FC Barcelona v Vissel Kobe to end the season

FC Barcelona's 2022/23 season will be ending on Tuesday 6 June (7.30pm local time in Tokyo and 12.30pm CEST, live on Barça TV) with a game against J-League outfit Vissel Kobe, a side featuring former Barça stars Andrés Iniesta and Sergi Samper.

The team will be flying east straight after their Sunday 9pm CEST fixture against Celta Vigo. They will be taken directly by coach to Santiago de Compostela, and from there will be boarding a charter flight to Haneda, where they are scheduled to touch down in Japan at around 11.30pm CEST Japanese time. They will fly straight back to Barcelona once the friendly is over.

The travelling party is being led by Rafael Yuste, vice-president of the Sports Area and will include all of the players named in the squad that faced Celta, namely Ter Stegen, O. Dembélé, Lewandowski, Ansu Fati, Ferran, Iñaki Peña, Christensen, Marcos A., Kessie, S. Roberto, F. De Jong, Raphinha, Kounde, Eric, Gavi, Pablo Torre, Arnau Tenas, Unai, Marc Guiu, Pau Prim, Dani R, Julian Araujo and Héctor Fort.

Prior to the game, the directors will be attending a reception with members of the Penya FC Barcelona Japan. 

The game itself is being played at the Japan National Stadium, capacity 66,000, and is the first game Barça have played in the country since 2019, four years ago, when the side coached by Ernesto Valverde also met Vissel Kobe, the first and to date only time that Andrés Iniesta has faced his former team.

Next Tuesday will be especially emotional for Iniesta, because it is one of the last times that he play in the Vissel Kobe jersey following his recent announcement that this will be his final season in Japan before he embarks on a new challenge in his career.