Philippe Clement: "First half hour not sharp enough"

Club Brugge maintains a perfect record in 2021. Blauw-Zwart did not have an overwhelming start like Sunday against Genk, but grew in the game and eventually picked up a deserved win.

"I am obviously satisfied with the three points, which were deserved even after ninety minutes," said Philippe Clement. "I was not satisfied with our first half-hour where we were not sharp enough: in our duels, depth, ball pace, way too much unnecessary ball loss. Apparently we needed a goal to be ready for the rest of the match. We then equalized before halftime. We did have a lot of ball possession, but too little quality. The second half was better. You then score the second goal. Then Cercle started to take more risks and then we failed to score the third goal on the counter. I'm satisfied with 60 minutes, but not with the first 30."

Cercle Brugge dangles at the bottom of the standings, but still showed itself to be a solid opponent. "I said it before the match. It's bizarre that Cercle is where they are. They have been playing good soccer all year. Today they continued the same tactics from against Kortrijk and were dangerous at times. You can clearly see where their coach wants to go. There are a lot of guys with quality, but they may lack efficiency at times to finish it off."

The Bruges coach brought Lang and Vanaken both to the side fairly early on. "Noa had received a kick on the knee in the first half and that seriously hindered him, hence the substitution. Hans was unlucky that that suspension fell just after the break. He needs to get back into the rhythm. It was just a tactical change because Balanta can get even more balance in midfield there with the infiltration of Rits. I'm going to spend the next two days seeing how the guys come out of this match. A few guys gave a tired impression, when you see them play afterwards it's not. It's more in the head than in the legs, I think. Now Sunday is a blast against Standard. Those are always top games and Standard has taken a lot of points now under Leye. I'll see in the next few days who is best to start that match." (VL)