Cercle Brugge vs Kortrijk

Jan Breydel Stadium is the venue as Cercle Brugge and Kortrijk go head-to-head in an exciting Belgian Pro League showdown.

Cercle Brugge had a busy week as they squeaked past Scottish outfit Kilmarnock 1-0 in the return leg of their Europa League playoff tie to reach the third qualifying round as 2-1 aggregate winners. A heroic midweek performance softened the blow of last weekend’s embarrassing 3-0 league loss at Westerlo, which got Cercle Brugge’s new Pro League season off to a disastrous start. The impending home return comes in handy, even though ‘Groen en Zwart’ stuttered at the Jan Breydel Stadium toward the end of last season, picking up just one win in five league matches here (W1, D2, L2), four of which saw both teams on the scoresheet. However, Cercle Brugge’s recent home league record against Kortrijk offers a different narrative, with Miron Muslic’s side winning the three top-flight H2Hs they’ve hosted by 2+ goals ‘to nil.’

Despite their recent woes at the Jan Breydel, visiting Kortrijk are no strangers to taking points from this stadium, having won three Pro League visits to Cercle Brugge before the abovementioned run ensued in March 2022. More confidence stems from the visitors’ inspiring five-game away form at the tail-end of last season (W3, D1, L1), even though Freyr Alexandersson’s team netted under 1.5 goals on each occasion. Kortrijk’s goalscoring woes plagued their opening game of 2024/25 as Gent eked out a 1-0 win at the Guldensporen Stadion last weekend. Worryingly for Kortrijk, they only netted nine goals across 15 Pro League road trips during the regular season in 2023/24, suggesting another uneventful showing could be on the cards.