The AFC Champions League 2015 (ACL) entered the second day of the matchday 5 on 22 April as Kashiwa Reysol of Group E saw off Jeonbuk Hyundai Motors (KOR) 3-2 at home with midfielder Taketomi Kosuke’s brace and sealed the knockout stage berth atop of the group.

Gamba faced Guangzhou R&F in China as the J.League champions cruised to a 5-0 win with forward Usami Takashi’s career-first ACL goal and moved up to second place in Group F. If Gamba win the final match against Seongnam FC (KOR) on 6 May, they are to advance to Round 16. Depending on Buriram United (THA)’s result, Gamba can go up to the next round even with a draw.

In the contest in the rain with their advancement at stake,, Kashiwa got off to a sharp start with great concentration and dominated the match from the start.

In the 9th minute, defender Eduardo headed home defender Wako Naoki’s right corner kick for the opening goal. In the 20th minute, Taketomi cut in to blast a right-footed shot to put his side further ahead.

With the momentum from the early lead at 2-0, Kashiwa continued to attack with quick tempo, and the Japanese side kept enjoying the initiative of the match. They did not show a sign of the disadvantage midfielder Leandro and defender Kim Changsoo were missing out due to cumulative yellow cards.

In the 39th minute, forward Cristiano broke through the right flank, cut into the box before Taketomi met Cristiano’s pass with his left foot to make it 3-0.

Jeonbuk, looking to get through the group stage with a victory, tried to fight back in the second half. As the Korean bench sent on midfielder Eninho and defender Lee Kyuro to activate their side attacks and pushed forward to attack in the Kashiwa end.

In the 67th minute, after substitute Lee Kyuro fed in a cross ball from the right flank, forward Lee Dong Gook fired in an overhead kick for their first goal of the match. In the 81st minute, Lee Dong Gook again found the back of the net from the edge of the box to close the gap to one goal. However, Kashiwa’s defensive side including goalkeeper Sugeno Takanori committed themselves to keeping the lead until the end.

Kashiwa sealed top spot of the group ahead of the final fixture on 6 May since they earned 11 points already in five matches. Even if Jeonbuk now with 8 points tie with Kashiwa in the next matchday with 11 points, Kashiwa still advance atop because their head-to-head result is one win and one draw in Kashiwa’s favour. . It is their third time to book the spot in the last 16 after they played until the quarterfinal in 2012 and semifinal in 2013. In this year’s last 16 match, they face the second-placed team of Group G on 19 May on the road and on 26 May at home.

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As a side note Jeonbuk cement the group’s second place and their own advancement with a win or draw in the next matchday against Shandong Luneng FC (CHN). Binh Duong (VIE) with only one point so far after the loss to Shandong completely lost their chance to advance to the next round.

Meanwhile, Gamba Osaka were in a situation where they couldn’t afford any more stagnation to stay in the hunt for the next round. Although they gave away the control of the match to opposing Guangzhou R&F, who still retained their own hope for the last 16, the recent momentum gained in the J.League and well-coordinated offence led by forward Usami Takashi helped them to rack up goals.

In the 14th minute, midfielder Endo Yasuhito headed a cross from Usami to forward Patric who rushed in and put it into the back of the net to open the scoring.

After that, Guangzhou kept moving up their players toward Gamba’s goal in order to tie the match, but Gamba attacked the space opened up behind such Gaungzhou players. In the 43rd minute, Usami fed a cross again from the left, Partic headed it to midfielder Abe Hiroyuki, who right-footed it into the goal. A minute later, Usami this time sent up a vertical pass, which was taken by Patric all the way from behind Guangzhou defenders to the finish for his second and the club’s third goal of the match.

In the second half, the Japanese side’s dominance did not slow down.
In the 68th minute, a pass from Usami ignited his club’s counter-attack. Lins, substituted into the match at the beginning of the second half, set it up for Abe and Abe scored his second goal of the match. Then two minutes later, Gamba’s counter-attack again was concluded by Lins feeding the ball this time to Usami for his first goal in his ACL career to the right corner of the goal. The goal also extended Usami’s scoring streak to five straight matches. The match ended with the final outcome of 5-0 in favour of Gamba Osaka.

Now that with two straight wins after the away win against Buriram United (THA) on the road, Gamba moved up to second place, well in the advancement zone, with 7 points, passing Buriram because of their superior head-to-head results against the Thai club. Seongnam, on the other hand, defeated Buriram 2-1 and lead the group with 10 points. Guangzhou only with four points have had their exit determined.

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The next matchday, the last one in the group round, are to be held on 5 and 6 May.

Head Coaches Comments

Tatsuma Yoshida, Head Coach, Kashiwa Reysol
Jeonbuk stand out among good teams in the K.League without a loss in the last twenty or so matches, so we were expecting the match against them will have big pressure on us even though it was our home match. In the four practices we had, we worked out to deal with it. That worked well for us. Our players willingly tackled every single work they had, and that led to today’s win and the fact that we get out of this group on the top. It means a lot that we clinched our top-place advancement still with one more match remaining in the group stage. I think this will allow us to play that remaining match strategically with good mindset.

Choi Kang Hee, Head Coach, Jeonbuk Hyundai Motors
The match didn’t turned out to be as we planned. We lost a goal earlier than we had expected and that took away our balance. Then we lost two more goals. In the second half, we wanted to come back and our players worked hard until the end. Kashiwa was at a high level overall in controlling the match. In our last match, they were more defensive, but they were totally different today. It has been pointed out that we tend not to play well against Kashiwa, but I felt it was right considering we couldn’t play our style of football today. It’s disappointing that we can’t get out of the group first place.

AFC Champions League2015

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