Kokkai Futoshi

Kokkai Futoshi (born March 10, 1981, as Levan Tsaguria, ) is a former professional sumo wrestler from Georgia. He began his career in May 2001. He is the first Georgian rikishi to reach sumo's highest division, makuuchi, which he achieved in 2004. His highest rank was komusubi, which he reached in 2006. He earned two special prizes for Fighting Spirit and two gold stars for defeating yokozuna. He wrestled for Oitekaze stable.

Early life and sumo background The makuuchi wrestler arriving for a tournament in January 2008. Kokkai was born as Levan Tsaguria in Sukhumi, Abkhaz Autonomous Republic in then-Soviet Georgia. The secessionist war in Abkhazia forced his family to move to Tbilisi, capital of Georgia, in 1992. He started amateur wrestling from the age of six, being taught by his father who represented the Soviet Union in the sport. Levan enrolled in the National Academy of Sports of Georgia and quickly got interested in sumo, taking part in the World Amateur Sumo Championships in Riesa, Germany. In January 2001, he arrived in Tokyo, Japan, and joined a local sumo school.

He made his professional debut in May 2001, joining Oitekaze stable. His stablemaster, former maegashira Daishoyama, gave him the shikona, or ring name, of Kokkai, named after the word for Black Sea in Japanese. He quickly rose through the lower divisions, winning the jonidan and sandanme championships with perfect 7–0 records. Another tournament title in the makushita division in January 2003 followed by a 5–2 score at Makushita 1 saw him reach elite sekitori status in May 2003. After winning the jūryō division championship with a 14–1 record in November 2003 he was promoted to the top makuuchi division in January 2004, just 16 tournaments after his debut.

Top division career

Kokkai steadily climbed the maegashira ranks, reaching the #1 position in November 2004 before slipping back slightly. One of his best performances came in July 2005 when he defeated yokozuna Asashōryū for the first time, scored nine wins and was awarded the Fighting Spirit prize. He made his san'yaku debut in September 2006 at komusubi rank and held it with a solid 8–7 record, but he fell back to the maegashira ranks after a back injury restricted him to a poor 3–12 mark in November.

In March 2007 he turned in an impressive 10–5 score but he struggled again in May 2007, only managing three wins at the rank of maegashira 2. After another losing score in July of that year he fell to maegashira 12 in September, his lowest-ever top-division rank. He managed nine wins in November 2007, his first kachi-koshi, or winning score, since March.

After a solid 9–6 performance in January 2008, in the following tournament he produced his best-ever top-division result, a 12–3 score from the rank of maegashira 5, which earned him joint runner-up honours behind Asashōryū and his second Fighting Spirit prize.

He is a devout Christian and prays every day.

Fighting style

Due to a neck injury, Kokkai was forced to change his sumo style. He began to fight more on the mawashi, gripping his opponent's belt, switching from the pushing and thrusting techniques he used earlier in his career. His profile at the Japan Sumo Association still lists tsuki/oshi as his favoured techniques, and his most common winning kimarite was oshi-dashi, or push-out, followed by yori-kiri, or force-out. He was also fond of using the slap-down (hataki-komi) and the pull-down (hiki-otoshi).

Family Kokkai's younger brother George also became a professional sumo wrestler in September 2005 under the name Tsukasaumi, but quit after just a year following the death of their mother, returning to Georgia to take over the family business.

Kokkai was married to a 22-year-old from his native country Georgia in August 2011.

Career record