Sample J-League notes .............
Jul 08, 2020
Eight previews in today's newsletter which ran to well over 4,000 words, you can read the five which covered this morning's J-League games below. The others were for the Serie A and Championship games, so something for everyone !
J-League 1:
Vegalta Sendai- Urawa Reds
These two have already met in the League Cup in Saitama, that was only three games, but five months ago ! Reds won that 5-2 and have not lost in five trips to Sendai (3 draws). I gave that earlier meeting a shout out ahead of Urawa's league opener when I noted .......
Urawa are one of Japan's big clubs, but have not had a good domestic season since 2016, the last three years they have finished 7th, 5th, 14th, Shonan would snatch your arm off if you offered them 14th, but for Reds, it is not good enough. There are excuses, they won the AFC Champions league in 2017 and were runner up in the same competition last year, in 2018 they were not allowed to defend that title and it seemed like they were sulking over that decision for all of 2018, it is very difficult to go deep in the CL and well in the league, as it makes for a very long season, with a LOT of travel. No distractions for Urawa this time round and they HAVE to put in a title challenge and/or qualify for the Champions League again, almost as a minimum.
They have made minimal changes in the off season, the squad did reach the Champions League final after all, CB Thomas Deng from Melbourne and expensive striker Leonardo from Albirex Niigata look good additions. Leonardo has set all kinds of lower league records in recent seasons and made the step up to J-L2 with incredible ease last season, scoring 28 goals and providing 6 assists, he was the top scorer in the second tier , after being top scorer by an eight goal margin in the third division in 2018. Any thoughts on him not being able to make another step up seem to have ended with his run out in the League Cup in midweek, where he scored twice within 35 minutes and provided a third on his debut in a 5-2 demolition of Vegalta Sendai. It was a performance full of promise and hope for the new season and Urawa will look to ride that momentum through early season and record a 5th win in eight visits in this fixture (just one loss).
They won that 3-2 and followed up with a 0-0 draw with champions Yokohama F. Marinos on Saturday. As Reds were a little sloppy defensively in the first, keeping a hungry Marinos scoreless was noteworthy, but it was very hard work and win, lose or draw , this will be a whole level easier . Leonardo scored in the opening day win too, but did not feature at the weekend and was not on the bench, despite Reds claiming no injuries. I expect him to play today and for Urawa to make the most of the drop off in quality of opposition with Vegalta 11th or 12th in each of the last three campaigns.
2 units Urawa Reds -0.5 ball 2.34 asian line/Sportmarket.
Sagan Tosu- Vissel Kobe
Sagan have not scored in their last six starts, three last season and three this , with five defeats and eight months since they last troubled the scorer. The 0-0 draw came on opening day away to Kawasaki Frontale who had one of those days where they could still be playing now and the ball would still not have crossed the goalline, they were wasteful, but Frontale had enough chances to have won two games. Kobe got that long awaited and dreamed of route into the AFC Champions League last season by winning the national cup and started this campaign with a Super Cup win and two victories in the CL.The future looked bright, but then two league games and just one point which has to be seen as a step back ,they are coming off a 3-0 defeat at home to Sanfrecce Hiroshima, ahead of their first game a 1-1 draw with Yokohama FC I wrote ..........
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Vissel Kobe have played a Super Cup and two Champions League games, scoring 9 goals total and now that they have that piece of silverware and are playing international football , they can start to fulfill their owners dream of asian domination. I spoke about all this ahead of their final league start of 2019...........
Jubilo's late survival bid ended last week, they won, but were condemned by results elsewhere. They have played pretty well for a month and have won for us in each of the last two weeks at good odds, but the deed is done now and there is the chance that all the energies put into an eventually fruitless survival attempt will now leave them drained. Vissel are going to finish top 10 , but not much better, they should have been challenging for top 3 and have the potential to be one of the biggest clubs in Asia, ahead of their most recent home game I noted.........
Kobe have ambition, money, potential and star players, but have really struggled to put it all together over the last two seasons for more than a couple of games. Their latest upturn ended with a 6-2 defeat at Hiroshima and Emperor's cup is their clear priority now and owner Rakuten/Hiroshi Mikitani will forgive almost everything if they win that and achieve the dream of CL football.
David Villa is retiring at the end of this season, he will want to play the final league game and the Emperor's Cup games.
They put more effort into that than expected, won 1-0 and followed up away to Kashima Antlers by a 3-1 scoreline. Go figure ! David Villa did not play last week, but what we have seen over the last two wins was the return of Lukas Podolski, only the 3rd and 4th games he has played since May and he finally looks fit again. They have won 7/12 when he is available, just 6/21 otherwise. Finishing 8th or 9th is not going to mean much, but now they have a couple of wins, it would be great to take that momentum into the cup games and to give those supporters , who have been waiting expectantly for so long, at least a good finish to the regular season. Jubilo feel a little like lambs to the slaughter today, we have said similar before about Vissel but on this occasion, pass the mint sauce !
They won that 4-1 , won the cup and have scored 21 goals in their last seven competitive starts, the floodgates have opened !!!!
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Well, they did not stay open long ! But I suspect all momentum was lost with the very lengthy break and it was always going to hurt some teams more than others. Nothing wrong with the overall performance in that opener, Sergi Samper and Andres Iniesta were head and shoulders above anyone else on the pitch and "winning" attempts 18-3, on target 7-2, ITB 14-2, saves 1-5 will normally get the job done, or indicate that it should have done ! Thomas Vermaelen did not feature in either league game, but that was less of a concern than the switch to two up top and three at the back for Sanfrecce , that didn't work and surely 4-1-4-1 today with Douglas up top on his own. Big game for Kobe, they cannot have another season bouncing around in the lower half of the table, even if the international competition will be their priority. Kobe won this fixture 6-1 last season and I expect them to win today if not as emphatically ! Away win.
1.75 units Vissel Kobe -1 ball 2.89 asian line/Sportmarket.
Yokohama F.Marinos- Shonan Bellmare
I was very flattering about Marinos last week ..............
On opening day defending J-League champions Marinos lost 2-1 at home to clubgowi long time favourites Gamba Osaka.
Yokohama will have been disappointed by the result but not by how they played, they passed Gamba to death for 90 minutes and no one (only Marinos) does that and they did the same early last season and we knew from that point on they were "good" and the same conclusion should be made this time round, at least until we see evidence to the contrary. If you ever see a team have circa 500 passes more than Gamba they should go straight into the notebook under the heading "do not oppose without very good reason" !
Gamba can also take confidence and not just from the result, as they also missed another three BC's and created four from very little possession and they will usually dominate that category. I feel they are desperate to start strongly this season as they have basically thrown away any title chance through the opening games in the last two campaigns and then afterwards played like champions ! They took just 10 points from their first 11 games in 2018, then 37 from 23 and, 8 from the opening 11 last season and then 39/23, playing at Champions League level for two thirds of each campaign. They blooded a lot of youngsters last season and all in the "Gamba way" under head coach Tsuneyasu Miyamoto who has spent 17 years at the club man and boy and late last season I noted .............
I have always been a fan of Gamba, their style of football involves a lot of passes and is heavy on possession, but when it all works it is very effective and pleasing on the eye, after a bad start last season, they got back to winning ways under head coach Tsuneyasu Miyamoto and ended 2018 on fire. He understands the club, what makes them tick and has overseen a bit of a transition to a more youthful squad and that is a work in progress, but it is being done in a balanced way and slowly. They again fell out of the blocks this time around, albeit not quite to the extent of last year, but have refound their form, their only loss in 9 starts was away to leaders FC Tokyo,but Gamba led for 32 minutes, missed some big chances and looked the better team there, the game changing in three minutes late in the first half. They have re-signed favourite son and oft discussed Takashi Usami who scored last week on his THIRD debut for the club and also added (re-signed) prolific striker Patric this last week, he contributed to 62 strikes (goals and assists) in 112 games when at the club between 2014-17 and I really like these two additions. They know the club well, can slip almost seemlessly in, as Usami already has and will help convert some of the multi chances the team has been creating.
They have a lot of firepower in the squad for their opener and massive forward bench options and I expect a big year from them, they have a 6-1-0 record in this derby and have only lost 2/14 h2h games with Cerezo home or away.
Marinos have won 7/10 trips to Urawa including the last three without conceding and it is a very short trip up from Yokohama to Saitama. The visitors had played a Champions League game just days before the loss to Gamba so have an excuse, but I am not worried about that and in terms of the defence they will face, Urawa seem weaker and still a work in progress at the back.
Positives in that for Urawa especially early in each half but Marinos probably win that game 7 times from 10 and only a couple of world class saves denied them, the one in the final minute was outstanding. Yokohama got better in each half and head coach Ange Postecoglu said he felt they had superior fitness levels and got on top when they increased the tempo late. That should stand them in good stead today given the need to win, quick turnaround favouring the better team with more depth ,Shonan being very limited and not creating much ( see above).
2 units Yokohama F.Marinos -1.5 ball 2.30 asian line/Sportmarket.
Nagoya Grampus- Gamba Osaka
Notes on Gamba's opener with Marinos in the preview immediately above this. They lost the Osaka derby on Saturday, it was more like the old Gamba in that they had 600+ passes and looked very slick at times, they had a big chance early and then hit the woodwork restricting Cerezo to long range efforts. But the visitors scored with their first attempt inside the box (Gamba won ITB 12-4) and got another with a wonder strike from 30 metres. Once they pulled a goal back with almost 30 minutes remaining it felt like a draw was the minimum Gamba could expect, but it was not to be. Head coach Tsuneyasu Miyamoto (see above) said he was pleased with much of the play and that the five substitute rule was very good for his squad and we got to see all four strikers. He felt that today's game would be far more open, with space to exploit and it is hard to disagree. These are traditionally amongst the most open games in J-League with the last 20 meetings averaging 4.14 and 16 producing 4+ . Gamba have also won on 4/7 visits.
Nagoya do play very open when the opposition is prepared to follow suit and that is definitely Gamba's modus operandi. Grampus have had two odd seasons since returning to J-L1 after one season in the second tier. In the second half of 2018 and first half of 2019 they took 56 points from 34 (full season number) consecutive games, which is top 3-6 level, but in the other 34 just 22 points total, they are both streaky and hit and miss ! They have four points on board but have not played anyone of real note yet, they won 2-1 at Shimizu S-Pulse at the weekend where there were 11 attempts on target and the woodwork was hit three times with both keepers active and we can expect more of the same today.
2 units "over" 3.5 goals 2.51 asian line/Sportmarket.
1.25 units Gamba Osaka -0.5 ball 2.59 asian line/Sportmarket Pro.
Elsewhere:
With four games remaining last season, Kashima Antlers led J-L1 and would have been favourites at that time, having been the dominant team in Japan for five years or so. They have played 8 games subsequently, with two lengthy breaks in between, scoring just three goals and winning once. They eventually finished third last season, have already been eliminated from the AFC Champions League and lost both starts this campaign conceding 5 goals . Today they host Consadole Sapporo who start the season with five away games, they are happy on the road and have scored at least twice in their last seven trips away from Sapporo, coming off a 2-1 win at newly promoted Yokohama FC at the weekend.Hard to put your finger on what has gone wrong at Antlers but something has and I cannot agree with the odds for today based on anything we have seen for a very long time, even if it is only 8 games. To be honest, they were not fully firing prior to that and the 1-1 draw between these two here last season could have played out differently with Consadole hitting the woodwork and missing two other big chances.
1.5 units Consadole Sapporo level ball 2.48 asian line/Sportmarket OR to score "over" 1.5 goals 2.625 general quote.
Stay safe and good luck !
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