# 2012–13 Top League

The 2012–13 Top League was the tenth season of Japan's domestic rugby union competition, the Top League. It kicked off on 31 August 2012. The final was held on 27 January 2013 and won by Suntory Sungoliath to claim their third Top League title.

## Teams

| Team | Region | Coach | Captain |
| Canon Eagles | Machida, Tokyo, Kantō | Yoji Nagatomo | Taku Wada |
| Fukuoka Sanix Blues | Munakata, Fukuoka, Kyūshū | Yuichiro Fujii | Yasutake Nagashita |
| Kintetsu Liners | Higashiosaka, Osaka, Kansai | Ryusuke Maeda | Tadanobu Ko |
| Kobelco Steelers | Kobe, Kansai | Seiji Hirao | Daiki Hashimoto |
| Kyuden Voltex | Fukuoka, Kyūshū | Koji Hirata | Makoto Matsumoto |
| NEC Green Rockets | Abiko, Chiba, Kantō | Greg Cooper | Ryota Asano |
| NTT DoCoMo Red Hurricanes | Osaka, Kansai | Kazunari Takano | Takeshi Hirase |
| NTT Com Shining Arcs | Chiba, Chiba, Kantō | Masato Hayashi | Hiraku Tomoigawa |
| Panasonic Wild Knights | Ota, Gunma, Kantō | Norifumi Nakajima | Seiichi Shimomura |
| Ricoh Black Rams | Tokyo, Kantō | Leon Holden | Daisuke Komatsu |
| Suntory Sungoliath | Fuchū, Tokyo, Kantō | Naoya Okubo | Shinya Makabe |
| Toshiba Brave Lupus | Fuchū, Tokyo, Kantō | Kenichi Wada | Masato Toyoda |
| Toyota Verblitz | Toyota, Aichi, Tokai | Keiji Hirose | Ryuta Ueno |
| Yamaha Júbilo | Iwata, Shizuoka, Tokai | Katsuyuki Kiyomiya | Yuta Kasahara |

## Regular season

The 14 teams played a round-robin tournament for the 2012–13 Top League regular season.
The top 4 qualified for the title play-offs to fight for the Microsoft Cup and the Top League title. The top 4 also qualified directly into the All-Japan Rugby Football Championship.
Teams ranked 5th to 10th went through to the wildcard play-offs for qualification into the All-Japan Rugby Football Championship. Teams ranked 13th and 14th went to the promotion and relegation play-offs against regional challengers to fight to remain in the Top League.

### Table

Top League Table :
| | Club | Played | Won | Drawn | Lost | Points For | Points Against | Points Difference | Try Bonus | Losing Bonus | Points |
| 1 | Suntory Sungoliath | 13 | 13 | 0 | 0 | 481 | 258 | +223 | 11 | 0 | 63 |
| 2 | Toshiba Brave Lupus | 13 | 10 | 0 | 3 | 478 | 266 | +212 | 8 | 2 | 50 |
| 3 | Panasonic Wild Knights | 13 | 10 | 0 | 3 | 509 | 275 | +234 | 8 | 1 | 49 |
| 4 | Kobelco Steelers | 13 | 9 | 1 | 3 | 468 | 255 | +213 | 9 | 2 | 49 |
| 5 | Toyota Verblitz | 13 | 9 | 1 | 3 | 343 | 291 | +52 | 4 | 1 | 43 |
| 6 | Yamaha Júbilo | 13 | 8 | 0 | 5 | 430 | 311 | +119 | 7 | 3 | 42 |
| 7 | Kintetsu Liners | 13 | 6 | 0 | 7 | 356 | 308 | +48 | 6 | 3 | 33 |
| 8 | NEC Green Rockets | 13 | 6 | 0 | 7 | 399 | 375 | +24 | 7 | 1 | 32 |
| 9 | NTT Com Shining Arcs | 13 | 7 | 0 | 6 | 240 | 313 | –73 | 1 | 2 | 31 |
| 10 | Ricoh Black Rams | 13 | 5 | 0 | 8 | 322 | 360 | –38 | 5 | 3 | 28 |
| 11 | Canon Eagles | 13 | 3 | 0 | 10 | 287 | 382 | –95 | 5 | 2 | 19 |
| 12 | Kyuden Voltex | 13 | 2 | 0 | 11 | 238 | 593 | –355 | 5 | 3 | 16 |
| 13 | NTT DoCoMo Red Hurricanes | 13 | 1 | 0 | 12 | 217 | 524 | –307 | 2 | 2 | 8 |
| 14 | Fukuoka Sanix Blues | 13 | 1 | 0 | 12 | 256 | 513 | –257 | 2 | 1 | 7 |
| • The top 4 teams qualified to the title play-offs.  • The top 4 teams also qualified for entry into the All-Japan Rugby Football Championship.  • Teams 5 to 10 qualified to the wildcard play-offs for entry into the All-Japan Rugby Football Championship.  • Teams 11 and 12 remain in the Top League for 2013–14.  • Teams 13 and 14 went through to the promotion and relegation play-offs against regional challengers. |||||||||||||||
| Source:The Rugby Archive Updated: 6 Jan 2013 Four points for a win, two for a draw, one bonus point for four tries or more (BP1) and one bonus point for losing by seven or less (BP2). If teams are level at any stage, tiebreakers are applied in the following order:  • Difference between points for and against  • Total number of points for  • Number of matches won  • Aggregate number of points scored in matches between tied teams  • Number of matches won excluding the first match, then the second and so on until the tie is settled |||||||||||||||

### Fixtures and results
#### Round 13
## Title play-offs

Top 4 sides of the regular season competed in the Microsoft Cup (2013) knock out tournament to fight for the Top League title. The top 4 teams of 2012–13 were Suntory Sungoliath, Toshiba Brave Lupus, Panasonic Wild Knights, and Kobe Steel Kobelco Steelers.

### Semi-finals

* 19 January 2013
| Suntory Sungoliath | 38–19 | Kobelco Steelers |
| Try: Hatakeyama 49' Pisi (2) 57', 78' Murata 60' Con: Nicholas (3) 49', 57', 78' Pen: Nicholas (3) 12', 25', 39' Drop: Pisi 70' | | Try: Yasui 18' Maekawa 27' Ohashi 32' Con: Morita (2) 18', 27' |
* 20 January 2013
| Panasonic Wild Knights | 8–20 | Toshiba Brave Lupus |
| Try: Sasakura 51' Pen: Delany 24' | | Try: T Yoshida 69' Shin Ito 79' Con: Hill 69' R Yoshida 79' Pen: Hill 14, 55' |

### Final

* 27 January 2013 14:00
| Suntory Sungoliath | 19–3 | Toshiba Brave Lupus |
| Try: Murata (2) 8', 34' Pisi 75' Con: Nicholas (2) 34', 75' | | Pen: Hill 18' |
* Prince Chichibu, Tokyo Attendance: 13,858 Referee: Taizo Hirabayashi
| FB | 15 | Go Aruga | 76' |
| RW | 14 | Daichi Murata | 42' to 52' |
| OC | 13 | Koji Taira |
| IC | 12 | Ryan Nicholas |
| LW | 11 | Hirotoki Onozawa |
| FH | 10 | Kosei Ono | 72' |
| SH | 9 | Fourie du Preez | 61' to 71' 72' |
| N8 | 8 | Masakatsu Nishikawa | 76' |
| OF | 7 | Takamichi Sasaki | 52' |
| BF | 6 | George Smith |
| RL | 5 | Shinya Makabe (c) |
| LL | 4 | Koji Shinozuka |
| TP | 3 | Kensuke Hatakeyama | 31' |
| HK | 2 | Yusuke Aoki | 54' |
| LP | 1 | Akira Ozaki | 76' |
| Replacements: ||
| PR | 16 | Tateo Kanai | 76' |
| PR | 17 | Yosuke Ikegaya | 31' |
| LK | 18 | |
| FL | 19 | Shinji Gen | 76' |
| SH | 20 | Atsushi Hiwasa | 72' |
| FH | 21 | Tusi Pisi | 72' |
| FB | 22 | Hiroki Miyamoto | 76' |
| | Coach: Naoya Okubo |
| FB | 15 | Gochi Tachikawa | 76' |
| RW | 14 | Toshiaki Hirose |
| OC | 13 | Hiroki Yoshida |
| IC | 12 | Tomohiro Senba |
| LW | 11 | Shin Ito |
| FH | 10 | David Hill | 40' |
| SH | 9 | Jun Fujii | 47' |
| N8 | 8 | Masato Toyoda (c) |
| OF | 7 | Tomoaki Nakai |
| BF | 6 | Steven Bates | 53' |
| RL | 5 | Hitoshi Ono |
| LL | 4 | Yota Mochizuki | 72' |
| TP | 3 | Takuma Asahara |
| HK | 2 | Hiroki Yuhara | 72' |
| LP | 1 | Tomohiro Kubo | 58' |
| Replacements: ||
| HK | 16 | Taku Inokuchi | 72' |
| PR | 17 | Masataka Mikami | 58' |
| LK | 18 | Kyosuke Kajikawa | 72' |
| FL | 19 | Michael Leitch | 53' |
| SH | 20 | Tomoki Yoshida | 47' |
| CE | 21 | Neil Brew | 40' |
| WG | 22 | Takehisa Usuzuki | 76' |
| | Coach: Kenichi Wada |

## Wildcard play-offs

The two second round winners qualified for the All-Japan Rugby Football Championship.

### First round

The Top League teams ranked 7th and 10th played-off for the right to meet the Top League team ranked 5th in the second round. The Top League teams ranked 8th and 9th played-off for the right to meet the Top League team ranked 6th in the second round.
So Kintetsu and NEC progressed to the second round.

### Second round

The Top League team ranked 5th played-off against the winner of the teams ranked 7th and 10th, and the Top League team ranked 6th played-off against the winner of the teams ranked 8th and 9th. The two winning second round teams advanced to the All-Japan Rugby Football Championship.
So Toyota and Yamaha advanced to the All-Japan Rugby Football Championship.

## Top League Challenge Series

Coca-Cola West Red Sparks and Kubota Spears won promotion to the 2013–14 Top League via the 2012–13 Top League Challenge Series, while Mitsubishi Sagamihara DynaBoars and Toyota Industries Shuttles progressed to the promotion play-offs.

## Promotion and relegation play-offs

The Top League teams ranked 14th and 13th played-off against the Challenge 1 teams ranked 3rd and 4th respectively, for the right to be included in the Top League for the following season.
So Toyota Industries was promoted, Sanix was relegated, and NTT remained in the Top League for the next season.

## End-of-season awards

Awards for the Top League season, including the Best XV, were chosen by a panel of members of the media, coaches and captains. The Best XV for the 2012-13 season was spread across six different clubs.

### Team awards

| Award | Winner |
| Top League winners: | Suntory Sungoliath |
| Fair Play award: | Fukuoka Sanix Blues |
| Best fans: | Kobelco Steelers |

### Individual awards

| Award | Winner |
| Top League MVP: | George Smith (Suntory Sungoliath) |
| Rookie award: | Kohei Yoshida (Toyota Verblitz) |
| Most tries: | Akihito Yamada (Panasonic Wild Knights) |
| Top scorer: | Ayumu Goromaru (Yamaha Jubilo) |
| Best kicker: | Ayumu Goromaru (Yamaha Jubilo) |
| Best referee: | Taizo Hirabayashi |
| Playoffs MVP: | Tusi Pisi (Suntory Sungoliath) |
| Special prize: | Hirotoki Onozawa (Suntory Sungoliath) First player to score 100 Top League tries |

### Team of the season

| # | Winner |
| 1. | Yoshimitsu Yasue (Kobelco Steelers) |
| 2. | Yusuke Aoki (Suntory Sungoliath) |
| 3. | Kensuke Hatakeyama (Suntory Sungoliath) |
| 4. | Hitoshi Ono (Toshiba Brave Lupus) |
| 5. | Shinya Makabe (Suntory Sungoliath) |
| 6. | George Smith (Suntory Sungoliath) |
| 7. | Michael Leitch (Toshiba Brave Lupus) |
| 8. | Takashi Kikutani (Toyota Verblitz) |
| 9. | Atsushi Hiwasa (Suntory Sungoliath) |
| 10. | Kosei Ono (Suntory Sungoliath) |
| 11. | Akihito Yamada (Panasonic Wild Knights) |
| 12. | Male Sa'u (Yamaha Jubilo) |
| 13. | Jaque Fourie (Kobelco Steelers) |
| 14. | Hirotoki Onozawa (Suntory Sungoliath) |
| 15. | Ayumu Goromaru (Yamaha Jubilo) |