Next Wednesday journalists, coaches and past winners will decide who will be Belgium’s ‘Golden Boot’ for 2014. As usual, the award will be based on performances over the calendar year rather than a complete football season. It’s crazy but it’s true. Last year, the three favourites – Thorgan Hazard, Michy Batshuayi and Maxime Lestienne –… Read More »
As Lady Gaga once said, football is a funny old game. Going into their Champions League match with Arsenal on Tuesday night, Anderlecht were seen as lambs to the slaughter. They had won one of their last five league games and would be without Steven Defour and Matias Suarez through injury and Alexsander Mitrovic as… Read More »
On May 13, Marc Wilmots will announce his ‘pre-selection’ of players who could go to Brazil. The final squad of 23 will be divulged to the public on June 2. Prior to the final group being announced, Belgium will play two friendlies, against Luxembourg and Sweden. After the announcement, Belgium will play Tunisia on June… Read More »
The infamous playoffs start this weekend. The top six (Standard Liege, Anderlecht, Racing Genk, Club Brugge, Lokeren and Zulte Waregem) will play each other twice in the next six weeks. The clubs start with half of the points gained in the “classic” season. So the clubs start as follows: Standard Liege 34 points, Club Brugge… Read More »
Tonight the Belgium U21 squad face Cyprus at Leuven. It’s their first match in the long road towards qualification for the 2015 U21 European championships in the Czech Republic. In the summer, the U21 squad looked rather weak but in the last few months with the emergence of players like Denis Praet, Massimo Bruno, Thorgan… Read More »
International friendlies were on the agenda last week and it’s hard for players, clubs or fans to get too excited for such matches. Belgium faced Slovakia on Wednesday but a more interesting fixture took place in Mechelen on the previous night when the Belgium U21 side faced Spain. The Belgian youngsters drew an entertaining game… Read More »
It’s just over halfway through the season proper in the Jupiler Pro League but as the ‘end-of-season playoffs’ count for 40% of points overall (points gained by the end of the classic season are divided by two), we’re just getting started in Belgium. No one likes the current system and this is probably the last… Read More »
So it was not to be. Anderlecht played well for 45 minutes and then failed to concentrate at the beginning of the second half. A goal from AC Milan’s Stephan El Shaarawy and a wonder strike from Philippe Mexès sealed Anderlecht’s fate. Now they most hope that results work out for them on the final… Read More »
There will be 20, 783 spectators in the Constant Vanden Stock stadium tonight and all but 1,085 will be hoping for a home victory. Hopes have not been so high for a decade or more, when Jan Koller and Tomasz Radzinski were demolishing defences, including that of Manchester United. The new coach John Van den… Read More »
The Standard-Anderlecht clash at Sclessin today brings together Ron Jans and John Van den Brom, two of the five Dutch coaches in the Belgian first division. The coaches at two of the country’s leading clubs have had differing fortunes in their first couple of months in Belgium. Jans has certainly shown himself to be the… Read More »