During the Rivalry Battle, a match designed to seize rival players, Itoshi Rin—the top-ranked participant in Blue Lock—showcased his astonishing individual skills. As the best among them, Rin openly admitted that he didn’t care about his teammates and looked down on the abilities of the other participants.

For Rin, the only thing that mattered was leveraging the Blue Lock victory system to secure his automatic place on Japan’s U-20 national team at just 16 years old and surpass his older brother, Itoshi Sae, in greatness.

In the 3 vs 3 match between Team Red, consisting of Rin, Aryu, and Tokimitsu, and Team White, consisting of Bachira, Isagi, and Nagi, an intriguing event took place. After Team Red defeated Team White, Rin showed no interest in who would be selected as a rival. Instead, he left the decision to Aryu and Tokimitsu, who chose Bachira due to his exceptional passing skills.

Here Are the 4 Reasons Why Itoshi Rin Finally Acknowledged Isagi Yoichi’s Greatness:

1. Isagi Yoichi Can Match Itoshi Rin’s Mindset

After some time had passed, Isagi challenged Rin again in the final round of the Rivalry Battle. Isagi’s motivation was clear: to defeat Rin and reclaim Bachira from Rin’s grasp. This led to an epic 4 vs 4 match between Team Red, composed of Rin, Aryu, Bachira, and Tokimitsu, and Team White, featuring Isagi, Barou, Chigiri, and Nagi.

After Rin scored the equalizer, bringing the score to 1-1 for Team Red against Team White, Nagi and Chigiri were awestruck by Rin’s brilliance as he managed to overcome their combined defense in a 1-on-2 situation. Isagi offered an insightful explanation to Chigiri and Nagi, who were eager to understand how Rin had become unstoppable.

Isagi pointed out that while Rin dribbled the ball within the shooting zone that led to his brilliant goal, Rin had cleverly lured both Chigiri and Nagi into taking turns to block his shot.

This allowed Rin to execute his prediction-based approach, performing fake shots that tricked Chigiri and Nagi. Rin pretended to kick the ball with his body posture indicating a shot while changing his movement speed to deceive his opponents.

After hearing Isagi’s analysis of Rin’s goal, Nagi admitted that he couldn’t keep up with Rin’s way of thinking. Meanwhile, Chigiri called Isagi remarkable for being able to match Rin’s mindset.

Even Bachira, who had played alongside both Rin and Isagi, was amazed by how far Isagi had come to rival Rin. Isagi demonstrated his brilliance by analyzing situations, devising strategies to score goals, and thwarting the opponent’s attacks.