TFA & JTA Forge Historic Agreement

The agreement (MoU) demonstrates the strong desire and commitment of the world’s leading Touch Football nation to help facilitate growth of the game internationally and build further on the great relationship between both countries. The key elements of the five-year agreement focus on improving Japan’s competitive standard of international competition through coaching support and athlete improvement and participation at events.

Touch Football Australia CEO, Colm Maguire was in Japan last week with an Australian touring party of High Performance representatives, signing off on the MoU together with JTA Chairman, Shusaku Kuchimoto, and officials in Tokyo.

“We are delighted to be in a position to partner with and form a long-standing agreement with Japan Touch Association and help shore up their future on the international stage,” he said.

“The agreement provides a robust pathway for their growth and competitiveness against international teams in future years and enshrines our commitment to support them in their quest for excellence and improvement,” Maguire added.

“The overall objective of the MoU is to assist the overall High Performance and development objectives of the JTA by facilitating overall access to TFA resources both human and material: these are inclusive of coaching support which we have thoroughly enjoyed through our current visit and participation in international and domestic events.

“To this end, this will see Japanese teams joining the 2016 Trans Tasman Series event in Auckland (April) for the first time and expanding their presence in future years’ instalment of the Trans Tasman and other events.”

By extension, Australian Men’s Open captain, Steve Roberts, fresh from his Touch World Cup success and who was also in Japan conducting coaching clinics alongside TFA High Performance Manager, Wayne Grant, has been confirmed as head coach of the Japanese teams, effective from the 2016 Trans Tasman event.

Maguire went on to say the agreement is part of the ongoing commitment by both Touch Football Australia and Touch New Zealand to open the doors to the world to participate more often against the two best nations in the world.

“Notwithstanding the level of competition but our events are also the best in the world and buoyed by the overwhelmingly positive feedback from the 2015 Touch World Cup and the mounting desire to participate in our events, we will further expand into 2017,” Maguire said.

“This will include the facilitation of entry of Japan and other nations around the world to join the 2017 Trans Tasman event in Open and Senior divisions.

“Our key partners at Touch New Zealand are equally excited to extend the invitation for Japan to compete and significantly open up their development and exposure opportunities.”