Created: Monday, 07 April 2025 Written by Alan Gibson

J1 Matchday 9 2025 Review

After Saturday's scoreless draw between Yokohama F.Marinos and Tokyo Verdy, Matchday 9 of J1 2025 continued on Sunday April 6th saw Kashima Antlers' unbeaten home run ended by Kyoto Sanga in a seven-goal thriller, Albirex Niigata shock Vissel Kobe at Kokuritsu National Stadium and Sanfrecce Hiroshima sneak past Cerezo Osaka to stay in touch at the top. Elsewhere, Machida Zelvia and Kawasaki Frontale shared four goals and the points, Shonan Bellmare returned to winning ways with a 2-1 home win over Nagoya Grampus, while Fagiano Okayama, Avispa Fukuoka and all registered 1-0 home wins. To round off the results Yokohama FC took the points in a 2-0 win over Shimizu S-Pulse.

After a dull opening to the J1 weekend on Saturday, the second day of the weekend saw Antlers' 27-game unbeaten home run bite the dust, even after they had taken a 2-0 lead. Leo Ceara added two strikes to his goal tally for the season to put his team ahead, before Masaya Okugawa brought Sanga back into the game and then a Rafael Elias hat trick that started in the 80th minute shocked the home crowd. Sanga had gone 3-2 ahead but looked to have been pegged back to a draw in the 92nd minute, when Shu Morooka leveled the game for Antlers, but Elias completed his hat trick minutes later and gave the away team the points.

Also in the upper echelon of J1 Zelvia and Frontale fought out a 2-2 draw, with Erison opening the scoring for Frontale, before Daihachi Okamura and Takuma Nishimura turned the game around only for So Kawahara to pull back a point for his team. After the weekend J1 saw Zelvia atop the division, albeit only on goals scored, with the same total of points and goal difference as Sanfrecce, both teams being a point ahead of three teams on 16 points. At the bottom of J1 we see just three points separating Albirex - on the bottom of the ladder with seven points - from Yokohama FC in 11th place, on 10 points.

To grab that equal-top spot, Sanfrecce triumphed over Cerezo, 2-1, on goals from Naoto Arai and Hayato Araki, after Lucas Fernandes had given his team a lead, the winner coming with just minutes to go, after a goalmouth scramble that looked as if it was offside, before VAR gave the home team the win.

The teams just off the top, along with Antlers - are Reysol - 1-0 winners over Gamba Osaka, on a goal from Yoshio Koizumi - and Avispa (also 1-0 winners, over a spluttering Urawa Reds, their goal coming from Yuto Iwasaki). After starting their season with three straight defeats, Avispa have four wins and a draw from their last five matches.

Working our way down the table, Fagiano (8th after this weekend) downed FC Tokyo 1-0 on a goal from half-time substitute Ryo Tabei, and Bellmare (9th) saw a goal from each of their striker starlets, Akito Suzuki and Sho Fukuda lead them to a 2-1 win over Grampus.

Of the other two games in the weekend, Albirex snuffed out a hopeful Vissel - finally seeing players return from injury - 1-0 on a right-foot curler into the top corner from Motoki Hasegawa. The "away" team (the game was a "home" game for Vissel played at the national stadium) then parked the proverbial bus and managed to hold off an all-out assault from Vissel to take the three points, but remain bottom of J1.

The last-to-mention game of the J1 weekend witnessed Yokohama FC pull themselves away from the bottom with a 2-0 home win over Shimizu S-Pulse. Kota Yamada has given his side a lead in the 50th minute before they weathered the storm as S-Pulse looked to get back into the game, and then added a sucker punch of a 97th-minute goal from Solomon Sakuragawa!