Reporter Han Bing reported on the two games against China, in March, it was Ito Junya, who turned 29, to send a killer assist in the first leg, and then made a penalty in the second leg and then personally headed the ball to lock in the victory, becoming the nemesis of the Chinese team. In fact, Jun Ito is also the sharpest weapon of the Japanese team in the round of 12. In November last year, Japan beat Vietnam and Oman by one consecutive away goal, and it was Ito Jun, who played at right-back, who also scored the winning goal. Japan's 14 points in the round of 12, Jun Ito also contributed 6 points directly and 6 points indirectly, which is the biggest contributor to Moriho's ability to retain the coaching position.
However, who would have thought that the sharpest blade of the Japanese team in the round of 12 was just an ordinary "weed shooter" (grassroots shooter). Unlike a talent like Kenei Kubo, who was already famous in Japan as a child, Jun Ito is also the representative of most Japanese professional players who strive to be more talented. Japanese ball sports expert Kazuto Oshima thought that Jun Ito would become a great instrument as early as 6 years ago, although he was a "passer-by" player who was unknown in elementary school, middle school and even the first half of college, relying on amazing speed, finally realized his football dream.
Jun Ito, who is also a classmate at Tono Junior High School in Kanagawa Prefecture, made his debut in the J-League when he was in high school. He was later recommended to enter Kanagawa University, where the captain of the varsity team was Sho Sasaki, and his classmates were Rimi Takagi and HoshiHirota, who entered the J League earlier than him. Even more unfortunate is that he has just made his debut in the varsity team in his sophomore year, but Kanagawa University has been relegated from the university league. In his junior year in the college league, he won the Golden Boot with 17 goals in 20 games, and the assist king with 10 goals and 12 assists the following year, but only clubs of the level of Kofu Furibayashi and Yamagata Yamagata sent him invitations.
Jun Ito is also famous for his speed and the technique of hard training on his right foot, with a 50-meter performance of about 5.8 seconds, and according to Japanese media reports, the 100-meter speed can be around 11 seconds. He has said he has never measured sprint speed, but won a silver medal in the 4×100m relay in Yokosuka City.
After joining Kashiwa Helios in 2016, Jun Ito was also placed in the position of full-back by Theo coach Mendes, and Jun Ito could only endure and wait, and finally returned to the winger position after the team changed coaches. Agitated against Shimizu in August 2017, he had an amazing performance of driving straight in with the ball 70 meters long. There are many players in the Japanese team who can sprint at 50 meters and 5 seconds 8, Takuma Asano and Maeda Dairan, but few people can combine speed and football so well as Junya Ito.
According to the technical statistics of the 2018 J-League, Jun Ito has also sprinted as many as 40 times in the game. Generally speaking, the number of sprints in a single game is already a high level, and it is evident in Jun Ito's efforts. At the end of the 2018 season, Helios was relegated to the Japanese Second Division, and Jun Ito also chose to stay in The Ocean in February of the following year, joining Belgian powerhouse Genk. After more than two years of hard work, the result was that in the 2020/21 season he scored 12 goals and assisted 16 times in 42 games, completely conquering the first division.
Although the 2017 East Asian Cup has become a Japan international, Jun Ito has also waited for four years to wait for his highlight moment. As he said, his life has always taken detours, but in the end he can always reach the end he wants to reach. In the era of the prevalence of "reverse foot" wingers, it is rare for Jun Ito to be such a sharp foot and an attacker who is active on the right side, especially the Japanese national team has left-foot masters such as Yasuru Do and Kenei Kubo, and the existence of Jun Ito is very important.
For family reasons, Jun Ito also gave up the opportunity to study at a private high school with stronger football skills, and instead chose the public high school where his mother had attended. The university is also in its hometown of Kanagawa because it is close to home. At that time, Ito Jun also had no strong desire to become a professional player. However, in a 1-6 loss to kirikoen, the strongest local player, Junya Ito's speed caught the attention of scouts who were originally players who had gone to visit Kiritsuguen.
Junya Ito was also under a lot of pressure while at Genk because the competition among young players was too fierce: "Genk has a lot of players who are 17 and 18 years old, and I am too late to become a professional at 23. Young players can sell well if they perform slightly better, and players like me have to fight hard. I'm the second oldest player on the team and I have to prove that I'm stronger than the youngsters. "His annual salary at Genk is only 300,000 euros, which is only moderate in The Genk team, but his performance is top-notch.
Junya Ito's life seems to be so step-by-step, he only needs to do his best to improve his football skills, and it seems that he does not need to expend more energy as to whether he will reach another higher stage. It is so to become a professional player, it is so to enter the national team, and it is also true to stay in the ocean.
Even last November, he posted his wedding photos on Instagram, and there was only a photo of a couple working together, he said that he was only married to an ordinary woman and did not want to overexpose his private life, and his international teammates at the time, Hiroki Sakai, Yoshiki Muto, Takumi Minano, Kenyo Fuan, and Yasuko Miyoshi all sent their blessings.
Jun Ito is such an ordinary and ordinary professional player, with mediocre talent but very clear about what kind of effort he needs to make his dream come true. His next goal is to participate in the 2022 World Cup as his best gift for the age of 30. Now it seems that even this gift was opened by his own hands...