is a former Japanese

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

player.

Playing career

High school

He played in the 59th

All Japan High School Soccer Tournament The All Japan High School Soccer Tournament (全国高等学校サッカー選手権大会, Zenkoku kōtō gakkō sakkā senshuken taikai, 全国高校サッカー選手権大会, Zenkoku kō kō sakkā senshuken taikai) of Japan, commonly known a ...

in 1981 as a striker scoring a goal from 50 metres for Akita Nishime High School.

Club

He played nine seasons for

Yanmar Diesel is a Japanese diesel engine, heavy machinery and agricultural machinery manufacturer founded in Osaka, Japan in 1912. Yanmar manufactures and sells engines used in a wide range of applications, including seagoing vessels, pleasure boats, constru ...

from 1981 to 1990 in the first division of the

Japan Soccer League , or JSL, was the top flight association football league in Japan between 1965 and 1992, and was the precursor to the current professional league, the J.League. JSL was the second national league of a team sport in Japan after the professional ...

- then the top flight of football in Japan. This was followed by two seasons at Kyoto Sanga F.C. in the second division.

International career

In early 1981, he played in the

1980 AFC Youth Championship The 1980 AFC Youth Championship was held from 21 February to 1 March 1981 in Bangkok, Thailand. The tournament was won by for the fifth time by South Korea. Qualification The finals will consist of five teams from the qualification phase. Q ...

, following the December 1980 qualifying, where combined he scored 8 goals in 5 games. He got his first senior cap with the

Japan national football team The , nicknamed the , represents Japan in men's international Association football, football. It is controlled by the Japan Football Association (JFA), the governing body for football in Japan. Japan was not a major football force until the e ...

on January 30, 1981 against a young

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populous ...

, entering at the 62nd minute.

Coaching career

In 2006 he was a coach with the

Vissel Kobe is a Japanese professional football club based in Kobe, Hyōgo Prefecture. The club plays in the J1 League, which is the top tier of football in the country. The team's home stadium is Noevir Stadium Kobe, in Hyōgo-ku, though some home match ...

youth (U-18) team. From 2006 to 2011 he was the director of the soccer program with

Kobe Gakuin University is a private, co-educational university located on the western edge of the city of Kobe, in Hyōgo Prefecture in Japan. It was founded in 1966 and overlooks the city of Akashi, the Akashi Straits and the Akashi Kaikyo Bridge - the longest susp ...

, affiliated with Vissel Kobe, until he was dismissed after an incident when he caught five players drinking, and kicked two of them. Since 2013 he has been the coach at Meitoku Gijuku High School in

Kōchi Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located on the island of Shikoku. Kōchi Prefecture has a population of 757,914 (1 December 2011) and has a geographic area of 7,103 km2 (2,742 sq mi). Kōchi Prefecture borders Ehime Prefecture to the northwest and ...

, participating in the 92nd through 95th

in the mid-2010s. He has also been the director of the Hirakata FC U-18 team.

Legacy

On August 11, 2019, Akira Komatsu was featured in an episode of the

Tokyo Broadcasting System Television JORX-DTV, branded as is the flagship station of the Japan News Network (JNN), owned-and-operated by , a subsidiary of JNN's owner, TBS Holdings. It operates in the Kantō region and broadcasts its content nationally through TBS-JNN Networ ...

series ''Disappeared Genius''.

Personal

His younger brother, Tsutomu Komatsu ( 小松勉 ), is a former manager of the

TDK is a Japanese multinational electronics corporation that manufactures electronic components and recording and data-storage media. Its motto is "Contribute to culture and industry through creativity". "TDK" is an initialism of the original Ja ...

Soccer Club.「「TDK SC」監督・小松勉さん　初のJFL参戦」

朝日新聞 is one of the four largest newspapers in Japan. Founded in 1879, it is also one of the oldest newspapers in Japan and Asia, and is considered a newspaper of record for Japan. Its circulation, which was 4.57 million for its morning edition and ...

（秋田県版）、2007年3月3日、2014年1月9日閲覧 He served for the blue Nikaho team for nine years as a bench boss.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Komatsu, Akira 1962 births Living people Association football people from Akita Prefecture Japanese men's footballers Men's association football forwards Japan men's international footballers