Young Japanese Footballers Coming to Arusha for East Africa Youth Soccer Tourney 2023 in December

The 14th Instalment of the East African Youth Soccer Tournament will this time feature players from Tokyo Japan as Arusha prepares to host this year’s version of the annual ‘Chipkiz Cup,’ coming up in December 2023.

TOFA the Non-Government Organization based in Tokyo Japan, is the entity which preparing to bring young football players from Tokyo, to participate in the forthcoming East African Youth Soccer tourney coming up in Arusha next December.

Chihiro Tanaka is the Chairperson of the organization known as ‘Talk Our Future from Africa,’ or simply TOFA who is currently in Arusha for initial arrangements. She explained that they feel it was high time the youth from Japan gets the experience of playing sports in Africa and learn about Tanzania.

Organized by the Future Stars Academy, the East African Soccer Tournament, known as ‘Chipkizi Cup,’ has been taking place in Arusha for a total of 14 years now and counting.

“Football especially happens to the best platform to bring the children from various countries together,” Tanaka stated.

According to the TOFA Chairperson, since the East Africa Youth Soccer tourney take place in December, many of the children in Japan will still be in school so it will be difficult to bring an entire team all of a sudden.

“Instead individual players will come, we shall be happy to be able to bring some Japanese Children to join their Tanzanian counterparts for various events in Arusha next December,” she added.

But after the December event, the ‘Talk Our Future from Africa,’ will go back to Japan and outfit a proper team for the other East African Soccer Tournament from 2024 onwards.

Speaking on behalf of the Future Stars, a representative from the Academy Peter Tito said they expect massive participation in the ‘Chipkiz Cup,’ because during the previous soccer tourney of 2022 a total of 300 teams took part in the youth football event.

The Chairperson of Arusha Regional Football Association (ARFA), Zakayo Mjema said the young Japanese Players are essentially also coming to learn from Tanzania through the East African Youth Soccer Tourney.

“In Japan there a number of football academies and youth soccer centres therefore this will create new opportunity for future cooperation in sports between Japan and Tanzania,” Mjema stated, adding that the ‘Chipkiz Cup 2023,’ is yet another opportunity for the country to receive more tourists.

According to the ARFA Chairperson, nowadays best international footballer come from Africa and almost all European Leagues consist of players from the continent.