Mito 2 -1 Sapporo

Mito scored 2 goals for only the second time this year as the team hung on to beat a dominant Sapporo side at Sapporo Dome. Sapporo clearly played better and had an amazing medium range goal to show for that effort, but Mito's catenaccio style is proving successful so far. In most games Mito has been outshot massively and has been behind strongly in possession as well, and this was no different, having less than a third of each in the match.

As has been the case since game 3, Mito has only been dangerous during set plays, and the only goals scored against other teams have been during free kicks or corner kicks. In this match, Mito would take four corner kicks and the two goals would result from two of these. Both would have the ball bounce around a bit before falling luckily in front of defender Sakuda, who would knock it in for his first 2 pro goals. They lacked the finesse of Sapporo's fine strike, but no fan prefers a pretty loss over an ugly win.

The upcoming holiday week has 3 matches with 2 being home for Mito. The first will be on Thursday with Tokyo Verdy making the short trip north.