BIGGEST MATCH EVER

Mito is pulling out all possible stops to try and reach the dream in place for years: to draw 10,000 fans to a home game. The closest chance came in 2006 when Kashiwa's huge fan base brought the home match to more than 9,500. Mito hopes the same nearby away team, this time for a match in which that team could clinch promotion or the title, will similarly bring big numbers.

Events in place to try and draw fans:

-Ticket prices will be reduced substantially, with the most expensive seats at 1500 yen and the rest at 500 or 1000 yen depending on the age.

-Area producers will have an open farmers market in front of the stadium. (This promotional tactic seems a bit weak.)

-Fans can try usually closed athletic training facilities at the stadium.

-As the third and final part of the series on Mito's poor fan numbers, "Kin-chan's Worst" TV show shown nationally on NHK will have the entire show cast in attendance and filming with fans to be shown in January.

-Kin-chan's own Ibaraki Golden Golds barnstorming baseball team will provide discount admission to those who attended the Mito-Kashiwa match.

-That schoolgirl who is creepily popular as the 2010 promotional PR Manager for J. League affairs will be in attendance.

-The new Mito HollyHock song will debut live at the stadium.

-The 7/11 convenience store chain will have heavy promotion throughout Ibaraki, including banners, stickers promoting the match on packages of soccer ball shaped bread for sale, and from October 2nd, the first 300 fans to buy tickets through the 7/11 ticketing machine can get them for only 711 yen.

As much as I want this to succeed, it will be VERY tough and may rely on Kashiwa homejacking the stadium. In any case, I'll be there... Only 9999 more to go!

Mito Unbeaten in September

While not making much of an impact in the league table, Mito had a better than expected month in the results department, winning or drawing all sanctioned matches.

Mito won 2 league matches and 1 Emperor's Cup match, and drew 3 league matches.

With next month including matches against Kashiwa, Chiba, and the Emperor's Cup tie against Shimizu, saying the same thing in November would be a much more positive accomplishment.

Mito 1 - 1 Oita

Mito 1 - 1 Okayama

Mito 3 - 1 Toyama

Mito 0 - 0 Kumamoto

A Bit of a Break for Mito

Mito's next Emperor's Cup match against Shimizu S-Pulse has been changed to Wednesday, October 13. Shimizu is still in the Nabisco Cup tournament and must play the previous weekend.

Mito will have a week and a half to rest and prepare after a home game as opposed to Shimizu who will have needed to play many more matches in the same schedule, including the second match of the Nabisco bracket the Sunday earlier.

Mito 4 - 2 Sagawa Shiga

Mito fans were scared to be defeated by yet another non-League team in the Emperor's Cup, falling behind by 2 in the second half to seeded JFL team Sagawa. But after being outmatched due to scouting errors, Mito turned it around well enough and scored 4 to take the win.

Owada '65
Shimada '80
Katayama '83
Hozaki '91 PK


Hozaki was about to score when, lacking any other option, the keeper grabbed his ankle and
pulled him down. He took the resulting PK to guarantee Mito's win.

Mito 2 - 1 Oita

Mito defeated Oita in the game making up the lightning shortened game earlier in the season.

Mito won with a fantastic goal from Koike and a fantastic set of acrobatic backflips after an average goal from Tokiwa.