2-0 Charleroi - Genk (2-0) KRC GENK: Jan Moons (c), Indridi Sigurdsson(Y), Aaron Mokoena, Koen Daerden, Kevin Vandenbergh, Dimitri De Conde (Paul Kpaka 46’), Eric Matoukou (Faris Haroun 46’), Brian Priske, Gert Claessens (Igor De Camargo 73’), Orlando Engelaar, Justice Wamfor. RCS CHARLEROI:Bertrand Laquait, Frank Defays, Loris Reina, Sebastien Chabaud, Laurent Macquet (Ousmane Bangoura 87’), Toni Brogno (Thibaut Detal 78’), Izzet Akgul (Orlando Dos Santos 66’), Ibrahim Kargbo, Mahamoudou Kere, Gregory Christ, Nasredine Kraouche. Goals: Akgul (1-0), Brogno (2-0) Referee:Joeri Van De Veld Attendance:13,443 (Y) = Yellow Card. (R) = Red Card from krcGenk.be -- Not a good result. Genk had a chance to move to 3rd place in the Jupiler League.
2-1 Genk - Cercle Brugge (1-0) KRC GENK: Jan Moons (c), Indridi Sigurdsson, Aaron Mokoena(Y), Koen Daerden(Y) (Igor De Camargo 80’), Dimitri De Conde (Eric Matoukou 87’), Paul Kpaka (Kevin Vandenbergh 63), Faris Haroun, Brian Priske, Gert Claessens, Orlando Engelaar, Justice Wamfor. Cercle Brugge: Mollez, Masureel, Milosevic, De Wulf, Miskovic, Viane, Dekelver, Vlahos, Meyssen (9' Meyssen), Pivaljevic (74' Roiha), De Smet Goals: 10' Haroun (1-0), 78' Vandenbergh (2-0), 82' Roiha (2-1) Attendance: 21483 Referee: J. Vereecke from KRCGenk.be
hi everyone...sorry but Im new to this. please be patient. I am extremely happy to find a thread related to KRC Genk. My little boy (well, mommy talk for 15 yo) is currently playing for Genk's u17 youth team and absolutely loves the club, the coaches, the training, the schooling, the environment, the support! I don't get to hear from him much or find out about how soccer is in Belgium in general, so your information is proving absolutely invaluable to an avid soccermom missing his young un. So kudos to you Tomo for starting the thread. Please keep it up! This will be my favorite place to visit from now on...
Welcome to you soccermoms2 ! we'll do our best to keep this thread going on (you can trust DSC05 and Tomo for that).
Congratulations SoccerMoms2. Keep us posted on how he's doing. Maybe you should post this in the Yanks Abroad forum as well. Thanks for posting.
Welcome soccermoms2, I had no idea an American boy was playing at RC Genk youth. I've read your posts on the other boards about the dilemma of him staying for more than one year. That's not an easy question of course so I can only tell you that if he really wants to make it in pro soccer, Genk definitely is one of the best environments for a youngster to develop. It's a top five club with lots of supporters but the pressure is not too high. IMO their youth system is one of the best in Belgium and the academy contains some of the biggest talents in Belgium. I believe your son might even be playing alongside Arne Nilis (son of former PSV star Luc Nilis) who has inherited the fabulous technique of his father. Genk moreover is a very quiet area to live. They call it a city but it's more like a merger of villages. Is your son in the elite team of Genk youth? This is a team especially developped for the hottest prospects from 15-19. He might still be too young for that though.
Thank you for your kind words Tomo and others on this board. Not sure how the system is set up there, all I know is that he is playing a year up with the u17s with Dirk Staelens as his coach...whom he absolutely thinks very highly of. It was actually coach Pol Peters who invited him originally to play for Genk when he played with his u19s against PSV Eindhoven in a friendly in April. wherein he scored a goal in the first 5 minutes and later had a couple more assists. Perhaps it was jetlag? Haha! The great thing is that he has integrated into the system and culture well. Totally feels like his game has improved one hundred fold. His mid season eval from coach (according to him) seems to validate this. And his school marks also reflect this. Very surprising to us since he is learning all 13 of his subjects in Dutch (which he has absolutely zero background of). Anyway, we are just happy that he is soo happy in his current home. Since we don't speak Dutch or French, we haven't had any direct contact with his coaches to really find out how he is doing. Just tough for us to think that he may want to return there again next year and forego his college aspirations. It will have to be his decision though. We can only support him. Again thanks everyone for being so kind. I am pleased that I had the chance to find this board where I can actually hopefully get first hand info on how youth / pro soccer works in Belgium.
One thing you have to consider.....if he's good enough to play pro, he can always go to College over there as well. If he doesn't make the pro team at 18 - he can always return here and be one of the best players at his college team, and maybe take a shot at MLS in a few years. Have you gone over there recently? Tell him that we are rooting for him - its great that we have a Young Yank in Belgium.
http://www.krcgenk-jeugd.be/website/start.html Perhaps he's on this picture? Might be he's not in there yet though. edit: This link doesn't seem to be correct. If you go to the link and click on the word "sportief" (on top, under the pictures) you can select the word "ploegen". Click on this and you can select which youth team you want to see. National U17: rankings: 1 R.EXC.MOUSCRON 19 14 2 3 29 43 14 45 2 K.LIERSE SK. 19 10 4 5 18 40 22 35 3 R.AEC.MONS 18 10 7 1 -4 23 27 31 4 K.VC.WESTERLO 19 9 6 4 10 36 26 31 5 SP.DU PAYS DE CHARLEROI 19 8 4 7 23 41 18 31 6 R.STANDARD DE LIÈGE 19 8 7 4 4 29 25 28 6 MOLENBEEK BRUSS.STROMBEEK 19 8 7 4 -3 24 27 28 8 GERMINAL BEERSCHOT ANTW. 19 7 6 6 3 32 29 27 9 K.ST.-TRUIDENSE VV. 18 7 6 5 3 29 26 26 10 SC.LOKEREN OOST-VLAAND. 19 7 8 4 -3 34 37 25 10 CERCLE BRUGGE K.SV. 19 7 8 4 -6 21 27 25 12 R.SC.ANDERLECHT 19 7 11 1 -2 33 35 22 13 K.RC.GENK 19 6 9 4 4 37 33 22 14 CLUB BRUGGE KV. 19 5 7 7 2 37 35 22 15 K.AA.GENT 19 6 10 3 -17 23 40 21 16 KV.OOSTENDE 19 6 12 1 -22 23 45 19 17 R.AA.LOUVIÈROISE 19 5 11 3 -30 17 47 18 18 K.SK.BEVEREN 19 4 9 6 -9 25 34 18
I don't know how they specifically work in Genk, but I've been told they have a very clear vision about what a young player should be able to do at a certain age. They're the only club who have been able to get a decent deal with a school to divide the players' time in study and soccer time. That is also the reason why almost all of the trainers of the Belgian national youth teams say to the selected players that they should go play in Genk, 'cause they will get the best education there. (of course this has given some controversy, the other clubs weren't too pleased with this). Dirk Staelens I don't know much about. He has a good reputation but that's all I can tell you so far. Poll Peters is a former school teacher who used to train the first team of St-Truiden (St-Trond). He knows what it's like to be in charge of a first division club. He likes to keep an eye on developments in sports: he studies volleybal and basketball to see if there are any things he can use in training football players. I believe him to be a really good coach. The fact that your son has been put one year higher is definitely a good sign. This is done with the most gifted kids in order to speed up their development. To give another example of why Genk is the perfect club for a youngster: They have two 16-year olds that get regular playing time, so they're not affraid to give their prospects a go in the first team. Is your son staying with a family or is he in the boarding school?
Hi again... wow! thanks for the link. I know he's been featured 3x on their website scoring some goals, but I didn't realize they had team pics too. He must have been too late for the team pics. He arrived end of July, just in time for their pre-season training at some beach town in Belgium. He is staying with a wonderful family hand picked by the club for their foreign players. Didn't realize there was a boarding school. Only been to Genk once, in April, for that fateful training session with coach Poll Peters...(who intimidated the heck out of me by giving me 20 minutes to decide whether he can come back the next day to play against Eindhoven). Talk about panic attack. But it all worked out. You're right, coach Poll is very well thought of - intuitive patient and supportive. Seems to be common traits for most Genk coaches. And another incredible difference is how my son says winning isn't as emphasized at Genk as in the US. Which confirms your observation that Genk isn't a pressurized situation for youth players. That it truly concentrates on player development. Is this typical of most Euro/Belgian club programs or is Genk unique in this sense? BTW, have you heard of Michel Bruyninckx? He created Soccer Pal on Music and is the director for the TOP Sport School in Leuven. He was also instrumental in him ending up in Genk. Another passionate soccer innovator.
This is great stuff. I'm learning quite abit about Genk now. Soccermom2, is your son a forward? Where is Genk? How far from Brussels? I may be going over in a few months, maybe I could make a side trip over and catch a youth game.
That's one of the things people are starting to realize in Belgium, that the end goal is much more important than the temporary goals. If you put the pressure to win on kids, they often get paralysed with fear and don't make the actions anymore. On youth level it's important to make the actions in order to become better. I think Belgian clubs stole it from the Ajax academy, although it must be a common feature of many a European club. This also includes fielding players on a different position than they are used to. Like you said that your son was defender of midfielder (?) and they are now letting him play the forward position. This can only make him stronger. Also if he goes back to defense, he will perfectly know how to pass to the player in front of him, 'cause he has played this position himself. After a while it it necessary however to get a fixed position, otherwise you might end up like Walter Baseggio from Anderlecht, who played all positions during his development and still doesn't know what his position demands from him. I've never heard of him, never even heard of Soccer Pal on Music. I do know the TOP Sport School which is highly regarded. Like I told you before, I'm not surprised he sent your boy to Genk, everyone who's working on high level would do the same thing.
Too much emphasis in the US youth soccer is placed on winning. Better to develop players and the winning will take care of itself. === if I get my way I'll go to London, Hannover, Rotterdam, train to Brussels, Genk - then to Angers, Gueugnon and finally Athens. This trip is going to wear me out.
Good question. Probably no more than 10-14 days. London will just be a one day stop. Hannover 2-3 days. Rotterdam 2 days...Angers 1 day, travel at night. Gueugnon - 1 or 2 days. Athens 2 days or so. Fly back to London, fly home.
Welcome soccermoms2! As you can see tomo is definitely the man when it comes to stuff inside of Belgium. I don't think I could help you too much as I'm in the States. I hope you son does well.
Wow, even I am learning stuff here about the team I support ever since they were founded (1988). As a young boy, I was taken to the game with my father, right after the merge by THOR Waterschei and Winterslag. He was a Waterschei-fan, but didn't mind going to the Winterslag-stadion, where Genk played its first two seasons before moving to the old Waterschei-ground. Soccermom, the next step may be to tell your son's name? If you'd rather not to, you can always send me a PM. I might then go and see one of his games, and tell how he did...
René Vandereycken, their coach, is doing some strange stuff. They were to go on winter preparation in Turkey, but he is complaining about this. It's a completely sponsored deal that's been set up in september. Now he wants to call it off.
This coach is not the best choice for Genk IMO.Too selfish and very expensive he makes me think of Arie Haan when he was in Anderlecht,same characteristics and also a bad choice from the club.He won't last long in Genk I think.
Agreed, but there is one thing I like about the guy: he asks his players to adapt tactics themselves during the game. In the beginning this will give some difficulties but when they get used to doing this they will benefit from it a lot. Best choice this season would have been to make Ariel Jacobs coach. At the moment I would love to see what Jacky Matthijsen can do with this team.
I agree with gerby and Tomo. However, when the opposite team plays defensively and Genk has to take the initiative, we cannot force anything. We are at our best when playing in the underdog roll: our best games were in Bruges (1-1) and Anderlecht (lost unfortunately by 4-2). On the other hand, can you blame Vandereycken for this, as you know that we could have bought Sasa Ilic in summer... Vandereycken isn't the easiest coach. His character clashes with Jos Vaessen. but Vaessen should have known that when hiring him, so he doesn't need to complain and bring their 'troubles' into the media. I would even say, keep the whole of Jos Vaessen out of the media!!