Jubilo Iwata – GK Kawaguchi is out for the season. FW Kanazono is out for at least another two months. MF Matsuoka is out for the season. MF Yamamoto out for a month, DF Cho out for at least another two weeks. FW Han out for a month or so.

Cerezo Osaka – MFs Yamaguchi and Ogihara and FW Sugimoto have returned from Olympic duty.

7 wins for Jubilo, 6 for Cerezo and 2 draws since 2003 – all in J1, of course. Jubilo have never been relegated.

Jubilo are suffering from a long injury list and are starting to tire and drop points when they really would like to be winning games. Influential Korean MF/FW Baek will be back from the Olympics and I feel he is a key man in the machine at Jubilo and may help turn things around for them but they must tighten up their defence – outside the bottom three they have the worst defensive record in J1. Having said that they have scored almost two goals per game on average so expect goals one way or another! They have won just one of the last five, and that was against bottom club Sapporo, and, if they are to stay in touch with the top 3 this is a must win for them.

Cerezo Osaka have been hit from all sides this season and must be wondering what they have to do to keep a fixed team. With Yamaguchi and Ogihara at London 2012 and Kim and Kiyotake shipped out, they have been playing with an entirely new midfield for the last few games and it’s only due to some timely goals from Kakitani that they are not deeper in trouble. The player, who signed with Cerezo before he was ten years old, but then spent the best part of three seasons at Tokushima Vortis developing his game, returned just in time to help the team get over the losses of Kagawa and Inui, and then saw Ienaga, Kim and Kiyotake also leave the team. He is the man to watch, a rising star, but how long will Cerezo be able to hold onto him? Jubilo injuries and players returning to Cerezo will swing it towards a WIN for CEREZO OSAKA!