Club - Cercle: the Club Facts

Sunday is here again: Derby time! At 13:30 we host Cercle Brugge on matchday fourteen in the Jupiler Pro League. Below you will find all Club Facts to live optimally towards the city derby!

The Match

Both Club Brugge, and Cercle Brugge will be looking for revenge, as both teams lost on the previous matchday. Club lost to leader Union, Cercle lost to number two Anderlecht. Club is seventh with nineteen points, Cercle is fourth with two more points. The 155th city derby in First Division is thus one with high stakes.

In the last 77 home derbies, Club won 48 times. 17 times it was a draw, and 12 times Cercle drew the longest. In the last nine home derbies Club did not lose (7W & 2D), scored 21 times and also kept the zero five times. The last time Club lost a derby was in an away game. In December 2021, it was 2-0 to Green-Zwart.

Last season Club took four points from the two confrontations between them. At home, Blauw-Zwart took out 4-0 after an owngoal by Marcelin and goals by Skov Olsen, Casper Nielsen and Roman Yaremchuk. In the away game Club gave away their lead twice (2-2) after goals by Lang and again Nielsen.

Club is going through a difficult period, but nevertheless it won four of its last five matches - across all competitions. Thus, twice Lugano, Antwerp and Beerschot prevailed. On the previous match day, Union was too strong (2-1). Last Thursday Club did qualify for the next round on matchday four of the Conference League after a 2-0 victory against Lugano, a boost.

Top marksman at FCB is Andreas Skov Olsen, who has already scored seven league goals. He also has three assists to his name in the JPL. However, the best striker at Club is De Cuyper (6), against Union the left-winger scored his first league goal. The goalkeepers of both clubs - Mignolet and Warleson - are two of the seventeen players who did not miss a minute in the league this season.

Club and Cercle are both in the top four in terms of most shots on goal (214 for Club, 206 for Cercle) and fewest shots against (140 and 142).

The opponent

Cercle Brugge is the guest at the Jan Breydel Stadium Sunday. Groen-Zwart is having a good season and is in fourth place. Coach Muslic's all-or-nothing soccer has earned his team seven wins, but also six defeats. On the other hand, there has not been a single draw this season. Last year Cercle was the team with the most draws.

A small blemish on a so far good season is the elimination in the 1/16th cup final. Second division team Zulte Waregem knocked Cercle out of the cup after penalties at Jan Breydel. Essevee will by the way come to Bruges again in December for the cup duel with Blauw-Zwart in the 1/8th final.

On the road, the Association took 50% of the points. It won against Standard (0-1), STVV (0-2) and KV Mechelen (0-2), and it lost against Antwerp (1-0), RWDM (2-1) and KV Kortrijk (2-1).

This summer, a lot of players left Green-Black. Keepers Ueda (Feyenoord), Deman (SV Werder Bremen), Vanhoutte (Union SG) and Hotic (Lech Poznan) left. Robbe Decostere left for Zulte Waregem and Jean Marcelin (now Bordeaux) and Radoslaw Majecki returned to Monaco on loan.

In their place came, as usual, a lot of young talent. In goal, Cercle reinforced itself with young Belgian Maxime Delanghe. At the back, they hired Nazinho from Sporting CP and Jordan Semedo and Romaric Etonde from AS Monaco. Alan Minda (Independiente Del Valle), Félix Lemaréchal (rented from Monaco) and Nils De Wilde (RSCA Futures) joined the midfield. Belgian promise Kazeem Olaigbe (Southampton) joined the attacking line.

The league's top marksman plays at Cercle as he did last season. Kévin Denkey replaced the Japanese Ueda superbly for the time being and has already scored ten goals. Lemaréchal, Ravych and Siquet all have two assists, making them the best attackers on the squad.

Cercle Brugge has, on average, the youngest starting eleven in the league with an age of 23.5 years. Remarkable, because in total there were only 8 minutes of teenagers on the field at Cercle. That honor was reserved for Jonas Lietaert and Romaric Etonde. At Club, teenagers were already 1971 minutes between the lines (Spileers, Nusa, Sabbe, Ordóñez and Vermant).

Milestones

• Skov Olsen can play his 70th game for Club, in which he has been decisive 52 times.
• Igor Thiago is facing match 25 at Blue-Black.
• Philip Zinckernagel can then finish his again 20th match for FCB.
• Left back Bjorn Meijer is preparing for league game number 40.
• Jorne Spileers faces his 25th JPL match at Club Brugge.

The referee

The man in charge of the city derby is Erik Lambrechts. Jo De Weirdt and Kevin Monteney back the ref. Incidentally, the trio reached a provisional peak last Tuesday by leading a Champions League match for the first time ever. The three were flawless in the match between Manchester City and Young Boys Bern.

The fourth ref is Michiel Allaerts. Lawrence Visser, along with Rien Vanyzere and Mario Vanlommel, will take his place behind the VAR screens in Tubize.

Lambrechts, a 39-year-old Flemish-Brabander, has been whistling matches at the highest level in Belgium since 2012, and in 2014 he made his European debut. So he knitted a nice sequel to that this week.

It is Club Brugge's 35th match that will be led by Lambrechts. Club's 21 previous home matches under his leadership resulted in 18 wins, 1 draw and 2 defeats. For Cercle, it will be the 19th match under his direction. 11 previous away matches of green and black under his leadership finished at 4 wins, 2 draws and 5 defeats.

Surprisingly, it will be only the first Bruges derby in Lambrechts' refereeing career. Earlier this season, he already whistled Standard-Club (2-1), KVM-Cercle (2-0) and KVK-Cercle (2-1).