Marlon Fossey and Standard Liege picked up an important, last-minute point on their trip to American-owned Molenbeek, while Mark McKenzie and Genk continued to slump with a narrow home loss.
Molenbeek 2 – 2 Standard Liege
Standard Liege are still finding it hard to win, though they did better than the week previously and picked up a point on the road against relegation zone Molenbeek on Brussels on Saturday evening. Marlon Fossey started on the right wing and played 87 minutes at Edmond Machten Stadium.
It was the visitors who got things going when after only 10 minutes, as Aka Kanga found the back of the net for the seventh time this season. But les Rouches only got to enjoy their lead for another 10 minutes because Mickael Biron leveled things up with a sweetly struck shot from the center of the box.
Worrying for the Walloon team is the fact that they were out-played by a team that could very well spend next season in the second division. Molenbeek edged possession and out-shot their visitors, 10 to 4.
The game did not liven up again until late on, when Ilay Camara slipped the ball into the bottom right corner of the goal in the 83rd minute. And you could forgive the fans for thinking that they stole a couple of late and much-needed points, but before the celebratory noise died down it was all square again after just two more minutes when Kelvin Yeboah scored his first goal for his new team. The Ghanaian striker just joined last month on loan from Genoa, after completing an earlier spell with Montpellier.
In 11th place, Standard will next host Leuven, a team that has been turning their fortunes around as of late.
Genk 0 – 1 Union St Gilloise
The Smurfs’ year still has not gotten back on track after Mark McKenzie and his Genk teammates suffered back-to-back losses, this time at the hands of league leaders USG. It was a hard fought game, to be fair, with Genk just dominating possession with 52%, while both sides only registered two shots of goal each.
McKenzie, as usual, put in a 90-minute shift in this losing effort, where the only goal came at the 67-minute mark. USG’s prolific goal-getter Mohammed Amoura headed the ball into the back of the net after Cameron Puertas picked him out in the middle of the 18 yard box. The Algerian leads the Pro League with 16 goals at the moment.
Genk, who now drop to the seventh spot, out of the championship play-off group, will travel to Mechelen on Sunday night.
Westerlo 0 – 3 Leuven
It was a bad night for the Americans of Westerlo last Saturday night when they hosted Leuven and let the visitors put three balls into the back of their net without a reply. The hosts, with both Bryan Reynolds and Griffin Yow starting, were unlucky on the night as they had 73% of the possession and 10 shots at goal, with seven on target but just couldn’t make any of them count.
OHL, on the other hand, had three shots on target and all required the keeper to pick them out of the back of his net.
Reynolds was subbed off at half time with the team already down 2-0, while Yow came off 20 minutes later.
After just two minutes, the visitors were celebrating when Youssef Maziz put the ball into the box for Ezechiel Banzuzi, who out-jumped a couple of defenders and nodding it home. Nine minutes later, it was 2-0, courtesy of Florian Miguel.
With the hosts chasing the game, Leuven could sit back and absorb some of the attack but on the hour mark, it was 3-0 when Mathieu Maertens celebrated his first goal of the season.
Things will not get easier as the American boys will have to go up against USG on the road on Sunday night.
Notes
Gabriel Slonina let one ball into the back of his net when Eupen faced Mechelen but his Pandas could not reply as they went down by a goal to none. Next up will be a visit to third place Club Brugge.
Cercle Brugge spanked Kahveh Zahiroleslam and Sint Truiden by a score of 4-1 in the Venice of the North. The American played 75 minutes and picked up a yellow card. Sitting in ninth place, they will host last place Kortrijk over the weekend.
