is a former Japanese football player and manager. He played for the Japan national team.

Biography
Kato was born in Rifu, Miyagi on April 24, 1956. After graduating from Waseda University, after a year's blank, he joined Japan Soccer League club Yomiuri (later Verdy Kawasaki) in 1980. The club won the champions in Japan Soccer League 5 times, JSL Cup 2 times and Emperor's Cup 3 times. This was golden era in club history. In 1992, Japan Soccer League was folded and founded new league J1 League. The club won 1992 J.League Cup. First J1 League season in 1993, although he played in opening match, he lost opportunity to play after that. So, he moved to Shimizu S-Pulse in July. In July 1994, he returned to Verdy Kawasaki. The club won J1 League and retired end of 1994 season. He was 38 years old. He played 243 games and scored 11 goals in the league. He was selected Best Eleven 9 times.

On November 19, 1978, when Kato was a Waseda University student, he debuted for the Japan national team against Soviet Union. He played at 1978 and 1982 Asian Games. From 1984, he served as captain and played at 1984 Summer Olympics qualification, 1986 World Cup qualification, 1986 Asian Games and 1988 Summer Olympics qualification. At 1988 Olympics qualification in 1987, Japan failed to qualify for 1988 Summer Olympics and he retired from national team. He played 61 games and scored 6 goals for Japan until 1987.

After retirement, Kato became a manager for Verdy Kawasaki in 1997. But he resigned in July. In 2000, he signed with J2 League club Shonan Bellmare. However the club finished 8th place, he was sacked end of 2000 season. In 2007, he signed with J2 club Kyoto Sanga FC and became a general manager. However he sacked manager Naohiko Minobe and Kato became new manager in October. He led the club to won the 3rd place in 2007 and promoted to J1 League. In July 2010, he was sacked.

In 2018, Kato was selected Japan Football Hall of Fame.

Statistics

|-
|1980||rowspan="12"|Yomiuri||rowspan="12"|JSL Division 1||14||0||3||1||2||0||19||1
|-
|1981||18||3||5||1||1||0||24||4
|-
|1982||18||0||3||0||0||0||21||0
|-
|1983||18||0||3||0||3||1||24||1
|-
|1984||16||0||5||1||0||0||21||1
|-
|1985/86||16||2||2||0||4||1||22||3
|-
|1986/87||22||1||5||0||0||0||27||1
|-
|1987/88||22||2||5||0||1||0||28||2
|-
|1988/89||20||0||3||1||3||1||26||2
|-
|1989/90||10||0||1||0||1||0||12||0
|-
|1990/91||21||3||2||0||2||0||25||3
|-
|1991/92||20||0||5||0||0||0||25||0
|-
|1992||rowspan="2"|Verdy Kawasaki||rowspan="2"|J1 League||colspan="2"|-||5||0||9||1||14||1
|-
|1993||1||0||0||0||1||0||2||0
|-
|1993||rowspan="2"|Shimizu S-Pulse||rowspan="2"|J1 League||14||0||3||0||0||0||17||0
|-
|1994||6||0||0||0||0||0||6||0
|-
|1994||Verdy Kawasaki||J1 League||7||0||0||0||0||0||7||0
243||11||50||4||27||4||320||19
243||11||50||4||27||4||320||19
|}

|-
|1978||5||1
|-
|1979||0||0
|-
|1980||3||0
|-
|1981||8||1
|-
|1982||8||0
|-
|1983||7||1
|-
|1984||6||1
|-
|1985||8||0
|-
|1986||5||0
|-
|1987||11||2
|-
!Total||61||6
|}

References

Other websites

 Japan Football Hall of Fame at Japan Football Association

1956 births
Living people
Footballers from Miyagi Prefecture
Japan international footballers
Japanese football managers
J1 League players
Japan Soccer League players
Tokyo Verdy players
Shimizu S-Pulse players