Sagan Tosu
| Full name | Sagan Tosu Football Club |
|---|---|
| Nickname(s) | Sagan |
| Founded | 1997 |
| Ground |
Tosu Stadium Tosu, Saga |
| Capacity | 24,000 |
| Chairman | Minoru Takehara |
| Manager | Massimo Ficcadenti |
| League | J1 League |
| 2016 | J1 League, 11th |
| Website | Club home page |
Sagan Tosu (サガン鳥栖 Sagan Tosu?) is a Japanese professional football club, currently playing in the J1 League. The team is located in Tosu, Saga Prefecture.
Sagan is a coined word with a couple of meanings behind it. One of its homophones is sandstone (砂岩 sagan?) in Japanese. This symbolises many small elements uniting to form one formidable object, for example as a metaphor for a team. Also, Sagan Tosu can be interpreted as "Tosu of Saga (Prefecture)" (佐賀ん鳥栖 Saga-n Tosu?) in the area's dialect. In addition, it is widely believed that the word is meant to be a pun with Italian giants Juventus although the club hasn't confirmed it.
In February 1997, Sagan was established as a new club which virtually takes over Tosu Futures, which became insolvent in the previous month, and admitted to participate Japan Football League from 1997 to 1998, as well as J. League Cup in 1997 as a preferential measure, although J. League Associate Membership status is not awarded to Sagan. In 1999 they were admitted to the new J. League Division 2 (J2) as the original ten teams, where they remained until their promotion to J1 at the end of the 2011 season. Things have changed and started to turn positive with the new President & Chief Operating Officer Minoru Takehara, who is also part owner of the club.
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