On Sat Aug 20th, Sanfrecce Hiroshima hosts Gamba Osaka at Edion Stadium in a meeting of these two extremely mismatched J-League teams. The game day is forecasted to be a cloudy but warm day with daytime temperatures of 24 degrees, a perfect day for football. In their last match, 5th placed Sanfrecce Hiroshima, recorded a 3-2 win against Kashiwa Reysol. Nassim Ben Khalifa scored the first goal for Sanfrecce Hiroshima in the 4th minute, but Yuki Muto got the equalizer for Kashiwa Reysol in the 41st minute , but Sanfrecce Hiroshima kept scoring and walked away with the win. Sanfrecce Hiroshima should be reasonably happy with their recent performance, earning 17 points in their last 10 matches, while 17th placed Gamba Osaka is fresh off their 0-2 loss against Shimizu S-Pulse. Benjamin Kololli scored the first goal for Shimizu S-Pulse in the 73rd minute, then Carlinhos Junior added another in the 86th minute on a feed from Thiago Santana In the end, Gamba Osaka couldn’t muster any offence and Shimizu S-Pulse ran away with the shutout win. Gamba Osaka looks to improve on their recent performance, having lost 7 of their last 10.
On Wednesday Jun 29th, Gamba Osaka hosted Sanfrecce Hiroshima in their last match together. Gamba Osaka won by a score of 2 to 0. Kurokawa struck first for Gamba Osaka in the 36th minute, then Issai Sakamoto added another in the 39th minute In the end, Sanfrecce Hiroshima was frustrated by Gamba Osaka’s defence and couldn’t put any tallies on the board. Gamba Osaka ended the match with the shutout victory.
Gamba Osaka is having problems scoring lately. Their top scorers, Kwon Kyung-Won and Ryotaro Meshino each only have 1 goal in their last 5. Sanfrecce Hiroshima’s most prolific scorer has been Tsukasa Morishima. He has netted 2 goals over the last 5 matches.