Sangoku Taichi

Sangoku Taichi (三国太一) is one of the supporting characters in the Inazuma Eleven GO anime and game. He is the goalkeeper for Raimon and also played once as a defender for Raimon.

Inazuma Eleven GO

 * "Raimon's previous captain. His kindness is his team's mainstay." 

Appearance
He is tall, has brown curly hair that is shaved from the sides and his eyes are black. He has a fair skin color. He wears the goalkeeper uniform of Raimon, Raimon jacket and Raimon school uniform.

Background
Sangoku suddenly had a flashback while playing during the match against Tengawara. It was shown that he was playing cheerfully with his friends in his childhood and how he was playing soccer with them as their goalkeeper. He also named his mother the goddess of victory.

Season 1
He is first seen along with the whole Raimon team that is led by Shindou Takuto to help the team that got attacked by Tsurugi Kyousuke. Afterwards they had a match against Tsurugi's team. He used Burning Catch to try to block Death Sword of Tsurugi, but he wasn't able to succesfully block it. Just like the other members he gets badly beaten. Afterwards Shindou suddenly released his power (which resulted in a Keshin) and stole the ball, but is severly tired and collapsed. He was sent to the hospital with Kirino Ranmaru by Shindou's side.

Later many members of the Raimon team quit which devastated the ones who were left. And Tsurugi comes in later stating that he is joining the Raimon team to which suprised everyone in Raimon. Afterwards, they had a match against Eito and had to lose since that was instructed to them by Fifth Sector, making Sangoku uneasy.

During Episode 9, Sangoku saw Matsukaze near the fields while he was going home after buying supplies. Sangoku invited Matsukaze at his home and taught him that he should also practice passing the ball, not just dribbling. In this episode, Tenma noted that Sangoku was a good cook. Sangoku's mother appeared in this episode, she said that she will come to see his next match which made sangoku refuse telling her that she should not come which made tenma say sangoku really does not want to see his mother so she can't see him losing in his match.

In Episode 10, the second half of the match against Tengawara, Sangoku suddenly has a flashback while playing. It was shown that he was playing with his friends in his childhood and how he was playing soccer with them as their goalkeeper then, the flashback ended. Suddenly, he got his will power back and focused on the game and protecting the goal. He threw the ball to them and one of the members of the opposing team thought the ball was open, but Shinsuke got it. Afterwards he had to block a Keshin hissatsu of another team but he was able to block it, in the end he was happy that the team won with a score of 2-1 meaning that Raimon will advance in the Holy Road tournament.

Afterwards, in the next match against Mannouzaka, the Raimon team and the others had a rough time and also Sangoku since he wasn't able to block most of Mannouzaka's hissatsu. But with the help all of the team members, the Raimon team won against Mannouzaka.

In the match against Teikoku, He is unable to block Koutei Penguin 7 and Mikado 's Keshin shoot.

At the end of Episode 19, he is unable to block Kaiou shoots. So he was replaced by Matsukaze Tenma as goalkeeper and had to play as a defender. After Matsukaze being able to block the opponents shoot, he got his hope back. At the end of the match, he created a Hissatsu called Fence of Gaia to block the shot that is more powerful than his catch hissatsu; Burning Catch.

In Episode 22, he use Fence of Gaia to blocked Minamisawa's Sonic Shot but wasn't able to block Minamisawa's second shot because it was went to another direction to which Sangoku did not anticipate. In Episode 23, he was unable to block Kai Nobutake's Rocket Head.

In Episode 25, Sangoku is seen training allong with the others Raimon team members. He becames shocked and surprised when Hikaru strikes his face in a goalpost. He and Kirino approaches of Hikaru to see if he is well and looked angry to Kariya, who's laughing a lot. Later he asked Hikaru to shoot. Hikaru, after saw Kurama by just some instants, being able to strike a very nice and strong shoot witch impressed Sangoku Taichi. He manages to block the shoot, but his gloves becames very damaged. In the next day, when Matsukaze Tenma asks who is Nishiki Ryouma, Sangoku comments that he hurts himself many times when he tried to block Nishiki powerful shots.

Against Hakuren, he used Fence of Gaia two times against Yukimura's hissatsu technique but failed at the first attempt because it was too fast. In Episode 27, Sangoku was injured by Segi, a powerful SEED of Hakuren. He was replaced by Tenma again.

He plays as the goalkeeper again in Episode 29 against Kidokawa Seishuu (GO), shocked to see that there was big water of wall in front of his goal during Raimon's next match.

In Episode 30, he tried to stop Gallop Buster and Triangle ZZ but failed to do so. In Episode 31, he failed to block Sousuke's shot, but Shinsuke blocked his shot. In Episode 34, he tried to block Maboroshi Shot with his block hissatsu but failed.

In Episode 35, he was able to block Genei no Dalamanglass shot with some help of Amagi Daichi's Biba! Banri no Choujou and Kariya Masaki's Hunter's Net. Though later in the second half of the match, Sangoku is benched because Nishizono Shinsuke will play as the goalkeeper till the end of the match. In the end, Raimon won.

In Episode 37, he was surprised that Shinsuke has a keshin. He was also happy when he saw Minamisawa.

In Episode 38, he used Fence of Gaia two times against Amemiya's Taiyou Shin Apollo's Sunshine Force and keshin shoot but failed. He was replaced by Nishizono Shinsuke, and in the next episode, he helped him to use his keshin.

In the Episode 41, he played in the final against Seidouzan. He tried to stop Ballista Shot but failed because he wasn't too fast. In the Episode 42, he used Fence of Gaia to stop Kurosaki's Bakunetsu Storm but failed another time. In the Episode 43, he became injuried and is replaced by Shinsuke.

Plot (Chrono Stone)
In Episode 1, it was revealed that he joined a sumo club when no one in Raimon could remember what soccer was. He also does not recognize Tenma at all.

In Episode 3, he appeared alongside with the Raimon soccerteam. They remembered their memories for soccer again but they didn't know who Tsurugi Kyousuke was. He agreed to help Tsurugi Yuuichi, Tenma and Fey Rune to bring back the soccer and stop the plans of El Dorado.

Inazuma Eleven GO the Movie: The Ultimate Bonds Gryphon
Sangoku appeared with the rest of the Raimon's team in the GO movie. He wasn't able to stop many shoots from Unlimited Shining or Ancient Dark. During the match against Team Zero, he wasn't able to stop Hakuryuu's normal shoot and keshin shoot, but with the help of Tsurugi, blocked White Breath. Then, he was badly injuried and was replaced by Endou.

At the end of the match, he used a new hissatsu, Burai Hand, to stop Shuu's and Hakuryuu's Zero Magnum.

Quotes

 * "Tenma, we can't disregard how the others are feeling, we were at the same place as them a while ago." (To Matsukaze Tenma)

Hissatsu

 *  [GK] Burning Catch
 *  [GK] Fence of Gaia
 *  [GK]  Burai Hand (Movie/GO/Wii Game)

Trivia

 * His surname means "three kingdoms".
 * Sangoku shares the same seiyuu as Yamino Kageto, Sasuke and Otaki Tono.
 * With Endou, Tenma, Tachimukai, Rococo, Shinsuke and Shadow, Sangoku is the only character with two different numbers in the same team (Raimon (GO): 1 (goalkeeper) and 17 (defender).
 * He is one of the third years of Raimon.
 * In Inazuma Eleven Strikers 2012 XTreme, he has a new catch hissatsu called Burai Hand, though he seems to don't have it in the anime.
 * His character song is "Honmono no Tsuyosa (True Strength)" (with Minamisawa).
 * He was the captain of Raimon before he gave the position to Shindou Takuto.
 * During the altered timeline in Episode 001 (Chrono Stone), Sangoku ended up joining the Sumo Club, which goes to show that if he wasn't in the soccer club, he would be in another club instead.