03 at the Wayback Machine
  5. ^ "J's GOAL | オフィシャルニュース | ニューウェーブ北九州がＪリーグ入会". Archived from the original on 2009-12-04. Retrieved 2009-11-30. J's Goal Website (Japanese only)
  6. ^ http://www.tvq.co.jp/news/news.php?did=5162[dead link]
  7. ^ "J. League Data Site". J. League. Retrieved February 21, 2021.
  8. ^ "Players & Staff選手・スタッフ". Giravanz Kitakyushu. Retrieved 2 February 2022.

External links

Giravanz Kitakyushu
J.League
Japanese club football
Authority control databases
Categories