Kashiwa Reysol

Kashiwa Reysol go into the current campaign carrying the weight of a name that once meant something in J1: a club that has won the title once, in 2011, but has spent long stretches since shuttling between the top flight and J2.

The corporate roots run deeper than the professional badge suggests. The rebrand borrowed from Spanish rather than Japanese — Rey and Sol, king and sun — which is where the nickname Sun King comes from, and where the yellow and black of the kit trace back to.

Home games are played at Sankyo Frontier Kashiwa Stadium, a ground that holds a little over 15,000. Before the J.League era, the Hitachi side had already banked silverware, including the old Japan Soccer League in 1972. That cup would return twice more, in 1975 and in 2012, the latter arriving the year after the league title and followed by the Japanese Super Cup.

Christo Stoichkov wore the shirt at the end of the 1990s, a name that still surfaces when the club's history comes up, and Hiroki Sakai came through the academy before his run in the first team between 2009 and 2012. None of the derbies — with JEF United Chiba across the prefecture, with Kashima Antlers over the Tonegawa river — carry more history than the one against Urawa Reds, part of what locals still call the Marunouchi big three.