What can you tell me about Genk?

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Genk is a nice team, one of the four big teams in Belgium. They are a young club as it's a result of the merging of THOR (ter heil onzer ribbenkast-to the sanctity of our ribs; must be one of the most idiotic names in football) Waterschei and Winterslag.
After the merging they performed bad, and even relegated to second division. But then they came back to first division and became champion under Aimé Antheunis (now the national team manager) with Branko Strupar as the striker.
They also won the cup the latest years and won the championship again, big star being Wesley Sonck, now playing for AJAX.
Now they have a very young team, with a lot of talented youngsters coming up. I believe they have 17 youth internationals from their U19's to their U21's. They also have the most loyal fans of Belgium, with big attendances at away matches.

 

And as a Club Brugge fan, I can feel nothing but disdain for them. I still like 'em better than Anderlecht though, which I hate.

I used to like 'em a lot better when they just came back from the second division, and finished 7th and 2nd the year after, and won the cup (even though they won it against us that year). Now they have gotten a high and mighty attitude, and they act as if they are in the same league as Club Brugge and Anderlecht. They are not. 2 cups and 2 league titles is ok, but not that impressive.

 

Tough question. There was a time where I would have said Lierse. Back in 98-99 they had a team composed of 7-8 players from their own youth development and they won the cup with that team. They were predicted a bright future, but for some reasons the guys of that team never did as well as people thought they would. Almost all of them have left Lierse by now (Somers, Daems, Huysegems, Hoefkens, Cavens). Right now, I would say Anderlecht have the best youth development. Their youth center in Neerpede didn't result in one player in the first team for years (with the exception of Bassegio), but now the backbone of the team comes from the youth development (Kompany, Junior, Lovré, Deschacht, Van Den Borre), and there are suppose to be more coming.

Club Brugge's youth development isn't that great. Of the current squad only Olivier Decock is a true Club Brugge youth product. I believe he has been with Brugge since his 8th or 9th birthday. And Tim Smolders is as well, but he hardly ever features in the starting eleven. There's Gheeraerts as well, but just as Smolders he hardly ever starts.

As for the best fans question, Club Brugge by a mile off course ...

 

Actually, I don't know if the U17 and U19 NT's are composed primarily out of Genk youth players. If they are, than I don't know why they don't give more chances to their youth players. I don't think there is one Genk youth player on Genk's first eleven.

 

Kevin Vandenbergh, son of the great Erwin Vandenbergh, is a youth product of Westerlo. He was bought by Genk two seasons ago.

 

I can't really think of that many players coming out of their youth system. Vandenbergh is the only that springs to mind.

On the subject of youth teams, Jan Boskamp did a great experiment with AA Gent in the 1998-1999 season, if I recall correctly.
AA Gent were in financial difficulties at the time, and they were short of players.
So Boskamp, who was just appointed coach, got all the best young players out of the lower divisions (second, third and even fourth division), to both save the club and create a good young team based on Belgian talent. The young guys he got were, among others, Cedric Roussel (Genk) and his brother (no idea where he is now), Kristof Snelders (GBA), Gunther Van Handenhoven (La Louviere, after 5 years of FC Metz and one year back at Gent), Thomas Chatelle (Genk), Pieter Collen (Now at NAC Breda after a short spell at Feyenoord), Laurent Delorge (Now at SK Lierse after 5 years at Coventry),...

I liked this project, to which the club was actually forced. It gave a lot of good players an early taste of first division football. And you have to commend Boskamp in his ability to skim the cream of the milk in those lower divisions.

 

Re: What can you tell me about Genk? [R]

I have a question about Genk and thought this thread might be suitable:

Genk is taking part in the UEFA Intertoto Cup (UI Cup). First leg of their duel with Marek Dupnitsa:

[size=-2]Racing Genk (Bel)[size=-1] [2 - 1] [/size][size=-2]Marek Dupnitsa (Bul)[/size][/size]
[size=-2]26'[/size][size=-2][1 - 0][/size][size=-2]P. Kpaka [/size]
[size=-2]65'[/size][size=-2][1 - 1][/size][size=-2]Karakanov [/size]
[size=-2]67'[/size][size=-2][2 - 1][/size][size=-2]K. Daerden [/size]

Have anyone seen this match? How did Genk perform and will they go through?

 

The under 17's team consists of a lot of Genk players indeed. They have been upgrading their youth system for several years now, in order to prevent young talents from going to PSV (which is nearby). Now they have a special team of young players which consists of the most talented players between 15 and 21. They get to train together with the first team regularly and will get a lot of chances throughout the season.

Gent had such a system, but afterwards it seemed it was only started to clear their debts, which actually worked.

I don't know about the genk match, whether they played well or not, but I do know that they managed to beat Borussia Dortmund afterwards. Next thursday they will be playing Portugese Uniao Leira in the semi's of the intertoto cup.

 

I'm sorry, didn't see you were a Dortmund supporter.

 

0-0 for a starter at home isn't too good. Let's hope they'll perform better away. Anderlecht also plays a Portugese team: Benfica, while Brugge can repeat their stuntmatch against Shaktar Donetsk if they make it to the third qualifying round.