River Plate vs Urawa Red Diamonds Prediction & Picks - Club World Cup

Prediction published on 6/17/25, 11:39 AM  by Edgar Jibran | Modified on 6/17/25 at 8:01 PM in Club World Cup Picks

River Plate's debut in the first ever World Club Cup will take place next Tuesday, June 17th at 01:00 pm CST, in a game which is expected to be very complicated against Urawa Red Diamonds. For this game, even though River Plate is considered as the big favorites to win, it's more than necessary to note that Marcelo Gallardo's team hasn't been able to show a solid performance during the first semester of 2025, so this game could be one of the biggest surprises in the first matchday of the tournament.

In this matter, it must be remarked that River Plate had a very bad shape at the Argentinian league, tournament in which they were eliminated by Platense in penalties. Additionally, they couldn't win the last game of Copa Libertadores against Universitario de Deportes, so they cannot face this game with overconfidence, as Mastantuono could be more focused on avoid any injury rather than in looking up for making history with his former team.

Meanwhile, the main expectation for Urawa Red Diamonds will be turning into one of the biggest outsiders in Group E, being worth noting that they'll definitely battle for the second spot of the group against River and Monterrey. Taking that into account, it also must be mentioned that the Japanese squad has a very offensive trend, so the ball possesion is expected to be very even between these teams.