Mons stay up despite defeat Saturday, 08 May 2004 RAEC Mons were thrashed 9-0 at home by second-placed Club Brugge KV on Saturday but avoided relegation as K. Heusden-Zolder and R. Antwerp FC both lost. Despite the scoreline, Mons president Dominique Leone was in celebratory mood. "We lost heavily tonight but I do not give a damn," he said. "We are staying in first division thanks to the changes we made during the season - getting [coach] Sergio Brio here and half a dozen new players in the winter. That is all that counts. The club is financially sound and we are going on."
Craziest game I ever saw. Every chance Brugge had was a goal. Half due to bad defending, half due to Brugge's superior quality up front. Well, mostly due to bad defending ...
Not a whole lot, just that it has been built on the ruins of some other clubs, including RWDM if i'm not mistaking. I also remember that Anderlecht wasn't all too keen on their resurgance at first.
I'm surprised to see them promoted already. WHat kind of attendance do they get? I can imagine that Anderlecht wasn't too keen on the idea, but having a derby match could help attendance.
Speaking as an American who has been a Belgium fan from afar ever since the 1986 World Cup, it's good to see some discussion here about Belgian football. Here's a recent online article I wrote: http://www.planetworldcup.com/GUESTS/peter20040419.html
Nice article. I was 9 when Belgium lost to England in the 1990 WC and I still remember that game as the greatest injustice ever done to our team. We hit the woodwork 3-4 times and had the better of the chances and the play throughout the game, and then we get that joke of a freak kick awarded against us. The rest is history off course...
Very good article. Maybe I should start supporting a Belgian club so there would be more posters here to discuss Belgian football.
RWD Molenbeek folded after the 2001-2 season, and then some investors purchased KFC Strombeek, a club from a Brussels suburb that had just reached the 2nd division for the first time, and moved it to RWDM's stadium, with the intention of giving RWDM's fans a new club to support. Before this past season they changed the name to FC Molenbeek Brussels Strombeek, but they just use the name FC Brussels. I don't know how much attendance they get. worldstadiums.com lists the capacity as 12,430. Brussels' oldest club, Union Saint-Gilloise, which won 11 championships prior to WWII but has been in the lower leagues for decades, has just won promotion to the 2nd division.
I've done a lot of searching for info while following the career of Earthquakes board legend Yves Buelinckx, who played for Strombeek/FC Brussels in 2002-3, so I've learned a little bit about the Belgian 2nd division in the process. I just found about Union today as I stumbled across them while searching for FC Brussels' stadium capacity. They have English content on their website www.rusg.be .
Here in the USA I've been a DC United supporter since MLS began. I also follow the Mexican league, where I support Monterrey, who must be setting some sort of record this year with 12 draws in 18 games. I know the basics about the Belgian clubs, although I haven't had the chance to follow the league closely yet. But I always pick a new league to follow every year, so next time out I'll go with Belgium.
Hey, thanks for the kind words. I'm an English professor at a small college in Pennsylvania, USA. But I'm also a lifelong soccer fanatic, and I've been writing for Jan Alsos' website Planet World Cup (www.planetworldcup.com, formerly World Cup Archive) for a few years now. It's tremendous fun, and you find yourself in contact with great people all over the world.
Hi, I'm a Belgian, so if you have any questions about Belgian soccer... Kompany is a great talent indeed. Some say he's the biggest Belgian talent in 30 years. Anderlecht now also has a 16-year old player who is becoming a first team regular, Anthony Van den Borre, just like Kompany also half Congolese. Another name to keep an eye on is Aruna Dindane, a striker from Anderlecht who made a laugh out of the Bayern Munich defense in the Champions League earlier this year. A talented midfielder is Jonathan Blondel, who was transferred from Tottenham to F.C. Bruges in january. Westerlo is rather a local club that works together with Chelsea and Feyenoord to get some Africans that don't get a work permit yet in the Uk or Holland. Their league position is generally ok. R. Antwerp F.C. is another team that cooperates with an English club: Manchester utd. However, they didn't perform too well this year and are relegating. FC Beveren is a peculiarity in the world of soccer. Beside of their agreement with Arsenal to exchange players (at present Igor Stepanovs, before Graham Stack) they mostly bring a whole team of Ivorians on the pitch. They are really talented and come from a soccer school from Jean-Marc Guillou, a French guy who once played professional soccer. The best teams in Belgium are Anderlecht, Bruges, standard lieges and rc Genk. I'm sorry for the long reply, wanted to be brief but I got carried away. Grtz
If Bruges are supposedly supposed to be one of Belgiums best teams well for what its worth they were beaten rather easily this year by a very average Bordeaux team.