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Ao Tanaka's early life, childhood and career in Japan
Ao had aspirations since childhood!
Ao Tanaka(田中 碧 in kanji) was born in Kawasaki, Kanagawa, Japan in 1998. His parents originally wanted to give him a different name. However, the sky was so blue the day he was born that they decided to name him Ao, which means blue in Japanese. Ao started playing soccer in kindergarten, and in addition to soccer, he played many other sports, including gymnastics. However, soccer was the one he enjoyed the most, and he started kicking the ball against the wall alone in the park.
Ao entered his local elementary school in Saginuma and joined the elementary school's soccer club, Saginuma SC. The club was a powerhouse in the area. Mr. Sawada, who was the coach of Saginuma SC at that time, remembers well the trial session before joining the club. Ao was kicking the ball happily at first, but halfway through he was crying in the corner of the schoolyard. When Mr. Sawada asked him why he was crying, he replied, "I'm bored with this practice. I want to practice harder." Mr. Sawada was surprised to see such ambition in such a young boy.
Even after joining the team, Ao was more ambitious and more conscious of practice than anyone else. Whenever he did not understand something in practice, he would eagerly ask questions to the coach or manager. While most children were either playing or talking, Ao, who was in the early grades of elementary school, faced his assignments silently and practiced repetitively by himself.
In addition to his high level of awareness, Ao had a good eye for the game from that time on. When he sensed that the opposing team was better than his own team in a second-grade game, he would instruct his teammates which player to mark before the coach could say so. According to Sawada, even back then, he had the best ability to analyze the war situation.
At that time, Saginuma SC had Kaoru Mitoma (who played for Brighton in 2024) one year older than Ao and Koh Itakura (who played for Borussia MG in 2024) two years older than Ao. After honing his skills with these players, Ao was selected by Kawasaki Frontale in his third year of elementary school and joined the team's junior youth team. His coach at the time, Mr. Takasaki, was very disciplined, not only in soccer, but in life as well.
Ao spoke about those days: "Mr. Takasaki was strict, and there were times when I hated practice and games. He was very strict about forgetting things and greetings. But even though he was strict in practice, he never got angry at me and praised me in games. Outside of practice, he played tag and beach soccer with us. He was not only scary, but he was a person who faced the children."
Under Mr. Takasaki, Ao practiced and steadily improved. His Frontale U-12 team participated in the Danone Cup World Tournament in South Africa in 2010 and finished in fifth place. When they lost 0-2 to France, everyone in the team, including Ao, cried in frustration, but it also gave him confidence that he could do well on the world stage.
Ao talked about the tournament, "It was like a festival, and the tournament was a lot of fun. It was like a festival, and the tournament was a lot of fun. We traveled by bus and ate in the same place with children from all over the world. Even though we didn't speak the same language, we had a lot of fun and talked to all kinds of people."
Ao continued to play soccer in junior high school with Kawasaki Frontale U-16. However, his junior high school years were a time when soccer was toned down for him. He enjoyed playing with friends, and it was a time when he had more freedom. But he never thought about quitting soccer. He never missed practice even when he was playing with friends, and he kept his mind on the edge, wondering if soccer would be the last thing he wanted to do. Ao's turning point came at the end of his junior year when he participated in a practice session with Kawasaki Frontale U-18.
In December of his third year of junior high school, members of the Kawasaki Frontale U-15 team began joining the U-18 team for practice. Ao, who until then had played soccer mainly with his peers, was shocked to see his seniors. There was Koh Itakura and Kaoru Mitoma, who had played together in elementary school, and Koji Miyoshi (who would play for Birmingham City FC in 2023). The quality of their play was far superior.
Ao then quickly changed his mind. From the day he was shocked, he went home after practice and continued to kick a soccer ball in the park. On his days off, he again practiced on his own and kicked the ball around the park. Later, he was officially promoted to Frontale U-18 and was the only first-year player selected for the bench. Within a few months, he was named to the starting lineup, but he says that every day was a nerve-wracking experience.
As a voluntarist, Ao was always the first one to pass the ball to someone else when it came to him. The days when he struggled to keep up with his teammates were enough to make him grow up rapidly. In his first year of high school, Ao was selected to play for the U-16 Japan national team on a tour of Thailand. While the national team games helped him grow, he also came away with a new insight. He realized that he was too thin and not fit enough. He is good at putting things into practice as soon as he realizes them. When he returned to Japan, he started doing the same physical training at home that he had been doing every day with the national team. He also continued to do the core training he had first learned at the national team every day.
Mr. Konno, who was the coach at the time, said of Ao: "Even though he was a first-year high school student, he was sincere in his approach to soccer. He was aggressive defensively on the ball and had good technique. He was probably the type of player who wanted to attack more, but he also realized the importance of winning the ball. He was struggling to keep up with the better seniors as a freshman in high school, but as a sophomore he was a mainstay in the game. In his junior year, he was moving around to help the team win, both offensively and defensively."
Ao was then promoted to Kawasaki Frontale's top team in his senior year of high school. He did not expect to be able to play in games right after his promotion. He thought he would not be able to play a game for the first one or two years because of the difference in physical and technical skills between himself and other players. In order to improve all the things he lacked, he wrote down in a notebook what he did not have and what he could do in the top team. After practice he spent his days finding the right answers or organizing what he had written, and then working on the next assignment.
And the opportunity came sooner than Ao expected. Having just turned 20, he made his professional debut in a game in which Frontale took a massive 5-0 lead. Players who knew him as a child and supporters who had watched him for years watched him like a parent, as he had been committed to Frontale since his academy days. Ao, who had thought, "I'll score when I get the chance," scored his first professional goal in his debut match in the second half of the second half. At that moment, he was congratulated by all the benches and players on the pitch. After the game, he described that moment as the most enjoyable time of his life so far. His coaches, who had known him since he was a child, were all delighted.
In the first half of the 2019 season he played late in games, but in the second half of the season he became a regular at the volante. Toward the end of the season, he broke his nasal bone, but he played the game while wearing a face guard. He played 24 games that year and was named Best Young Player. He was the first Kawasaki Frontale player to win the award. He played more at inside half in 2020, moving up a row from his original anchor position due to the team's change to a 4-3-3 system. He scored a total of five goals and was named to the Best Eleven for the first time in his career.
In 2021, Ao joined Fortuna Düsseldorf on a time-limited transfer and scored his first goal after the move the following year. On the 28th of the same month, Düsseldorf announced that they had acquired him on a full transfer from a time-limited transfer. He moved from Dusseldorf to Leeds United FC in 2024.
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