I, for one, was glad to see that Urawa's coach Holger Osieck was "unhappy" with the result from Sunday's 1-1 home draw with Yokohama F. Marinos - played in front of 51,829 fans at Saitama Stadium. He was certainly happy with the midweek 0-0 home draw with Sydney FC, which saw his side become the second Japanese team after Kawasaki Frontale to progress to the Champions League quarter-finals. That's probably because his team executed its game-plan almost to perfection; foul, defend, counter-attack, defend, foul, defend, counter-attack, defend. You get the idea.

For all the build up to the Urawa - Sydney FC clash, the match was a monumental anti-climax, as games that attract so much hype can often be. Sydney FC would have won but for some glaring misses in front of goal - David Zdrilic's failure to open the scoring with a free header midway through the second half may spell the end of his unhappy career with the club. Mark Milligan and David Carney also came desperately close for Sydney - although Urawa's Brazilian striker Washington could have undeservedly won the match for Urawa when he shot wide from sixteen yards in the last minute of the game.

There have been enough column inches written about the game itself without me having to rehash them, but as the Australian media is want to do, I couldn't help but chuckle at some of the deliberate misconceptions bandied about in the aftermath of this clash. Perhaps my favourite has been the Sydney Morning Herald's (surprise, surprise...one of Sydney FC's official sponsors!) consistent claim that the match was played in front of over 50,000 fans. Now I might have only scored 22% on my Higher School Certificate maths exam (hey, if I want to know how to do my tax...I'll call an accountant) but the last time I checked, a crowd of 44,793 was at least 5,207 fans short of the half-century mark. Why let facts stand in the way of an embellished story though, hey fellas?

It was also claimed in the Aussie media that the Urawa fans reserved a "special" atmosphere for Sydney FC. It sure was special - partly because it was Urawa's second-lowest attendance of the season, and partly because the atmosphere was about half that generated at a J-League game. In defence of the many Urawa fans who simply didn't turn up, I was personally surprised by just how far out of town Saitama Stadium actually is. With the Japanese tending to work late, it was no wonder that by the time the 7.30pm kick-off rolled around, thousands of fans were still streaming through the turnstiles and looking to take their seats. The horrendous traffic outside the ground didn't help, but of course with the match beamed live on TV throughout Asia, there was never a suggestion of delaying the kick-off to allow those fans to catch the entire ninety minutes of action.

It might be time for me to put my hand up and admit that I am bitter about the result from Wednesday night. Not just because I'm a Sydney FC fan - albeit a begrudging one, and not just because I dislike Urawa more than any other Japanese team. It's just that after thirty years of mistreatment by FIFA, shambolic administration and heart-breaking bad luck, it looked like Australian football had finally turned the corner and was starting to get what it deserved. I think if Sydney FC had qualified for the knock-out stages it would only have served to paper over the cracks at the club - but I certainly don't think that Urawa were the better team in the group. Sydney lead 2-0 after twenty minutes against Urawa in Sydney - before drawing 2-2, they lead 1-0 over Persik Kediri before losing 2-1 on a water-logged pitch in Solo City, and they drew 0-0 with Shanghai Shenhua in Sydney...with midfielder Ufuk Talay hitting the crossbar from a penalty - his first ever penalty miss for the club. Take maximum points from any of those fixtures and Sydney FC would have progressed.

As it is, it is the so-called "giants" of Asian football...with an imposing one J-League title to their name, who progress to the quarter-finals. According to Saburo Kawabuchi - head of the Japan Football Association, the AFC Champions League "should be more like the UEFA Champions League." I guess that's what we saw on Wednesday night. With a team that possesses an array of attacking talent such as Takahito Soma, Shinji Ono, Robson Ponte and the sulking hulking Washington, it's no wonder Urawa chose to sit back and defend for the entire ninety minutes. They were just trying to be more European...

So it's come down to this. Given the turmoil at Sydney FC prior to the start of their Asian Champions League campaign - with coach Terry Butcher given the sack and Branko Culina brought in as interim manager, it was difficult to envisage the Harbour City club unduly troubling the likes of Urawa Reds and Shanghai Shenhua United in their ACL group, right? Wrong.

Going into the final group game at Saitama Stadium on May 23, the 2005 A-League champions Sydney FC are still in with a chance of qualifying for the knock-out stages of the competition at their first attempt. They'd have been in prime position, had midfielder Ufuk Talay not crashed a penalty into the crossbar in Sydney's most recent 0-0 draw at home to Shanghai Shenhua.

That draw, coupled with Urawa's 3-3 draw with Persik Kediri in Indonesia means that the Japanese giants have nine points going into the final match, with Sydney FC just behind them on eight. Urawa can afford to draw in front of what should be a vociferous home crowd at Saitama Stadium, but Sydney FC will come at them with all guns blazing.

Urawa were stunned when these two clubs met at Aussie Stadium back in March, having seemingly underestimated the 2005 Australian champions, as they fell two goals behind after just twenty minutes. The J-League champions showed their mettle, however, more than matching Sydney for the rest of the game and roaring back thanks to strikes from Robson Ponte and Yuichiro Nagai. The latter arguably scored the easiest goal of his career in Sydney, and Clint Bolton's uncharacteristic handling error - he spilled a cross at the feet of Nagai, could come back to haunt the A-League giants.

Urawa, however, are under the pump in Japan. Rumours that several squad members don't see eye to eye with new coach Holger Osieck just won't go away. Despite the over-abundance of talent at his disposal, Osieck rarely makes changes to a team that has already made gruelling trips to Sydney, Shanghai and Solo City this season. As a result, Urawa have rarely looked their best in 2007.

Thus a fascinating battle should ensure between a club written off before this competition kicked off, against the over-hyped J-League champions. Before this competition commenced, Urawa loudly proclaimed their desire to become the first Japanese team to reach the quarter-finals of the Asian Champions League since the competition was revamped in 2003. They have already been beaten to that punch by Kawasaki Frontale, and with Sydney FC looking to do business in Saitama, there might just be another nasty surprise in store for the 2006 J-League champions Urawa.

There's nothing like bandying about some good old clichés to get your point across. So there'll be no love lost when two of Japan's biggest rivals clash at Saitama Stadium this weekend! There, I said it. Urawa are playing Gamba Osaka, and no doubt the English-language media in Japan will be working themselves into a frenzy.

Saburo Kawabuchi - head of the Japan Football Association, claimed last week that the Asian Champions League needs reformatting. It invariably does, but it's difficult to see how Kawabuchi's vision of allowing more clubs from Japan, Korea and Australia to enter is going to help clubs from South-East Asia develop.

Recently the Australian media has been falling over itself to proclaim Urawa Reds as "the biggest club in Asia." Eh? Two years ago Urawa weren't even the biggest club in Japan. Maybe that fact has been lost on the likes of Kawabuchi, who dream of full houses at matches between clubs like Urawa Reds and Sydney FC.

Of course, Urawa's final Asian Champions League encounter with Sydney on May 23 very well COULD draw a full house. But it would be a first. The reality is that clubs like Kawasaki Frontale, Gamba Osaka and anyone else that qualifies for the Champions League, will continue to play in half-empty stadiums, fielding less than full-strength teams. The fact that Urawa have somewhat bucked that trend recently (even though few media outlets pointed out that two crowds of around 30,000 in the Champions League so far still meant that Saitama Stadium was only half full) makes it easy for the media to claim that Urawa are Asia's biggest club.

The fact that they have just one league title to their name suggests that they are not. The same could be said of Gamba Osaka, with the Panasonic-funded club having only the 2005 J-League crown to show for their efforts. Yet the winds of change have blown through Japanese football, so no longer can traditional powerhouses like Kashima Antlers, Jubilo Iwata and Yokohama F. Marinos claim to be the biggest teams in the country.

These things are often cyclical, so now it's Urawa and Gamba Osaka's turn to be labelled "the biggest arch rivals in Japan!" In reality, they've probably only been rivals for two years, but since Urawa thwarted Gamba Osaka at every turn last season - and Gamba responded in kind by smashing Urawa 4-0 in the 2007 Super Cup - this match is sure to be a hotly contested affair.

There are plenty of stars on show, and Marcus Tulio Tanaka's tussle with Magno Alves should prove fascinating. There will also be plenty of scrutiny on Urawa's Brazilian striker Washington - if he gets on the pitch. Out-of-form, heavily criticised, dropped and then restored...now Washington "supposedly" has an injury, but the rumours coming out of Saitama are that the temperamental striker doesn't see eye to eye with new coach Holger Osieck.  

Anyway, it should prove an exciting match, irrespective of how dubious any claims of "the biggest club in..." are. Gamba are currently on top of the table, while Urawa are in second, and with the likes of Jubilo Iwata, Yokohama F. Marinos and Kashima Antlers all floating about in mid-table, it looks like the new status quo of Japanese football is here to stay for some time yet.

I'm beginning to understand what the great Australian football broadcaster Les Murray was getting at when he said in his autobiography "By The Balls," that analysing football for a living can be a grinding experience.

That's certainly what watching Shimizu S-Pulse's 0-0 League Cup draw against Kashiwa Reysol last Wednesday night felt like. That result means that, for the second season in a row, Shimizu S-Pulse have been knocked out at the group stage of the League Cup.

The result was arguably more interesting for the fact that Kashiwa bludgeoned their way to a draw, with any promising S-Pulse attack invariably broken up by a foul. That tactic has brought Kashiwa success in the J-League as well, but it's sure to infuriate opposition players and fans alike - and the angry scenes after Kashiwa had beaten S-Pulse in the League Cup earlier in the season, bear testament to that.

Elsewhere in the League Cup, defending champions JEF United look a good bet to progress to the quarter-finals, despite their 1-0 loss to Gamba Osaka in their most recent match. They should be joined by Oita Trinita and Ventforet Kofu, although Shimizu's group is a lot tighter, with Omiya Ardija the favourites to go through.

After the disappointment of Wednesday's result, I was hoping for better things in Shimizu's J-League blockbuster with Kawasaki Frontale on Sunday. As it was, Shimizu went down 2-1 in a pulsating encounter, but only after a terrible backpass by Arata Kodama (I think...I may have been blinded with rage at the time) gifted an equaliser to substitute Masaru Kurotsu. A shell-shocked S-Pulse immediately conceded a second, to the delight of the majority of the 21,208 fans inside a packed Todoroki Stadium.

The real match of the day was probably at the National Stadium in Tokyo, however, where 35,013 fans witnessed Urawa Reds beat the aforementioned Kashiwa Reysol 2-0. Washington and Shinji Ono scored the goals in front of a sea of Urawa fans, with Reysol's Kashiwa Stadium far too small to accommodate the Reds' travelling army.

There was a similar scenario in Yokohama, where a crowd of nearly 20,000 turned out to witness Yokohama FC go down 1-0 to an out-of-form Kashima Antlers on Saturday. Both matches were interesting in that the partisan atmospheres generated at Mitsuzawa Stadium and Kashiwa Stadium respectively were negated, by the necessity to play in a much larger stadium.

Coming full circle then, and its interesting to note that Shimizu S-Pulse have switched their derby with Jubilo Iwata from Ecopa Stadium - a 2002 World Cup venue, back to their spiritual home of Nihondaira Stadium. S-Pulse have even gone to trouble of printing t-shirts proclaiming as much, with the unpopular Ecopa a sixty minute train ride from Shimizu. Just goes to show that when it comes to generating an atmosphere, sometimes less truly is more.

So the League Cup kicks off here in Japan this week, and woe any coach who doesn't take this competition seriously!

With talent spread so evenly in the J-League, plenty of clubs realise that the League Cup represents an excellent chance to pick up a piece of silverware.

Conversely, a poor run in the Cup can spell doom and gloom if you're a highly paid foreign coach brought in to win trophies. Just ask Paulo Autori!

The League Cup in Japan features only J1 clubs, and kicks off with a four-team Group stage. There a couple of interesting looking groups this year, but none of that is important...because my home-town team Shimizu S-Pulse have been drawn in the same group as Kashiwa Reysol.

Now I'm a mild-mannered man and I try to be fair and objective. But last weekend in the J-League, Shimizu were robbed thanks to what can only be described as THE WORST DECISION IN THE HISTORY OF FOOTBALL.

Okay, it wasn't really that bad. But I reckon Shimizu will be out for revenge, since it was Kashiwa Reysol to whom they lost at Nihondaira Stadium for the first time in ages, and since they kick-off their League Cup campaign, predictably, against Kashiwa Reysol.

As for the decision in question - let's just say it was another classic piece of J-League refereeing, which saw Shimizu striker Cho Jae Jin pulled down in the box, Shimizu midfielder Fernandinho slot the ball into the net, and J-League referee Tsutomu Anazawa blow for a foul - after the ball had hit the back of the net - against Shimizu.

Anyway, I would say that JEF United are the team to beat in the League Cup, since they've won the last two editions, but I reckon a team of blind monkies could probably beat United at just about anything right now. Kashima Antlers obviously couldn't, but that's another story.

On a final note, Kawasaki Frontale and Urawa Reds are absent from the group stage of the League Cup, as they are competing in the "prestigious" (according to the AFC) Asian Champions League. Kawasaki take on Bangkok University tomorrow, but I must confess a personal interest in the Sydney FC - Urawa game.

I was a Sydney FC season-ticket holder during their inaugural A-League season, and since I possess a healthy disdain for all things related to Urawa, I'll be cheering louder than usual for their opponents in this one.

Wow, sorry for the cryptic Raised Fist title. Who would have thought that a kid who wears glasses listens to dodgy Swedish metalcore?

But moving right along, the J-League is indeed back and just like those breakdown-crushing, bicep-rippling Swedes, it may or may not be stronger than ever. FC Tokyo and Jubilo Iwata are certainly stronger, although ironically Tokyo strengthened by signing some of Jubilo's surplus requirements for this season. In Takashi Fukunishi (and to a lesser extent, Takayuki Chano), FC Tokyo may finally find some of the leadership and experience that they lacked last season. Yet in cutting loose the aforementioned Fukunishi and Chano (as well as Toshihiro Hattori and Hiroshi Nanami), Jubilo may free up room in their squad for several of their promising youngsters to come through. It worked last season with Yoshiaki Ota, and it could reap even bigger rewards this season.

Elsewhere, Urawa are still licking their wounds from a 4-0 thrashing handed out by Gamba Osaka in the Super Cup last weekend. Urawa may have been missing a few players through injury - including 2006 J-League MVP Marcus Tulio Tanaka, but given that they've assembled a squad that is the envy of every other J-League team, one couldn't help but notice the muffled cheers of joy from fans of every other J-League club, at the spanking handed out by Gamba. Spare a thought for Urawa's cross-town rivals Omiya Ardija though - they take on a potentially rampant Gamba on Saturday evening. (Actually spare a thought for last season's J2 champions Yokohama FC. They take on a potentially vengeful Urawa in their first ever top flight match!).

Kashiwa Reysol take on Jubilo on Sunday afternoon, but I reckon a far more interesting match-up takes place between Nagoya Grampus Eight and JEF United, in a match that could be billed as "the battle of the biggest mid-table clubs." Nagoya have the explosive Frode Johnsen up front, and his duel with JEF United's new Serbian defender Nenad Dordevic could prove fascinating. Whoever losses this match could be in for a nightmare season.

Personally, I'll be at Nihondaira Stadium this weekend, and it looks like I won't be the only one. As of writing, there were just 1,000 tickets left for Shimizu S-Pulse's clash with promoted outfit Vissel Kobe. The visitors can expect a hostile atmosphere (well, as hostile as Japanese crowds get) at a packed Nihondaira, and they'll have their hands full containing the likes of Fujimoto, Hyodo and co. Not to mention new signings Akinori Nishizawa and Fernandinho.

That's right kids, the J-League is back! And I for one, couldn't be happier.

Gamba Osaka probably do. Their nightmare run of crucial losses to Urawa Reds began in last season's Super Cup, when they were spanked 3-1 in front of 35,674 fans at the National Stadium in Tokyo. They hit back - kind of, by drawing 1-1 with Urawa on the opening weekend of the 2006 season, but they then lost 3-2 in the last round of the J-League, to hand the crown to Urawa. To top it off, they also lost 1-0 in the Emperor's Cup Final, despite outplaying the Saitama-based club for the entire match.

So it's back to the drawing board for Gamba, and they might look upon this match with some degree of tedium, given that the team standing in the way of a potential piece of silverware is the ubiquitous Urawa. Fans in Japan could be forgiven for getting slightly bored with the endless Gamba - Urawa grudge matches, but the J-League has never shied away from giving a dead horse its proverbial flogging. Urawa won the double last season, meaning the traditional showdown between League and Cup winners was made redundant, with Cup runner's-up Gamba getting the nod over Kawasaki Frontale, who finished second place in the league.

There are actually some talking points in this match - and its not just the debut of Yuki Abe in Urawa colours that has the fans buzzing...or at least, humming softly. Last season Gamba Osaka scored 80 goals in the league - 42 of them coming from their strike force of Magno Alves and Ryuji Bando, but they conceded 48. Their chance to catch Urawa on the final day of the season was hindered by the fact that the Reds had a better goal difference than Gamba. So what has the club decided to do? Naturally they have decided to sign another high-profile striker!

By bringing in Bare, who scored 14 goals for Ventforet Kofu last season, coach Akira Nishino seriously risks upsetting the balance of his side. How three of the more fragile egos in Japanese football fit into two striking positions is anyone's guess - unless Gamba opt for a 3-4-3 formation this season, which could see them concede even more goals against teams top-heavy with quality midfielders. Like Urawa.

At any rate, the Super Cup clash between Urawa and Gamba promises to be a mildly interesting affair. I won't be there personally - there's only so much of the National Stadium that I can take, but rest assured, I'll be putting my feet up and occasionally flicking over to the game from whatever bizarre soap opera I'm watching, to bring you all the thrills, chills and occasional spills of the match.

Don't let the snappy title fool you. This is no laughing matter. Yuki Abe has moved to Urawa Reds. And the fate of the entire Universe may rest upon his shoulders.

Not really, although a lot of people here in Japan were kind of disappointed that Yuki Abe has joined the dark side, setting a record for the highest fee paid for a Japanese player in a domestic transfer in the process. It's not that they begrudge Abe success - after eight years at JEF United, you could hardly begrudge the man anything - it's just that some J-League fans are claiming that Urawa are strengthening their team, by dismantling others. Hey, if it works for Chelsea, it could work anywhere!

After virtually single-handedly (or should that be, single-footedly?) firing JEF United to successive League Cup crowns, Yuki Abe virtually WAS the team at JEF United. His sale may have raised around $US3 million dollars, but it has left United without their talisman. Curiously, they've chosen to remedy this by getting rid of half their squad, although the fact that most of those players were entirely useless was probably a solid basis for doing so.

In other news, there have been several more juicy transfers in the J-League so far. Paulo Wanchope to FC Tokyo! Takayuki Suzuki to Yokohama F. Marinos! Yoshito Okubo to Vissel Kobe! The entire Jubilo Iwata over-30's brigade to another team! None of these matter. No, my friends...the only transfer that matters, is former Espanyol and Bolton striker Akinori Nishizawa's move to Shimizu S-Pulse.

It seems that the S-Pulse management have heeded my calls to get rid of Marquinhos. That's probably because I persisted in making those calls about five metres away from the S-Pulse bench. Marquinhos will be diving and writhing in agony for Kashima Antlers next season - just his fifth club in his long and loyal six year career in the J-League so far. He will be replaced by none other than Nishizawa himself, a player that struck fear into the hearts of every fan sitting in Row F last season, with his wayward finishing and strange hairstyles.

Fear not, Akinori. I have faith. And what's more, I don't even sit in Row F.

Did you know that the average armadillo grows to about 75 centimetres (or 30 inches, for you metric-phobes out there) in length? I just looked it up on Wikipedia. I know it's not football related, but I'd give anything not to re-live the 2007 Emperor's Cup Final.

It should have been a great game! It wasn't. These things happen in football. Urawa beat Gamba Osaka in the 2007 Emperor's Cup Final in fortuitous circumstances. They were lucky to beat Avispa Fukuoka, Jubilo Iwata and to a lesser extent, Kashima Antlers in the rounds preceeding the Final, so it was hardly surprising that luck should favour the Saitama club on the day.

There would have been no need for luck had Ryuji Bando or Magno Alves done what they are paid to do, and that is put the ball in the back of the net. Magno Alves in particular is a fascinating player to watch. On a day when Urawa's own Brazilian striker was enjoying the sunshine on a Brazilian beach (or maybe he wasn't, but that's where I wanted to be come half-time), Alves had the perfect opportunity to demonstrate the skills that saw him share the golden boot with Washington. Instead he demonstrated the skills that lead many J-League fans to believe that he's not in quite the same class as Washington.

Alves spent most of the match pointing and shouting - sometimes aiming withering glares in the direction of his strike partner Bando, often running this way, sometimes running that, but never running in a direction that was going to assist Gamba Osaka in any particular way. In fact, Alves seemed to exert most of his energy in trying to get out of the way of actually doing something useful. When the ball did land at his feet, he seemed startled, and would either pass it straight to a Urawa defender, or otherwise reel off one the hopelessly inaccurate shots that seem to be the forté of his game.

Perhaps I'm being a bit harsh on old Alves. He was probably just cold. I know I was cold. As an Aussie, I use to laugh at the descriptions of "bitter cold" when I listened to the FA Cup Third Round on the World Service as a youngster. That is until I experienced it myself. Once, in a feat of idiocy I am yet to match, I ventured out to the Südstadion to cheer on the hapless Fortuna Köln in the derby against Fortuna Düsseldorf. Fortuna Köln were in such desperate need of support, I concluded, that I decided to make my jersey visible. So I piled layer upon layer of clothing under my jersey and set out for the game. It snowed. I nearly caught hypothermia. Freezing, I went to leave five minutes before the end, but turned on my heel at the gate and stood just long enough to watch Frank Süs score a last minute winner. Bless him for it, because if he hadn't scored that goal then I might never have watched football again.

Now where was I? Ah yes, the Emperor's Cup Final. It was boring. I mean, it had its moments, such as Akira Kaji heading the ball straight at ex-Gamba goalkeeper Ryota Tsuzuki in the Urawa goal. Or Akihiro Ienaga fashioning some half-decent chances that didn't end up with him infuriatingly taking the wrong option at a vital moment, which he seems to have a tendency to do. On the whole though, the entire game was tedious.

It might have been more memorable if it was settled by a cracking pile-driver, two minutes from the end. Instead it was settled by a scrappy counter-attack, when substitute Masayuki Okano burst through what appeared to an optimistic 0-0-10 formation on Gamba's part, to send in a low cross to Yuichiro Nagai - who was deputising for Washington up front. The Brazilian marksman probably would have blasted a hole in the back of the net, but Nagai prefers a more subtle option, so he subtly fired the ball straight at Naoki Matsuyo with all the power of a weak kitten. Matsuyo rather unhelpfully diverted the ball straight into the goal, to send the majority of the 46,880 strong crowd into spasms of wild relief. No one could have put up with another thirty minutes of that in extra-time.

And so, Urawa Reds become the first team to win the double since Kashima Antlers in 2000. The match also marked the end of Guido Buchwald's three years in charge at the club. He returns to Germany having successfully retained the Emperor's Cup that Urawa won for the first time last season, not to mention having guided the club to their first ever J-League crown. Midfielder Alessandro Santos has also left Urawa to sign with Salzburg in Austria, where he will be joined by Gamba Osaka's popular defender Tsuneyasu Miyamoto. Miyamoto was no doubt distraught at not having ended his Gamba career by lifting the Emperor's Cup for the first time in the club's history. This is a match that Miyamoto will no doubt not look back on with fond memories. But hey, at least he didn't have to watch it!

In my last blog, I hypothesized that Urawa Reds couldn't possibly receive more help in their quest to retain the Emperor's Cup. I was wrong.

In their dramatic 10-9 penalty shoot-out quarter-final win over Jubilo Iwata, Urawa's substitute midfielder Tomoyuki Sakai had his spot-kick saved by Jubilo's stand-in goalkeeper Yohei Sato. For some inexplicable reason, referee Masayoshi Okada ordered the spot-kick to be retaken. Sakai converted at the second attempt, and Jubilo defender Yusuke Inuzuka was the unfortunate player to miss, rolling his penalty wide to ultimately hand Urawa a semi-final birth, after a pulsating 3-3 draw in normal time.

Urawa used that let-off to maximum effect, beating Kashima Antlers 2-1 in Saturday's semi-final, to book a grudge match against Gamba Osaka in the Emperor's Cup Final in Tokyo on New Year's Day. You might remember that it was Gamba who came to Fortress Saitama, in the hope of claiming an improbable victory (by three goals, no less) on the last day of the J-League season, to regain the J-League title they won in 2005. Urawa ended up prevailing in that match to clinch the 2006 J-League crown, and the Osaka outfit will be hell bent on extracting revenge.

Gamba booked their own place in the final with a comfortable 2-1 win over Second Division club Consadole Sapporo in the other semi-final. The win means that talismanic captain Tsuneyasu Miyamoto - who lead Japan at both the 2002 and 2006 FIFA World Cups, will play at least one more match in the blue and black jersey. The tenacious defender set up Masafumi Maeda's winner against Sapporo, but he will join fellow Japan international and former Urawa midfielder Alessandro Santos at Red Bull Salzburg in Austria, next season.

The other man calling it a day - in what will be an emotional send-off at the National Stadium in Tokyo, is Urawa's popular German manager Guido Buchwald. After finally leading the Saitama club to the J-League crown they so desperately desired, Buchwald has decided to return to Germany to spend more time with his family. Holger Osiek will return for his second spell in charge at Urawa, and the players will be keen to send Buchwald off as a winner and impress their new coach. One man will have to miss out though, and emotions will be high, as fans of both Buchwald and Gamba's Miyamoto urge their heroes on to victory.

At any rate, to say that this is a highly anticipated affair would be an understatement. The National Stadium will be rocking, as both Urawa and Gamba look to end their seasons on a cracking high, and start 2007 on a winning note.