Kenichi Uemura

Kenichi Uemura
Personal information
Full name	Kenichi Uemura
Date of birth	April 22, 1974 (age 50)
Place of birth	Yatsushiro, Kumamoto, Japan
Height	1.80 m (5 ft 11 in)
Position(s)	Defender (retired)
Youth career
1990–1992	Matsunaga High School
Senior career*
Years	Team
1993–2004	Sanfrecce Hiroshima
2004	→Cerezo Osaka (loan)
2005–2006	Tokyo Verdy 1969
2006	Yokohama Sports and Culture Club
2007–2008	Rosso Kumamoto / Roasso Kumamoto
International career
2001	Japan
	*Club domestic league appearances and goals

Kenichi Uemura (上村健一, Uemura Ken'ichi, born April 22, 1974 in Yatsushiro, Kumamoto, Japan) is a former Japanese football player. He is a defender and was capped 4 times for Japan national football team.

Playing career

After graduating from Matsunaga High Schook, he joined J. League Division 1 side Sanfrecce Hiroshima in 1993. He broke into the first team in the first season. His first league appearance came on July 4, 1993 against Verdy Kawasaki at Todoroki Stadium. He scored his first professional goal on July 24, 1993 against Urawa Red Diamonds at Hiroshima Stadium.

He represented Japan at the 1996 Summer Olympics. He scored a goal in a group stage match against Hungary.

National coach Philippe Troussier gave him the first full international cap on April 25, 2001 in a friendly against Spain in Córdoba. He was a member of the Japan team for the 2001 FIFA Confederations Cup and he played three games.

After 11 year long service at Hiroshima, he moved to Cerezo Osaka in 2004, then Tokyo Verdy 1969 (2005–2006). After a brief spell at Yokohama Sports & Culture Club, he joined Roasso Kumamoto in 2007.

He damaged his knee ligaments three times and experienced seven operations. These injuries have affected his form.

Uemura retired from professional football after the 2008 season.

Club career statistics

Template:Football player club statistics 1 Template:Football player club statistics 2 |- |1993||rowspan="11"|Sanfrecce Hiroshima||rowspan="10"|J. League 1||17||1||2||0||6||0||25||1 |- |1994||26||0||2||0||1||0||29||0 |- |1995||46||4||4||0||colspan="2"|-||50||4 |- |1996||12||2||0||0||7||0||19||2 |- |1997||3||0||0||0||0||0||3||0 |- |1998||17||0||3||0||0||0||20||0 |- |1999||29||7||5||1||4||1||38||9 |- |2000||28||6||2||0||3||0||33||6 |- |2001||25||2||2||0||5||0||32||2 |- |2002||10||1||4||0||0||0||14||1 |- |2003||J. League 2||38||0||4||0||colspan="2"|-||42||0 |- |2004||Cerezo Osaka||J. League 1||15||0||0||0||6||0||21||0 |- |2005||rowspan="2"|Tokyo Verdy||J. League 1||18||0||1||0||4||0||23||0 |- |2006||J. League 2||1||0||0||0||colspan="2"|-||1||0 |- |2006||Yokohama Sports and Culture Club||Regional Leagues||0||0||colspan="2"|-||colspan="2"|-||0||0 |- |2007||Rosso Kumamoto||Football League||30||3||1||0||colspan="2"|-||31||3 |- |2008||Roasso Kumamoto||J. League 2||28||0||0||0||colspan="2"|-||28||0 Template:Football player club statistics 3343||26||30||1||36||1||409||28 Template:Football player club statistics 5343||26||30||1||36||1||409||28 |}