Maya Yoshida

Maya Yoshida (吉田 麻也, Yoshida Maya, born 24 August 1988) is a Japanese footballer who plays as a centre back for Serie A club Sampdoria and captains the Japan national team.

Club Career

Nagoya Grampus

Born in Nagasaki, Japan, Yoshida began playing football at Nanling FC in his second year at elementary school. His older brother, Honami, played an important role to his football career when he searched on the internet for Nagoya Grampus's U-15 and this led Yoshida to join the U-15 side. Once Yoshida has joined, Yoshida relocated to Nagoya to be close at Nagoya Grampus and attended Toyota High School.

After spending five years at Nagoya Grampus Youth Academy, he was promoted to the first team in the 2007 season, having signed his first professional contract. Yoshida joined the club's first team training soon after and started out in a defensive midfielder when playing for Grampus's youth team, but was converted to a centre back. After spending months on the substitute bench, Yoshida finally made his debut for the club, coming on as a second-half substitute, in a 2–1 loss against Oita Trinita on 3 May 2007. Since then, he became a first team regular for the side, playing in the centre–back position. It wasn't until on 5 November 2007 when Yoshida scored his first Nagoya Grampus goal, in a 3–1 win against Thespa Kusatsu in the fourth round of the Emperor's Cup. At the end of the 2007 season, he went on to make twenty–four appearances and scoring once in all competitions.

In the 2008 season, Yoshida began to feature in the starting line-up for most of the league matches with his Serbian teammate Milos Bajalica. He started the season well when he helped the side go on an unbeaten with seven matches in all competitions. Yoshida continued to feature in the first team until he was called up to the Japan U23 squad in July. After Japan U23's elimination in the Summer Olympics, it wasn't until on 23 August 2008 when Yoshida returned to the starting line-up against Kashima Ant

This page also has a version in other languages :  Мая Ёсида (russian)