Buoyed by back-to-back wins at the end of June, Urawa Red Diamonds will commence their July schedule as relegation-threatened Shonan Bellmare visit Urawa Komaba Stadium on Saturday afternoon in the J1 League.
The Red Devils comfortably put Jubilo Iwata to the sword last time out, whilst Bellmare suffered a damaging defeat to fellow strugglers Kyoto Sanga on home soil.
Match preview
Following a six-game winless run across all competitions - which included a defeat to second-tier V-Varen Nagasaki in the League Cup - Urawa have managed to get back on track in the J1 League, winning consecutive matches for the first time since the middle of May, beating Nagoya last Wednesday before defeating Jubilo on the weekend.
Facing a side who are slowly being dragged into bottom-three contention, the Red Devils recorded a convincing three-goal success at Urawa Komaba Stadium, with strikes from Ryoma Watanabe, Atsuki Ito and Hirokazu Ishihara sealing Urawa's joint-largest victory of the 2024 season to date.
After finishing fourth in the J1 League standings of 2023 and missing out on AFC Cup qualification by just a single point, Saturday's hosts are adrift of the top-three conversation this time around, currently sitting in ninth position, six points behind third-placed Gamba Osaka.
Despite being restricted to minutes off the bench in recent matches, 31-year-old Thiago Santana remains the primary source of attacking magic for the Red Devils, with the Brazilian forward netting seven goals in 21 league appearances so far after scoring 13 in the second tier for Shimizu S-Pulse during 2023.
If the league standings were determined purely on home form, Per-Mathias Hogmo's troops would be marching towards an appearance on the continental stage in 2025, with Urawa earning an impressive tally of 21 points from 11 fixtures at Urawa Komaba Stadium - only Kashima Antlers (22), Gamba Osaka (22) and Cerezo Osaka (22) have collected more home points.
Approaching this weekend's trip to Urawa, visitors Shonan are facing the real possibility of their seven-year stay in the J1 League coming to a sobering end in 2024, with Bellmare suffering another blow in their fight for survival on Sunday, losing at home to relegation rivals Kyoto Sanga.
Despite having 66% of possession, Shonan managed just a single shot on target throughout the 90 and failed to breach the net of Gu Sung-Yun, meaning that Taichi Hara's solitary strike in the opening 25 minutes of the contest was enough to hand the visitors a significant three points.
With their only victory in the last seven matches across all competitions arriving against Konan University in the Japanese Cup, Bellmare are bang out of form and sliding towards a maiden second-tier appearance since 2017, with Saturday's visitors occupying 19th place, four points behind Sagan Tosu in 17th.
Shonan will need Brazilian marksman Lukian firing if they are to avoid an unthinkable bottom-three placement, with the 32-year-old capable of enjoying purple patches of goalscoring form as he showcased a month ago, when he netted four times across meetings with Albirex Niigata, Jubilo and Gamba Osaka.
The reverse fixture between these sides was one of the most entertaining matches of the J1 League campaign to date, with a 81st-minute Samuel Gustafson strike for Urawa forcing a share of the spoils at Lemon Gas Stadium, where an eight-goal thriller ended even at the final whistle.
Team News
After keeping back-to-back clean sheets recently, Urawa are set to stick with a centre-back pairing of Yota Sato and Norwegian Marius Hoibraten on Saturday afternoon.
Winger Watanabe has doubled his goal tally from two to four over the past week and will retain his spot on the left flank, with Hidetoshi Takeda operating in the advanced-midfield role.
There needs to be a change for the Red Devils on the right wing, with Ola Solbakken returning to parent club Roma following the expiration of his loan deal.
Despite missing a second-half penalty versus Kyoto, Shonan's Sho Fukuda did enough in his overall performance last weekend to retain his place up front with Lukian.
Bellmare may opt for an alteration at wing-back, where Daiki Sugioka could be promoted from the bench at the expense of 32-year-old Takuya Okamoto.
Urawa Red Diamonds possible starting lineup:
Nishikawa; Ishihara, Sato, Hobraten, Ohata; Ito, Yasui, Santana, Takeda, Watanabe; Linssen
Shonan Bellmare possible starting lineup:
Song; Y Suzuki, Kim, J Suzuki; Sugioka, Barada, Tanaka, Hata; Okuno, Fukuda, Lukian
We say: Urawa Red Diamonds 2-0 Shonan Bellmare
Only dropping points to second-placed Kashima in the last three matches, Urawa are enjoying a good run of form and should be too strong for relegation-threatened Shonan this weekend.
The visitors suffered an alarming defeat to a fellow basement dweller last time out, and we do not expect Bellmare's fortunes to change for the better in Saitama on Saturday.
For data analysis of the most likely results, scorelines and more for this match please click here.
Carter White
