Japan’s Shonan Bellmare’s U14 girls soccer team looking at training in the NMI this summer

Former NMI National Soccer Team head coach and technical director Kiyoshi Sekiguchi is on Saipan for two days looking at forging a partnership with the Northern Mariana Islands Football Association to hold training camps for Japan’s Shonan Bellmare’s U14 girls team.

Sekiguchi coached the CNMI U15 National Team that historically notched CNMI’s first international win after they won against Macau during the 2011 East Asian Football Federation U15 Youth Tournament held in Taipei, Taiwan.

He is now the director of the international department of Shonan Bellmare and has met with NMIFA president Jerry Tan and the rest of the FA yesterday to discuss the partnership for a two-week soccer training camp for the 20-25 players of the U14 girls team either this July or August.

Besides the football camp, Sekiguchi said in an interview at the NMI Soccer Training Center yesterday that he wants to expose the players to other activities that will help them better understand the culture, language, and history of the CNMI.

“It’s very important to learn from other countries and people. They should learn the difference between Japan and other countries, and accept the difference,” he said. Sekiguchi added that there are three things he wants to share with the teams that will be training here: That the people are very kind, the CNMI and Japan have a lot of historical ties, and that by being here, they get to spruce up on their English.

In the future, Sekiguchi wants to also potentially host a training camp in the CNMI for Shonan Bellmare’s other age groups.

Shonan Bellmare is a Japanese professional football club based in Hiratsuka, Tokyo, Japan and plays in the J-1 League—Japan’s premier pro league. The club also has players in various age groups. They are being trained and groomed to move up to J-1 and J-2 Leagues.

Sekiguchi’s last visit to the CNMI was in 2019. During his tenure, before the NMI Soccer Training Center was built in Koblerville, he said that the teams used to practice at either Hopwood Middle School’s field or at the Oleai Sports Complex’s field.

With his visit this time around, he is surprised at how big the NMISTC has gotten—with an additional pitch built just last year, making it three pitches in total.