On Friday night, a disappointing Anderlecht lost at KV Mechelen thereby giving Gent a chance to go top on Saturday night. It wasn’t to be as Trond Sollied’s men went down 1-0 at home to Beerschot despite dominating the match. That gives Club Brugge an opportunity to close the gap and move into second place when they play struggling Sint Truiden on Sunday evening. Christoph Daum will be rubbing his hands, and planning another clean sheet, in anticipation.
Anderlecht are definitely suffering in their spell without captain Lucas Biglia. On Friday, Ariel Jacobs played with Guillaume Gillet and Sacha Kljestan in central midfield and it patently did not work. There have been rumours that Genk’s Daniel Tozser will be moving to Brussels in January but Anderlecht need a player with more finesse than the Hungarian if they want to successfully replace Biglia long-term.
As for Gent, they battered Beerschot for 90 minutes but failed to score for the second game in succession. In truth, Gent have a wealth of attacking talent but lack someone who can guarantee to score 15-20 goals per season. On the flanks, Petit-Pele Mboyo again looked a real talent for the Buffalos.
Kortrijk moved into fourth spot, based on matches won, as they completely outplayed Westerlo. The only goal of the game was scored by Anderlecht’s Big Serb Dalibor Veselinovic, on loan at Kortrijk, who – I grudgingly have to admit – took his chance well.
Bob Peeters took his Cercle side to Mons and came away with three points; this was the Dragons’ first home defeat of the season. Cercle Brugge were well-organised and the league’s leading scorer Jeremy Perbet noted afterwards that he’d been marked by four men. Veteran striker Oleg Iachtchouk was prominent for Cercle.
Standard Liege drew at Lokeren and undoubtedly missed their midfield leader William Vainqueur; they look half the side without him. Racing Genk, however, seemed to be relaxed as they forgot their Champions League blues by thrashing Lierse 4-0. Elyaniv Barda got two and looked very sharp indeed, Kevin De Bruyne’s stand-in 17 year-old Anthony Limbombe made the first goal and Jelle Vossen both scored and a missed a penalty. It was Vossen’s 100th game for Genk.
In the other match, Zulte Waregem’s 19 year-old Macedonian international Aleksandar Trajkovski – once wanted by Anderlecht – scored a brilliant goal from 30 metres out against Leuven. Both sides have been finding it hard to win in recent weeks and it came to pass that the game finished 2-2.
Results
KV Mechelen 2 Anderlecht 1
Lokeren 1Standard 1
Gent 0 Beerschot 1
Mons 0 Cercle Brugge 2
Kortrijk 1 Westerlo 0
Genk 4 Lierse 0
Leuven 2 Zulte Waregem 2