Shogun Soccer Scouting #13: Kota Takai

Big prospect but can he make the big leap to the Premier League?

Jun 28, 2025

After releasing a newsletter on Hayato Inamura earlier this week, big news hit that very night with Kota Takai linked to Spurs. Various outlets are saying all that’s left is the medical! It’s obviously not official yet but this will mostly be written up with Tottenham Hotspur in mind.

Periodic reminder, you can find me on Twitter & BlueSky.

Anyway, let’s get started!

tl;dr (too long; didn’t read):

Big, tall, imposing profile that relishes physical battles. Comfortable carrying or passing the ball. Concerns over agility, speed, and timing challenges.

Date of Birth: September 4, 2004
Age: 20 years old
Nationality: Japan
Position: Center Back (Right/Left)
Club: Kawasaki Frontale (J1)
Squad Number: #2 (2025 season)
Height/Weight: 1.92m // 90 kg (Source: SoccerDigest)
VIDEO NOTE: Kawasaki Frontale’s HOME kits are light blue with black trim with black lettering & AWAY kits are white shirt, shorts, socks with blue lettering. I’m using footage from the 2024 and 2025 J.League seasons, in addition to Asian Champions League Elite 2024/2025.
DATA NOTE: The StatsBomb data viz are from the 2024 J.League season under a different manager and style of play. Just keep that in mind.

Physicality & Tackling

A first impression one gets when watching Kota Takai is how willing and often he puts his body on the line whether thundering into tackles or blocking shots. He is not one to shy away from challenges. He uses his big frame to block the path of opponent and/or ball. He is very physical when fighting for the ball (at times too much, leading to fouls) and uses his arms really well to gain leverage to get his body between the attacker and the ball. Takai is at his best when able to force opponents to stop or slow down within the range of his reach such as trapping them against the sideline or forcing them toward a supporting teammate. From there he pounces and overwhelms them with his considerable size.

All of this makes it difficult for opponents to dribble past him or at least force opponents to pass away from the immediate danger area where teammates are ready to cover.

Still, there are issues.

While quite agile given his size, it is nevertheless an issue that it is a lot harder for him to pull out when he commits to a tackle. It is also difficult for him to turn to follow attackers making runs and in tight spaces, nimble attackers can take advantage of his slow turning speed before he is able to completely envelop them physically. This can occasionally be seen in the footage provided and it will be an issue when considering the speed and agility of the best attackers in the Premier League.

There are times when opponent attackers drop off Frontale’s defense line to receive, a well timed separation, in which Takai is a step or two late to follow as the pass comes in. Along with untimely challenges he can simply be too aggressive which has led to many fouls called, albeit in a league that’s refereed in a very strict manner.

Aerial/Long Balls & Set Piece Threat

At 1.92m, Takai stands quite tall but isn’t reliant on it as he can also jump well. Outside the box he knocks back long balls under pressure or in space with ease, getting good distances and occasionally turning it into a pass opportunity. In the box, he keeps a tight mark on opponent attackers to win the ball. I imagine his aerial win % will drop in the Premier League (or elsewhere in Europe) until he gets acclimatized and make adjustments.

As an added bonus, his aerial abilities make him a set piece threat and Takai has scored or been involved in goals from corner kicks and free kicks. Kawasaki Frontale’s set-piece plays has had Takai running to the far post to knock back inside to a teammate or generally causing chaos in the box.

Box Defending

In other aspects of box defending, Takai excels. What’s notable is how his good positioning and sense of danger allows him to block crosses (especially when guarding the near post) and shots. Another aspect is his good communication with his teammates. Takai regularly warns other about potential threats and assertively communicates to teammates when switching players to mark as the play unfolds.

Covering, Balls In-Behind

When covering or supporting fellow teammates in passes behind the defense line Takai shows good awareness and as mentioned before, communicates well and reads intentions of both teammates and opponents well. However, there are occasions where he can get caught ball-watching and his lack of pace when running back can lead to trouble.

The physical metrics below paint a rather sobering picture of Takai. I will note that Kawasaki Frontale prefer to keep the ball and a more controlled game, relative to the league. This means that the constant back-and-forth and fire-fighting sprinting will not show up as much in terms of Takai’s physical metrics. This was especially more so last season under Tohru Oniki from when the data is based on. Things are a bit different now under Shigetoshi Hasebe so it’ll be interesting to see what the same graph below looks like with 2025 season data instead (only 2024 data is available for free). Nevertheless, it is absolutely true that Takai isn’t the fastest player among Center Backs and ideally a club partners him up with someone quick to support him (for Spurs that’s probably Mickey Van de Ven).

The aspect that alleviates Kota Takai’s lack of elite pace is his clever reading of the game and quick reactions. While he is of course supported by good midfielders at Kawasaki Frontale who can restrict passing options in front of him, Takai is good at anticipating passes to perform interceptions. Similar to when he goes into the tackle, Takai steps forward from the defensive line with conviction and from his intercepting action can then start the counterattack by driving forward or making a direct pass.

On The Ball

In possession, a strength of Kota Takai is his comfort on the ball. Kawasaki Frontale are a team that loves to pass it around in the build-up phase and Kota Takai helps facilitate that. Takai can carry forward past pressure with body feints to throw opponents off. He can be patient, gauging the actions of the pressing opponent with stop-start movements before switching directions quickly.

While Takai doesn’t perform a lot of progressive carries by StatsBomb’s definition, he is very clearly comfortable in shifting the ball around and waiting for opportunities to release passes into the midfield.

In the build-up phase, Takai is good at creating room for himself and others in the build-up phase. When Kawasaki Frontale push up into the middle 3rd, Takai takes up very aggressive positions further past the halfway line centrally or supporting the Full Back/Winger out wide. Takai’s positioning also makes it easier for him to compress the lines and counter-press when the team loses the ball too.

Passing

Along with comfort carrying the ball at his feet, Takai is also a positive passer. It does help that Frontale are very inclined to build-up from the back and have a lot of talented players around him but Takai himself is a high volume passer that can be quite incisive when the opportunity arises.

In 2024 and 2025 so far he hasn’t played a high volume of progressive passes compared to other Center Backs in the league but one needs to consider that Frontale’s build-up isn’t overtly reliant on him alone unlike the others who rank highly in these metrics on other teams. Other defenders, notably the Full Backs take on a lot of ball progression as well as midfielders who drop in on occasions for Frontale. I imagine that for any prospective team the amount of ball progression load that Takai takes on can be tweaked depending on the other defenders. In addition, Takai has the quick thinking to turn interceptions and loose ball wins into attacks immediately with his first or second touch.

At longer ranges, Takai is excellent at playing long diagonals to teammate and quickly start attacks or simply switch sides to break an opponent’s press. I find it quite impressive how much power he gets with little run-up.

Looking deeply using StatsBomb’s Pass Success Probability model, Takai’s passing skills shine strongly. His completion percentage on his Right foot is higher than what the model expected while on his Left it’s slightly lower but at an high rate overall. However, the differences become more stark when looking at passes made “under pressure” and “progressive passing”. This makes me think that while Takai has played plenty of times at Left Center Back, he may not be the best option there if you want the same kind of progressive passing as on the Right (where he clearly excels). In 2024 he was very good completing passes under pressure.

His complete WyScout data profile holds up well to what was discussed throughout this report. Good-to-great defensive stats, decent on-ball stats (especially with the context provided earlier), but poor disciplinary record.

Summary

Overall, Kota Takai has the physical and technical toolkit that people look for in a “modern” Center Back. What makes Takai interesting is that he can be quite versatile. This season, as we’ve seen throughout the footage, Takai’s role has been about being the aggressive one of the Center Back pair. However, he’s played alongside a variety of partners and he can also play a more patient/covering role too. While he is predominantly Right footed, he can play on either side of a Center Back pairing. In 2025 he has mainly played on the Right as his partner is a Left footer. In addition, Takai does have some experience in a Back 3 through recent call-ups with the Japan National Team. He has also played Right Back at youth national team levels but to me, it’s clearly not the best use of him so I’d stay away from that. It should be telling that he’s never played there at the club level.

A number of issues that Takai has are that he does not have elite recovery speed so he needs to be careful and more focused for runs in-behind as he can occasionally get caught out ball-watching. Nimble attackers can give him issues as they can dance around and take advantage of his size and slower turning speed. This along with the fact that he can be a bit too aggressive at times has meant that he has racked up a lot of fouls and cards in the past two seasons. Nevertheless, Takai is a big guy with a lot of technique and has been a resourceful part of his team’s build-up play with his mix of passing and ball carrying.

Despite his physical attributes, he will still need time to adapt to scale up to bigger, faster, and better opponents in the Premier League. In that regard, there’s not a whole lot I can say aside from that the Spurs staff will assess him in pre-season training and friendlies to see how he performs. I don’t think he will be a starter right away especially in a Back 4, perhaps slightly more likely in a Back 3. Takai is quite adaptable and as mentioned he can play different roles so I don’t think it matters much whether Thomas Frank goes with a Back 4 or Back 3, it’ll be more about the composition of the Center Back unit and how complementary their skill sets are.

From Spurs’ point of view, just 5 Million Pounds for a prospect with a lot of upside, who can play a variety of Center Back roles is a logical and cheap swing to take. From Takai’s point of view, I do feel he could’ve chosen to go to a mid-table Bundesliga/Serie A side to get guaranteed playing time, especially in a very important World Cup year. He did get offers from Udinese & Borussia Mönchengladbach this summer which is about the level that would’ve made sense to me for his first foray into Europe at his current abilities.

Kota Takai is in my opinion the best Center Back prospect that Japan has had since Takehiro Tomiyasu. I do think Tomiyasu had accomplished more at Takai’s current age but you also have to keep in mind that Japan’s level (especially in defense) is much higher now than it was 6~7 years ago. Still, even the current Arsenal defender did not jump straight to the Premier League from the J.League! Heading into the 2026 World Cup there are big hopes on Takai’s broad shoulders in Japan, I think he can become a star but he needs to be given time.

Thanks for reading!