At the top it was as you were, with the 1st and 2nd place teams – Vegalta Sendai and Sanfrecce Hiroshima – fighting out a thrilling 2-2 draw – two goals from Brazilian striker Wilson for the top team, with J1 top scorer Hisashi Sato and Koji Moriasaki on the scoresheet for Sanfrecce.
In 3rd place, we saw Urawa Reds held by a buoyant Cerezo Ozaka side who were looking for a win to send Hiroshi Kiyotake off to the Bundesliga on a high. Reds scored the opener through Suzuki after a nice exchange of passes with Kashiwagi opened up the defence. Kakitani scored the point-securing equaliser in the final moments after relentless 2nd half pressure from the home team had bought no reward. In the end, Reds will be happy to come away with a point.
In the other half of Osaka we saw eight goals at Gamba Osaka v. Kashiwa Reysol. Nothing unusual there, to be honest, except it used to be Gamba who scored more than their visitors! Today they capitulated to Reysol 6-2, with three goals coming from Sawa. Reysol were 3-0 ahead within 20 minutes, but Gamba pulled it back to 3-2 by half time amd the stage was set for the big comeback. But Reysol tore up that script in the 2nd half and Gamba look set for a long struggle for survival in the second half of the season. A telling statistic – Gamba 10 goal attempts, while Reysol registered nine “shots” and scored six goals!
J1 saw another draw between Yokohama F.Marinos and Nagoya Grampus. After two of the same in midweek against Gamba, Josh Kennedy gave another goal on a plate to Nagai for the away goal. Marinos’ goal came from good pressure forcing a mistake in the Nagoya midfield, Ono giving the through pass for Marquinos to run onto and blast home as the keeper came out to challenge.
Vissel Kobe continued their improvement under coach Akira Nishino, taking all three points away at Kawasaki Frontale through a wonder strike from Ken Tokura. Vissel continue to build slowly and look a good bet to move up the table as confidence grows.
Omiya Ardija heaped more misery on Shimizu S-Pulse with a 1-0 victory, the goal coming in injury time of the 2nd half when Daigo Watanabe latched onto a through ball from Rafael – possibly his final touch for the team before a move to Brazil we hear – and Omiya took the points.
Another draw came at Niigata where Albirex earned a rare point against Kashima Antlers. themselves, not doing as well as they would have hoped. Kashima took the lead through Dutra, while Michael popped the equaliser in from a low right wing cross to earn that precious point.
Jubilo Iwata overcame FC Tokyo by a 3-1 scoreline, making it look easy as Tokyo succumbed to goals from Shuto Yamamoto, Miyazaki (his first J1 goal) and Cho to halt their recent mini-slump.
Sagan Tosu registered another home win, but made hard work of it, with the 1-0 winner coming in the 95th minute from Mizunuma. Consadole must have been thinking they had another point!