The Jupiler League ends its already short winter break! At the start, the climbers from Mechelen and Standard Liège face each other. During the break, the guests completed a sunny training camp in Marbella on the Costa del Sol. The Walloons’ batteries were more or less completely empty towards the end of the year.
The squad went through the additional games in the Europa League. The previous downward trend should now be stopped with fresh energy. After all, Liège has been waiting for the next win for four match days and only fifth place in the table.
As is known, only the first six clubs after the end of the regular season qualify for the final championship round. If this is not to be missed, a scenario that is certainly not planned on the Meuse, threes have to be broken in again.
The home side are right behind standard in the tableau, whereby the goal for the season is certainly a bit more relaxed than newcomer. So far, the Flemish have done very well in the Belgian upper house for their limited resources. The end of the year for 2019 was also successfully contested with two victories against Oostende and Mouscron.
For the upcoming match between Mechelen and Standard Liège, the forecast includes double the chance for the KV. The team of Coach Wouter Vrancken will be very motivated because you could beat the red and whites in the table with a win. The AFAS stadium kicks off at 19:30 p.m. on January 17.
Mechelen:
The season started for Mechelen with a crashing 0-3 defeat against the master KRC Genk in the Supercup. For the cup winner, a difficult season was emerging as a promoted player. But the Flemish had quickly grabbed themselves and subsequently played stable.
Winning the Belgian Cup last year proved that the team was of sufficient quality for the top Belgian league. The financial scope at Mechelen is otherwise small. For this reason, hardly any changes were made to the squad compared to the previous season of promotion.
However, this also had the advantage of a very well-coordinated team. In addition, the yellow-red have a high level of experience. Some old handlers like the 36-year-old attacker Igor de Camargo or central defender Arjan Swinkels can be discovered with the country’s four-time title holder.
A shortcoming is the defensive. This has the highest number of goals conceded among the top ten teams in the Jupiler League. A weak point that can also be observed regularly in home games. For this reason, Mechelen versus Standard Liège also offer the odds for a mutual goal.
In the ten home games of the European Cup Winners’ Cup in 1988 so far, the prognosis would have been no less than seven times correct and KV could only get one clean sheet.
Standard Liège:
The team of coach Michel Preud’Homme played a game almost every four days last December. The entire month was therefore divided into English weeks. Also because of numerous injured players, this enormous number of encounters was obviously not manageable.
The last match against the buffalo from Ghent was symptomatic in this context: 0: 1 was lost in front of their home crowd and a real build-up was not possible due to the physical deficits.
For the kickers from the Meuse, it also went bankrupt for the second time in a row after having previously suffered an embarrassing failure at the penultimate table Waasland-Beveren. In addition, he was eliminated in the Belgian Cup against Antwerp. So 2019 ended with three losses.
The unfortunate end of the group phase in the Europa League played a psychologically negative role in advance. In the final home game against the Gunners, a 2-0 lead was given away, which also had this competition done.
Coach Michel Preud’Homme therefore had his hands full mentally in the training camp mentioned at the beginning. The team should now be in better shape again due to the break. On the other hand, the next construction site near Liège has already opened.
With Renaud Emond the best scorer was lost. The attacker is now chasing goals at Nantes in Ligue 1. This is a noticeable weakening for the Liège offensive.
PREDICTION: Both teams to score / YES @ 1,62
