Kobe – Gamba Osaka blog in English

Vissel Kobe vs Gamba Osaka
2022 J1 Season Round 30
Sunday 18 September 2022
Noevir Stadium
Kick Off: 19:00 (JST)

The stakes couldn’t be any higher for Gamba Osaka or Vissel Kobe ahead of this Sunday night’s Hanshin Derby. Hosts Vissel currently occupy the promotion / relegation spot, but they are just a solitary point behind their visitors from nearby Osaka, with a game in hand, following a crucial 2-1 victory over FC Tokyo in midweek. Kobe are only ahead of 17th placed Fukuoka on goal difference, while both Kyoto and Shonan sit a mere point above the Nerazzurri and 2 ahead of Vissel meaning that the result of this fixture could have serious implications across the country. Gamba come into this tie on the back of an 8 day break since their disappointing 0-0 draw with FC Tokyo at Panasonic Stadium, an outcome that looked like a distinct possibility pre-match and not a whole lot happened during the 90 minutes to suggest that it was going to end any other way. Having failed to score in their last 3 home outings, caretaker boss Hiroshi Matsuda may relish the chance to take his charges on the road again as they search for a third win on the spin outside of Suita. The Ao to Kuro have teased a potential return for Takashi ‘The Kobe Killer’ Usami, while there have been murmurings from the Kobe camp that seasoned international Yuya Osako could launch his latest comeback from injury here too. However, with or without that star duo we’re likely in for tension, drama and potentially a good deal of fireworks in one of Japan’s most picturesque cities, what more could you want from your Sunday evening?

Tale of the Tape

Five matches into Hiroshi Matsuda’s reign as Gamba kantoku and the Nerazzurri have won twice, drawn once and lost twice, accumulating 7 points in the process, if they can repeat that over their remaining 5 fixtures then they should just about be able to avoid the bottom three. Of course there have been ups and downs, defensively 3 clean sheets have been kept in 5 games (compared with 5 in the previous 24), while 8 goals have been given up in the other 2 outings against Hiroshima and Tosu. However, if it’s just the odd game when every shot from the opposition ends up in the back of the net versus stability in the next few, that’s probably an acceptable bargain given the current situation. Speaking of shots against, since the horror show at the Edion Stadium when 5 goals were ceded from 27 attempts, Matsuda’s Gamba have averaged only 12.3 (6 on target) shots against per 90 minutes compared with 15.9 (9.1) overall. The DAZN commentators on Saturday seemed to be on commission for using the phrase ‘442 zone defence’ when describing Matsuda’s set-up (‘innerlap’ appeared to be their buzzword when discussing FC Tokyo) and the signs do seem to be pointing towards greater defensively stability at Panasonic Stadium, though how much this is thrown off by Genta Miura’s concussion and the potential upcoming suspension headache (Kurokawa and Saito) remains to be seen. Further forward, Gamba applied more of a high-press against FC Tokyo than had been seen under Matsuda previously, with the Brazilian duo of Patric and a seemingly rejuvenated Leandro Pereira leading the charge. The Nerazzurri harassed and harried their opponents in their own half throughout the 90 minutes, though the strategy proved to be most effective during the opening half hour. FC Tokyo did seem to be made-to-order opponents for the Nerazzurri as, unlike Tosu the previous week, who came to Suita chastened by a 4-0 hammering at Kawasaki, the Gasmen were fresh off the back of a couple of more-than-decent results and had a slight air of ‘we only have to turn up here to win’ about them, which I’m sure irritated kantoku Albert Puig and their supporters no end. Gamba won 20 of 25 tackles attempted on Saturday night, I don’t quite have the stats to back this up, but anecdotally I’m pretty sure that’s by far the best performance in that metric all season. While it’s fair to say based on league position that FC Tokyo are much stronger than Gamba in 2022 and equally the Nerazzurri’s need to win was far higher than their opponents on Saturday, the sad truth is that the home side were unable to translate that greater desire and fighting spirit into something more tangible, like a much needed home 3 pointer. The lack of a finishing touch again came back to haunt them and it’s worth re-stating that the Nerazzurri’s top scorers are still Dawhan, Onose, Patric and Pereira, who are all tied on just 3 goals apiece. Furthermore, it should also be noted that this was the 3rd home game in-a-row where Gamba have failed to score, so there’s still plenty of work for Matsuda and his coaching staff to do on the training ground. While that might all be a touch negative, one bright spark for those of a blue and black persuasion was the return to the starting eleven of Yuki Yamamoto for the first time since round 9. The schemer helped take some of the creative burden off Juan Alano’s shoulders and put in an impressive display on attack and defence, completing 46 of 53 passes and supplying 1 last pass as well as winning 3 of 4 tackles (usually his weak point), making 3 blocks and recovering possession twice. The Ao to Kuro faithful will be hoping his partnership with Mitsuki Saito can continue to bear fruit over the remaining 5 games of the 2022 campaign.

Frankly speaking, Vissel have followed up a historic high 3rd place league finish in 2021 with an absolute abomination of a season to date this year. They kicked off their campaign with a run of just 1 win and 8 points from their opening 15 league fixtures and though things have picked up since then with 6 wins and 20 points being accrued from the next 13 games, they still find themselves mired in the bottom 3. During their Annus mirabilis last term they outperformed their opposition in terms of xG by 0.13 per game, however, this time round it’s been much more even, 1.22xG for per 90 minutes versus 1.21xG against, a razor thin margin which has left them susceptible to the vagaries of luck. Coaching and formation changes as well as injuries to key attackers Osako and Muto haven’t helped, but over the course of their 28 J1 games to date they’ve scored 9.35 times less than they should have based on their accumulated xG for figure of 34.16. Defensively things match up pretty evenly, 35 actual goals conceded compared with 33.88xG against. Vissel started the year in a 4-4-2 with a midfield diamond under Atsuhiro Miura and that has since morphed into a 4-2-3-1 / 4-4-2 and latterly a 4-3-3 / 4-1-2-3 for the home bout with FC Tokyo. I may have wrote kantoku Takayuki Yoshida off as another shining example of tall, handsome men being more likely to earn promotions than anyone else in society and just another Mikitani yes-man, but in fairness to the former Nagasaki boss, he’s managed to grind out results with 5 wins, 2 draws and 3 defeats the league record so far during his tenure. Kobe are going at a clip of 2.13 points per game under Yoshida as opposed to 1.00 across the campaign as a whole, granted he did win his first 3 games in charge, before the ride became a bit more bumpy. The current set-up that Yoshida has implemented does seem to get the best out of Koya Yuruki and he’s really stepped up to the plate while his more experienced attacking colleagues have been on the treatment table, a double in the away win at Sapporo in addition to two assists versus FC Tokyo on Wednesday night are testament to that. However, Vissel just like their near neighbours Gamba have struggled to hit the back of the net with any kind of regularity, Yoshinori Muto is their top scorer with 5 strikes, closely followed by Osako and Yuruki on 4. Indeed, ex-Yamagata and Urawa winger Yuruki’s 7 direct goal involvements is the leading total at the club and it means he’s had a hand in nearly 30% of Kobe’s goals this year. Gamba have been well warned about where the danger is coming from in this Vissel side, will they be able to maintain their recent defensive stability, or will Yuruki, Muto and co. be able to expose some old familiar frailties?

First Match Recap

Gamba’s 2-0 stroll in the sunshine against Kobe at the end of Golden Week has, on reflection, probably been their season’s highlight to date. Granted, the early dismissal of Vissel centre-back Ryuho Kikuchi for a DOGSO offence certainly played it’s part, but there were plenty of signs prior to that which indicated the Nerazzurri were the more focused and driven side on the occasion and thus the likelier to come out on top regardless of how many players Kobe kept on the field. Jiro Nakamura smacked the crossbar, Ko Yanagisawa the left post and Kwon Kyung-won the right in a raucous first-half during which the aforementioned Kikuchi saw red for tripping Patric with the big Brazilian bearing down on goal. In fairness to Vissel they put their bodies on the line to prevent Gamba taking the lead in the second period and could even have gone ahead themselves when substitute Iniesta shimmied and jinked and played in Yoshinori Muto whose shot was well smothered by Jun Ichimori. However, the visitors were undone twice in the final ten minutes, Kwon Kyung-won headed home the opener after a corner was only partially cleared before Wellington Silva wrapped up the scoring with his first Gamba goal courtesy of a pretty large deflection. In the aftermath there were suggestions that the Ao to Kuro should have considered themselves fortunate to come out on top, but such diatribes failed to take into account the fact that Kikuchi was rightly ordered off, the Nerazzurri outshot their opponents 33-5, struck the woodwork three times and had shots blocked, deflected away, and saved on numerous occasions. The Kobe dam simply had to burst and fans like myself left Panasonic Stadium in buoyant mood with Gamba avoiding home defeat to Vissel for only the second time since the club moved to their new digs back in 2016.

Gamba Osaka

The run in – After this Sunday’s Hanshin Derby, there’s an international break which means Gamba aren’t back in action until their home bout with out-of-form Kashiwa Reysol on 1 October. The following week there’s a trip to Nissan Stadium to square off against title-chasing Yokohama F. Marinos, a side they’ve only lost away to once in their last 7 visits. Next, there’s a 3 week gap before the visit of Yasuhito Endo and Júbilo Iwata who could already be down by that point and then the league season finishes just as it began with a game against Kashima. Hopefully the round 34 tie in Ibaraki doesn’t feature any shenanigans from you-know-who in the Stags #40 jersey. A tough, but not insurmountable set of fixtures await, Gamba’s fate lies in their own hands, will they be good enough to haul themselves to safety or will they be sucked down to the depths of J2?

Keisuke Kurokawa – I’m a little late with this nugget of information due to my illness, but I thought it was worth sharing nonetheless. When questioned about Keisuke Kurokawa, Matsuda kantoku said he initially struggled to understand what type of player Kurokawa was and what his strengths and weaknesses were. This is likely the reason that he was absent for the 5-2 loss at Hiroshima, Matsuda’s first game in charge. However, upon further inspection on the training field, as well as perhaps observing that sadly Hiroki Fujiharu is no longer a J1 player (Gamba have 2 draws and 8 losses from the 10 J1 games Fujiharu has started this year), Matsuda realised what a quality player Kurokawa was and quickly re-called him to the starting lineup.

Rihito Yamamoto – With the on-field success of Yuki Yamamoto last weekend I thought this was a good chance to shine the spotlight on his midfield namesake, Rihito Yamamoto. With Meshino, Juan Alano and Musashi Suzuki all getting regular first-team minutes, it’s sometimes easy to forget that Gamba made a fourth summer signing in late July, that of Tokyo Verdy and Japan U-20 star Rihito Yamamoto. He actually joined with a small fracture in his foot and has been completing a rehabilitation program ever since, though with 5 matches remaining I’m somewhat doubtful that he’ll play at all this year. Through no fault of his own Yamamoto has become a pawn in Gamba’s transfer market madness. Take his position of central midfield, the Nerazzurri have basically played with two players in that role all season, yet on their books they have the 2 Yamamotos, Dawhan, Mitsuki Saito, Kohei Okuno and Shu Kurata who are all skilled in that area. What is the reason for amassing so many talented players, especially when all except Kurata are essentially only central-midfielders who can’t play effectively elsewhere? This is an issue that plagues the club in several positions around the field and in the wake of Tomohiro Katanosaka’s dismissal there was talk of bringing the front office and coaching departments closer together. In all honesty, the fact that this didn’t happen years ago is borne out in the club’s struggles in recent seasons. Those who don’t move with the times are destined to fail.

A word on referees – Last week against Tosu, referee Takafumi Mikuriya had a completely scattergun approach to what was and wasn’t a foul or booking. The somewhat infamous Yoshiro Imamura took charge of Gamba vs FC Tokyo and while he was more consistent, his strategy of don’t give anything in the first-half, but everything is a free-kick and yellow card after the break surely infuriated both sets of supporters in equal measure. There were definitely a few wild lunges going in from Gamba players as things got frantic towards the end, though once more I have to question how FC Tokyo’s Keigo Higashi managed to remain on the field for the full 90. After being rightly yellow carded for breaking up a dangerous counter attack, he then proceeded to grab the ball with his hands (a second yellow surely?) to prevent a quick re-start and then when Imamura had cleared away the scrum of players challenging for the ball, Higashi rolled over on his back and started blatantly wasting time by feigning injury (which should have been a third yellow in the space of a minute?). Anyway, I digress as it happened late on and wouldn’t really have made much difference to the final outcome. The other major incident during the match was Yasuki Kimoto’s challenge on Leandro Pereira as the striker bore down on goal in the 55th minute. At a first glance (and that’s all we got on DAZN, suspicious much?) I think it was a fair tackle by Kimoto, however, as fans we were left wondering, why no replays? Why no VAR check? They spend minute after minute analysing certain decisions in scientific detail, how could they have been so sure, so quickly that Kimoto hadn’t caught Pereira?

The battle of the Yuya’s, Fukuda vs Osako – 8 May 2020 Gamba Osaka are hosting Vissel Kobe at Panasonic Stadium, after 22 minutes Yuya Fukuda clumsily brings down Yuya Osako for a foul and receives a yellow card for his troubles. Veteran national team forward Osako is unimpressed with the challenge and seeks revenge. Four minutes later the opportunity presents itself, he trips Fukuda, but Gamba’s number 14 only stumbles so Osako properly kicks him to ensure he hits the ground. Osako levels up the yellow card count 1-1, but Fukuda falls awkwardly and dislocates his shoulder meaning he’ll miss almost 4 months of action. In the aftermath, young Jiro Nakamura gets into a scuffle with Osako and Gotoku Sakai over the forward’s refusal to check on the condition of his prone opponent, and in fairness to him he eventually did shuffle over for a token apology. Why am I going into so much detail about this? Well, it’s clear that while Osako in no way intended to injure Fukuda as badly as he did, his actions suggest he was trying to hurt a fellow professional to get even. Possibly because Fukuda is such a popular player among the Ao to Kuro faithful, I’ve heard opinions from Gamba supporters along the lines of, if Osako is in the Japan national team squad for the World Cup then I’ll only cheer for him grudgingly. So, should both Fukuda and Osako make it onto the Noevir Stadium turf on Sunday night I’m very interested to see what goes down.

Team News

The club announced one symptomatic Covid case on Tuesday 13 September, there were no close contacts within the squad. Other than that, the following players are doubts for this fixture and / or have an important status announcement regarding their availability.

DF Genta Miura – Left the field with concussion against FC Tokyo last weekend following a clash of heads with Adailton. Was training separately from his team-mates as of Tuesday 13 September and must be a serious doubt for this fixture.

MF Rihito Yamamoto – Recovering from a minor fracture in his foot. He’s still just in light training, but should be good to go very soon, whether Matsuda chooses to utilise him is another issue entirely

FW Takashi Usami – The ‘Kobe Killer’ was seen in full training on Monday 12 September as he makes his way back from an achilles tendon rupture suffered in early March. He couldn’t return just in time to sink his old friends over in Hyogo again, could he?

Shu Kurata, Keisuke Kurokawa, Kosuke Onose and Mitsuki Saito are all just a single yellow card away from the one game suspension threshold of 4

Predicted Lineups and Stats

Vissel Kobe

Transfer windows are usually a busy time around the Noevir Stadium and this summer was no exception with 4 arrivals and 3 departures. Sagan Tosu wing-back Nanasei Iino, who has generally played in a more advanced role since joining, classy Brazilian centre-back Matheus Thuler (Flamengo) and Montenegrin international goal-getter Stefan Mugoša (Incheon United), all get the BlogGamba seal of approval. Replacing the departed Kento Hashimoto with Yuki Kobayashi less so, as I can’t quite get away from a comment I saw from a Gamba fan on Twitter which compared that deal with the Nerazzurri’s decision to replace Yosuke Ideguchi with Shinya Yajima in 2018, ie a bona fide international who could feature in the upcoming World Cup, leaving for Europe and his place being taken by a run-of-the-mill J1 player. Other than those moves, young Brazilian forward Lincoln has returned to his homeland, joining Cruzeiro on loan after a disappointing 18 month spell in Hyogo where he found the back of the net just once in 21 league outings. Additionally, Mitsuki Hidaka, someone who I bigged up in my preview for the match at Panasonic Stadium, has departed for lower league Spanish outfit Atlético Paso on loan, a strange switch, but I think he was desperate for a move to Europe no matter how it came about, so good luck to him. Next season, regardless of whether or not they’re in J1 or J2 I expect to see a new face in the dugout, and it certainly will make for fascinating viewing if Vissel do grace the second tier for the first time since 2013, what effect, if any, would that have on the Mikitani Rakuten project? That’s a question I can’t answer, but what I can tell you is that the Port Town Boys have already acquired 4 new faces ahead of the 2023 campaign. Defender Shogo Terasaka, midfielder Shuto Adachi and forward Niina Tominaga will all move up from the club’s impressive Under-18 side which has produced the likes of Yuki Kobayashi (defender), Daiju Sasaki and Yutaro Oda in recent years. Another former youth team product, winger Toya Izumi, rounds out the new arrivals and he will move back to Kobe once he graduates from Biwako Seikei Sport College in Shiga (alma mater of Riku and Riki Matsuda among others).

Team News

The following players are doubts for this fixture and / or have an important status announcement regarding their availability.

MF Andrés Iniesta – Has missed the last 3 league games plus the ACL loss to Jeonbuk and the Emperor’s Cup defeat at the hands of Kashima

MF Sergi Samper – Likely out for the rest of the year with a cruciate knee ligament injury. Was back in Spain receiving treatment, though he has subsequently returned to Japan to continue his rehabilitation.

FW Bojan Krkić – Has been out for 2 months with a knee injury, expected back sometime in October

FW Stefan Mugoša – Has missed the last 4 games (3 league and 1 Emperor’s Cup)

FW Yutaro Oda – Has missed the last 3 games (2 league and 1 Emperor’s Cup)

FW Yuya Osako – Went off vs Yokohama F. Marinos in the ACL and has since missed the loss to Jeonbuk plus 3 league matches and 1 Emperor’s Cup tie. According to his coach’s rather cryptic comments he could return on Sunday.

Predicted Lineups and Stats

Thanks for reading and enjoy the game whoever you are supporting.

Gamba Osaka vs Vissel Kobe
J1 2020 Round 32
Panasonic Stadium Suita
Wednesday 11 November 19:00

The Lowdown

Gamba return from a welcome 8-day break to square off against Vissel Kobe in the final Kansai Derby of the year this Wednesday night. This is a round 32 fixture which has been brought forward as a result of the Hyogo side’s participation in the Asian Champions League in Qatar at the end of the month. Vissel are yet to lose a league match at Panasonic Stadium since Gamba moved in back in 2016 and they will be sure to use that as motivation as they have yet score in any of their 3 previous matches against the two Osaka clubs in 2020.

Vissel come into this encounter sitting 11^th in the standings, a full 16 points behind Gamba with 4 extra games played. It certainly has not been the campaign they would have envisaged back at the start of the year when they won their first ever piece of silverware, the Emperor’s Cup, with a 2-0 win over Kashima Antlers. Their subsequent participation in the ACL has proven to be a huge burden on their small squad. Since the end of the Obon holiday in August, Vissel have played 22 matches (21 J1 and 1 Levain Cup) compared with Gamba’s 17 (all J1) and like fellow ACL participants Yokohama F.Marinos and FC Tokyo, this ridiculous schedule has caused results to take a nosedive. Between 2017 and 2019 both Gamba and Vissel ended up within one place of each other in the standings, even finishing level on points last season, so this year’s giant gap can be seen as a testament to the negative impact ACL participation has had on Kobe’s hopes of a successful J1 campaign.

Gamba have only 4 fixtures left in Suita this year including this one, 11^th placed Vissel will be followed by, Sendai (18^th), Tosu (15^th) and Shimizu (17^th) so the Nerazzurri will be keen to improve their home stats. They currently average 1.69 points per game at Panasonic Stadium with a scoreline of 1.31-1.23 in their favour. This pales in comparison to their excellent away record where they’ve taken 2.3 points per game with an average score of 1.62-0.92. Tight games have been the order of the day and, in fact, Kobe (2-0) are one of only three teams Gamba have bettered by more than one goal this season, Kashima (2-0) and Sendai (4-1) being the others, with Antlers being the only team to leave Suita defeated by more than a single goal margin. Just 2 clean sheets have been kept at home this year out of a total of 6 (vs Hiroshima and Kashima) and there have been 2 failures to score (vs Kawasaki and Shonan) while this has only happened once on the road.

If you remove Kawasaki from the league standings (I wish) Gamba’s record looks really impressive. They currently rank 2^nd in total wins and also least defeats as well as having J1’s third tightest rearguard behind Frontale and Grampus. On the flip side, only the bottom 7 teams in the standings have netted fewer than Gamba’s 38 goals, Cerezo and Urawa have identical goalscoring records, though Reds have played a game more. Interestingly, Gamba’s top scorers this year are Kazuma Watanabe and Ademilson, both with 6 goals, only Vegalta Sendai have a top scorer with fewer strikes (Alexandre Guedes 5) while Sapporo and Shonan’s top marksmen are also on 6 goals. Only 1 of Watanabe’s 6 strikes have come at home this year, while stand-in skipper Shu Kurata has netted all 4 of his total on the road. Takashi Usami, on the other hand, is more of a home-body with 4 of his 5 efforts coming at Panasonic Stadium. With these numbers in mind, we can see the importance of Yosuke Ideguchi’s recent goal burst from midfield, I probably sound like a broken record now, but he must be a strong contender for the 2020 J1 Best Eleven. Goalkeeper Masaaki Higashiguchi will surely be in the running too as long as he doesn’t have too many more shaky performances like he did in the first half against Sapporo a couple of weeks back.

A few more quick Gamba stats before we take a look at Kobe. I know I often mention it, but it does bear repeating that the Nerazzurri hold a 16-3-0 record in games where they’ve led at any point this year. This means they’ve only dropped points from winning positions on 3 occasions compared with a whopping 12 times (7 draws and 5 defeats) in 2019. Usami still tops the J1 last pass rankings with 60 in 26 appearances, a full 27 more than Gamba’s next best ranked player, Shu Kurata (33) and 6 ahead of the league’s top assist provider, Kenta Nishizawa of Shimizu.

Now to our visitors who will be left with only 3 J1 matches to play in 2020 after this game. Next, they host Shonan and Urawa at the Noevir Stadium before jetting off to Qatar to participate in the Asian Champions League and after that they’ll return to Japan to face FC Tokyo in the capital on the final day. Vissel started the season with German Thorsten Fink in charge, however, despite helping the port side to their first ever pieces of silverware, he was shown the door in September. Former Sporting Director Atsuhiro Miura is now in the hot-seat and after a dream start with 4 wins in his first 4 games he’s begun to find life a bit tougher. Kobe have just 1 win and 4 points from their previous 7 games moving into this encounter.

There’s a degree of symmetry to Vissel’s results this year, they’ve now played 30 games, 15 at home and 15 on the road and have scored 25 and conceded 27 both home and away. Like a number of teams this season, they boast a better record on their travels than on home soil, taking 19 of their 36 league points outside of Hyogo. They’ve got the better of Sapporo, Sendai and Yokohama F.Marinos (all 3-2), Urawa (2-1) and Tosu (1-0) away as well as putting up a great fight in their 3-2 loss at runaway leaders Kawasaki.

In total, Vissel average a scoreline of 1.67-1.8 compared with Gamba’s 1.46-1.08 which is gives a pretty good indicator as to where each side’s strengths and weaknesses lie. Kobe are currently the league’s 3^rd top scorers with 50, though Kashiwa (49 but with 4 fewer games played) will surely overtake them soon. At the back, only Shimizu (55) have let in more than Vissel’s 54, though it should be noted that Sendai (52 goals conceded in 26 games), Yokohama FC (51 in 27) and Sapporo (49 in 27) are all contenders to end up with worse overall defensive records.

In terms of individuals, Kyogo Furuhashi has led the way in goals scored with 12 (joint 4^th in the Golden Boot race) while Andres Iniesta and Gotoku Sakai have provided a team high 6 assists each which leave them tied 6^th equal in that particular ranking. Furuhashi and right-back Daigo Nishi have also chipped in with 5 assists apiece while Brazilian, Douglas, an off-season capture from S-Pulse, has weighed in with 7 J1 strikes and 5 assists. In truth, despite posting reasonable numbers, I think it’s fair to say that Kobe fans were expecting more considering he bagged 14 goals and 5 assists in a struggling outfit last year. It could be that youth is the way to go for Vissel and looking in that direction, things do seem bright. Young midfielder Tatsunori Sakurai will join next year from Maebashi Ikuei High School (U23 defender Riku Matsuda’s alma mater) while centre-back Yuki Kobayashi has been decent on loan at Yokohama FC this season. Yuta Goke has been the real bright spark for Kobe in 2020, usually playing on the right-side of the front three, though he did drop deeper in the match on Sunday, he is someone Gamba will definitely need to keep an eye out for in this game.

Head to Head

As mentioned above and as highlighted in the table below, Vissel like playing at Panasonic Stadium and are unbeaten in J1 games there since it opened in 2016. I took in the final match between these two sides at the old Expo 70’ Memorial Stadium on my birthday back in 2015. Incognito in the away end due to the home tickets selling out, I was forced to endure a stale 0-0 that only livened up in the final 10 minutes. Luckily the steak I had at Denny’s afterwards made up for it, but I digress. Shonan, FC Tokyo and Cerezo have all ended long winless runs in Suita this year while Gamba buried their 19-year away hoodoo at Tokyo too, does this mean the stage is set for a first home win over Kobe at Panasonic Stadium?

Team News

Gamba Osaka

Gamba once again have selection issues to contend with. Kim Young-gwon (left knee) had to leave the field early in last week’s Osaka Derby and is a major doubt for this game, as is defensive partner Gen Shoji who has missed the past 4 games after aggravating his ankle injury against Yokohama F.Marinos. Elsewhere, Yuji Ono (knee – season) and Ademilson (club suspension) will both definitely miss out. Kim Young-gwon (if fit) and Yuya Fukuda both currently sit just one yellow card away from suspension after being cautioned against Cerezo. Shinya Yajima will make his 50^th league appearance for Gamba if chosen and former Kwansei Gakuin University team-mates, Ryu Takao and Yuki Yamamoto have celebrated birthdays in the past week, Takao is now 24 and Yamamoto 23.

Vissel Kobe

Kobe have once of the smallest squads in J1 in terms of overall numbers, though fortunately for them, they don’t have many injury problems. Belgian centre-back Thomas Vermaelen has been absent since the game at Hiroshima on October 18^th, I’m not sure if that’s a fitness issues or if he’s being rested ahead of the upcoming ACL games. Kyogo Furuhashi wasn’t in the squad for the previous 2 games and no injury was reported so I’m assuming he was just being given a rest too. Spanish holding midfielder Sergi Samper will make his 50^th J1 and Vissel appearance in this clash while long-serving winger Keijiro Ogawa is set for his 200^th J1 game. Former Kashiwa attacker Junya Tanaka, who sunk Gamba with a late double in this fixture last March, will reach if 50 J1 goals if he can find the back of the net on Wednesday.

Predicted Line Ups

Fresh from 8 days off, it’s likely we’ll see the strongest possible eleven available to Miyamoto start this Kansai Derby. I’ve opted for Fujiharu ahead of Fukuda as a result of his superior defensive attributes, also in defence, if either Kim or Shoji are fit enough to start then I expect them to do so. Yuki Yamamoto looked a bit tired in last week’s win over Cerezo, but after the extended break he should have recharged his batteries enough to hold off the challenge from Shinya Yajima. Once again in attack, either Watanabe or Patric could partner Usami, while young guns Toyama, Kawasaki and Tsukamoto will fight it out over 2 available bench seats.

Under their new head-coach, Vissel seem to have settled on a 4-3-3 formation after previous kantoku Thorsten Fink’s constant switching between 4-3-3 and 3-5-2. With their league season all but over and the majority of their focus now on the upcoming Asian Champions League it is anyone’s guess as to what personnel will be deployed on Wednesday night. As it’s a local derby I’ve assumed Kobe will field a strong side, but I’ll list a few alternatives to the lineup below. Goalkeepers Maekawa and Iikura have been rotating lately and Wednesday seems to be Maekawa’s turn to start, though the more experienced Iikura could be called upon. Vermaelen is always an option to play centre-back while ex-Gamba full-back Ryo Hatsuse may give Daigo Nishi a break. Further forward, youngsters Takuya Yasui and Daiju Sasaki will be champing at the bit to get more game time in midfield. In attack, if Furuhashi doesn’t make it, expect Kojiro Ogawa to be given the nod in his 200^th J1 game, also centre-forward Noriaki Fujimoto may be preferred to Douglas in the central role.

Match Prediction

Gamba should be fresh after their long break while Vissel are in very poor recent form in the league so one may be tempted to think this will be a comfortable home win. Not me, as this is a derby after all and Kobe have game changers all over the field. I’ll still opt for a Gamba victory, but only by their usual slim margin of 2-1.