Club Brugge – Charleroi: the Club Facts

THE NUMBER: 3

With Hans Vanaken on Wednesday night, a Club player won the Golden Boot for the third year in a row. On Sunday, there will be 2 Bruges Golden Boot winners on the pitch (Vormer and Vanaken) and 1 in the staff (Simons).

THE REFEREE

Alexandre Boucaut is the referee for Club's first game of 2019. He is assisted by the linesmens Frederic Godelaine and Vito Di Vincenzo. Fourth official is Christof Dierick, Laurent Colemonts is VAR on duty.

It will be Blue-Black's 33rd official match led by the 38-year-old ref. Club's 14 previous home matches with him as ref ended in nine wins, four draws and one defeat.

Earlier this season, Boucaut led Club's duels at home against Waasland-Beveren (1-1) and Zulte Waregem (1-3) and away at Mouscron (0-1).

THE PLAYERS

Wesley could play his 110th official match for Club on Sunday.

Siebe Schrijvers could be in action for the 20th time for Club.

Dion Cools can play his 75th league match for Blauw-Zwart.

For Lois Openda and Sofyan Amrabat, it could be the 10th league match at Club.

Mats Rits can play his 200th match in First Division! He played all 21 outward league matches at Club. He also played 155 times for KV Mechelen and 23 times for Beerschot AC.

THE MATCH

As in 2018, the first official match of 2019 will be a home match against Sporting Charleroi. Last year, Club secured a big 5-1 victory in that first match in the cup against the Zebras. So in that season, the two teams played each other five times: apart from the cup match, Club secured a 1-2 win in the regular league and a 3-3 draw on home turf. And in Play-Off 1, Club won 1-3 and 6-0 against Charleroi.

Earlier this season, Club ran into its 2nd league defeat of the season at Mambourg. Hans Vanaken had put Club ahead after only 11 minutes, but just before half-time Cristian Benavente equalised. The match looked set to end in a draw, when Massimo Bruno still took the 3 points for the home side (2-1).

This is the 98th game between the two teams in First Division. The 48 previous home matches against Charleroi ended in 37 wins (last time 6-0 on 19/04/2018), 8 draws (last time 3-3 on 04/02/2018) and 3 defeats (last time 0-2 on 29/02/2008).

In the past 12 home league games, Club managed to score against Sporting Charleroi each time. Last season, it scored no less than 14 times in 3 home matches (2 league matches and 1 cup match) against the Zebras combined.

Club had a successful winter training camp under pleasant temperatures in Qatari Doha. It suffered a narrow defeat in a friendly against PSV Eindhoven (2-1). With a great solo, Hans Vanaken provided the honours.

DE THE OPPONENT

Sporting Charleroi travelled to Valencia in Spain for their winter training camp. In a friendly against German second division side FC St Pauli, which featured ex-Club player Waldemar Sobota, Felice Mazzu's team turned a 2-0 deficit into a 2-3 win. 2 goals from Jérémy Perbet and 1 goal from Marco Ilaimaharitra ensured the turnaround.

The club said goodbye to two players this winter: French striker Romain Grange was loaned to French second division side Grenoble Foot 38. 33-year-old defender Francis N'Ganga, who has yet to see action at Charleroi this season, moved to Ermis Aradippou (Cyp).

Sporting Charleroi ended the first half of the competition at 8th place in the standings. On the road, it achieved 9 out of 30. It won over Eupen (1-4) and Lokeren (2-4), played draw against Standard (0-0), Waasland-Beveren (1-1) and Anderlecht (1-1) and lost to KRC Genk (3-1), Cercle Brugge (2-1), AA Gent (2-1), KV Oostende (2-1) and Zulte Waregem (3-1).

Before the winter break, Sporting Charleroi had to suffer a 0-1 defeat in the Walloon clash against Standard Liege. Paul José Mpoku scored the only goal of the match.

The Club defence needs to keep a special eye on two players: top shooters Cristian Benavente and Victor Osimhen have already scored nine and eight goals respectively.

Sporting Charleroi has got one of the most foreign-flavoured teams in the First Division. On average, only 2.29 Belgians were at the kick-off. Only Cercle Brugge starts with even fewer Belgians on average (2.14).

THE OTHER MATCHES

Fri 18/01 20:30 K. Sint-Truidense VV - KRC Genk (Ref: Lawrence Visser) sat 19/01 18:00 R. Standard de Liège - KV Kortrijk (Ref: Erik Lambrechts) sat 19/01 20:00 KAS Eupen - KSC Lokeren OV (Ref: Kevin Van Damme) sat 19/01 20:00 KV RS Waasland-SK Beveren - Cercle Brugge KSV (Ref: Bert Put) sat 19/01 20:30 SV Zulte Waregem - R. Antwerp FC (Ref: Nathan Verboomen) Sun 20/01 18:00 KAA Gent - RSC Anderlecht (Ref: Jonathan Lardot) Sun 20/01 20:00 R. Excel Mouscron - KV Oostende (Ref: Lothar D'Hondt).