Takefusa Kubo's Life and Career Journey in Football "Si ‘Messi’ from the Land of Samurai"

Before being recruited by Real Madrid, the name Takefusa Kubo might still sound unfamiliar to Footballovers. But since Real Madrid recruited him from FC Tokyo he has increasingly become a byword in the world of social media and has made his name even more popular. He is touted as "Lionel Messi" from Japan. Then who exactly is Takefusa Kubo? Maybe you are curious, please refer to the following story.

Takefusa Kubo is a talented soccer player from the land of the rising sun who was recently recruited by Real Madrid. Kubo's playing position is as an attacking midfielder or Miedfilder. He was born on June 4, 2001 in Kawasaki City, Kanagawa, Japan. This 174 cm tall player has an old man named Takefumi Kubo. His football talent had begun to shine at the age of seven when playing for FC Persimmon, a local club based in his hometown, Kawasaki.

At the age of 8 he entered FC Barcelona Soccer Camp, which is in Japan. In August 2009, he was awarded the Most Valuable Player award.

Maybe Footballovers doesn't know yet that the following year, precisely in April 2010, Kubo was chosen as a member of the FC Barcelona School team participating in the Sodexo European Rusas Cup Tournament held in Belgium. In the tournament Kubo played so well that he was awarded the Most Valuable Player (MVP) even though his team was only third.

After playing in the tournament in Belgium, Takefusa Kubo then returned to Japan and joined the Kawasaki Frontale u-10 team. But Kubo was not long in the team because in August 2011 he was invited to enter La Masia to strengthen Barca Alevin C or also called Barcelona u-11. Together with Barcelona U-11, in the 2012/13 season Kubo successfully won the status as the top scorer in the league by scoring 74 goals in just 30 matches.

In the following season, he became the MVP in the U-12 Mediterranean Cup tournament. He also helped his team dominate the league and win the Catalunya Cup.

Kubo's career sped away like a meteor falling to Earth. Because in 2014 Kubo was promoted to Barca Infantil A or Barcelona u-14. But unfortunately at this stage his career at Barcelona was not smooth after in 2015 the club was declared violating FIFA's international transfer policy regarding the recruitment of players under the age of 18 years.

In March 2015, Kubo was forced to go home to look for play experiences. FC Tokyo took advantage of that by handing over contracts to the junior team.

Kubo's performance continued to improve with FC Tokyo Junior and was promoted to the u-23 team in September 2016 at the age of 15 years. At that time FC Tokyo U-23 played in the J3 League or level 3 competition in the Japanese league. Kubo made his debut in the J3 League at the age of 15 years, 5 months and 1 day, precisely on November 5, 2016 against AC Nagano Parceiro.

On 15 April 2017 Kubo became the youngest player to score in the J League at the age of 15 years, 10 months. He scored against Cerezo Osaka u-23 in the J3 League continued competition. With this, Kubo managed to break Takayuki Morimoto's record of scoring for Tokyo Verdy two days before his 16th birthday in 2004.

January 2018, Bhayangkara FC held a trial match against FC Tokyo at the Bung Karno Main Stadium. Kubo participated in the match and contributed two goals in FC Tokyo's 4-2 victory.

Then on August 16, 2018, he joined Yokohama F. Marinos on a half-year loan. he immediately scored on his debut with Yokohama Marinos in an away match against Vissel Kobe on 26 August 2018. Together with Yokohama Marinos Kubo, he only played 5 appearances and scored 1 goal.

Kubo then returned to FC Tokyo. And since the beginning of the 2019 season, Kubo has always been a regular starter at FC Tokyo, until finally brought by Madrid. He is not in the senior team but must play first at Real Madrid Castilla. The 18-year-old player was tied up with a six-year contract and Madrid paid 2 million euros. Even before Kubo had a chance to fight over several big European clubs, such as PSG, Manchester City and Barcelona before Madrid finally won the hunt for the player nicknamed "Messi Japan".

While his career in the Japanese national team. It turned out that Kubo has always been a mainstay for the Japanese national team in all age groups, ranging from U-15 to U-20 levels. At the age of 15, he was called up to the Japan U-20 national team for the 2017 U-20 World Cup. He also performed at the 2018 u-19 Asian Cup held in Indonesia, at that time he had played against Indonesia in the quarter-finals.

His appearance is getting better day by day, making him able to penetrate the Senior national team. When he was not even 18 years old, Kubo was called into the senior national team to head for the 2019 Copa America in Brazil. He made his senior national team debut on June 9, 2019 in a friendly match against El Salvador, he entered as Takumi Minamino's successor in the 67th minute.

His ability to play takefusa Kubo is said to be similar to Barcelona and Argentina national team star Lionel Messi. Videos that show the ability to mengocek the round skin has indeed become viral on YouTube. However, Kubo does not want to be compared with the Argentine, although clearly as a footballer, he wants to be level with Messi someday. Hopefully!