Intro
There is only one game in Asia this GW but it also marks the start of the AFC/ACL tournament which I will give some info about here.
AFC/ACL
The AFC Champions League (ACL) is an annual continental club competition that sees up to four J1 League teams participate.
The associations are split into two regions
West Region consists of the 25 associations from the West Asian Football Federation (WAFF), the South Asian Football Federation (SAFF), and the Central Asian Football Association (CAFA).
East Region consists of the 22 associations from the ASEAN Football Federation (AFF) and the East Asian Football Federation (EAFF).
For Sorare the main focus is J1 and K League teams that have qualified. There are also players on Sorare that moved to non sorare leagues and are eligible (eg Gabriel Pires for Al-Gharafa and Maxime Lestienne for Lion City Sailors.
Due to the winter World Cup this year, the schedule for the ACL is very different to usual year. The group games will all be played in a 2 week period from April 15th - May 1st with teams playing up to 6 games during that time.
Groups
Four teams qualified from the J1 League to the groups stages. They are:
Urawa Reds
Yokohama FM
Kawasaki Frontale
Vissel Kobe
* Please note that Shanghai have withdrawn from the competition and as a result Vissel Kobes group only has 3 teams
General Info
The Asian Football Confederation said it had been decided to allow each ACL team to field a maximum of four foreign players, one of whom must be from an Asian country. This is called the 3+1 rule. Teams like Frontale have 2 players from an asian country (Chanthip and Ryong) so are to field a max of 4 foreign players. For YFM, they dont have any players from asian nations outside of Japan so will need to pick 3 from their 5 Brazilian players (Elber, Eduardo, Cera,Lopes and M.Junior)
The remaining remaining Chinese league clubs (Shandong Taishan and Guangzhou) are sending their B-team/youth team for the group stage. The same thing happened last year and resulted in some big wins for the J1 League teams:
This does present an opportunity for sorare, however, there will be heavy rotation for these type of games and the challenge will be picking the right players/starting X11.
The winners of each group and three best runners up will qualify for the round of 16 which will take place in August. The full schedule can be seen below:
Although I can't find the odds for the games, it is safe to assume the J1 and K league clubs are by far the strongest in their groups and the biggest & most important games will be when they face each other
Player Suspensions & Injuries
I have made a new page on the site that has all known player injuries. I can be found here
GW 261 Fixtures
Lineups
Kawasaki Frontale vs Ulsan
Marcinho went off with an injury on the weekend however looks fine to me in the training video I have seen
Fans reported that Ienaga wasnt seen in training on Monday. Its uncertain the reason why hence the 60% confidence level
Schmidt did well in the previous game and could start here again. I feel it is a coin toss between him and Wakizaka. Wakizaka is a favourite of the manager and though he has been out of form a little recently, could get the nod.
I did see Noborizato and Kurumaya in the training video but I dont see them starting yet, they may well make the bench.
For Ulsan and K league info, I highly recommend this group for all K League info!
I have also posted the lineup info on the Sorare Sharp app, if I see any updated before deadline, I will be updating it here
General & Sorare
As there is only 1 game in Asia this GW, the prize pools are small. Below is the Asia 4 prize pool
D4
Wakizaka is a risk but I dont have any other options and with such small prize pool, a bit of luck will be needed to get into the rewards :)
I hope you found this useful!
I am always more than happy to talk things J1 League & Sorare on twitter or Discord
Click below for the J League Sorare Discord channel:
