Vincent Kompany’s Anderlecht went three games without a win, but beat KV Kortrijk away from home on the tenth matchday of the Belgian Pro League. RSC Anderlecht played in a 4-4-2 formation with Lukas Nmecha and Percy Tau, but struggled enormously with KV Kortrijk. On the ball the visitors were really static and Anderlecht had a lot of difficulties getting the ball to the final third. Luckily they managed to score after 6 minutes already after Lukas Nmecha scored an easy tap in from close range. Half an hour into the game Percy Tau made a good run with the ball and scored with a great long shot in the near corner. In the second half Kortrijk was the better side, but again Anderlecht managed to score. Nmecha was alert in the box and scored another easy goal after Percy Tau remained calm in the box. In the final minutes Kortrijk got a very debatable penalty, which Mboyo slotted home.
Ratings:
- A1 – Very good, could play higher
- A2 – Strong potential to play higher
- B1 – Good, strong player at level
- B2 – Potential to be strong player at level
- C – Average for the level, re-watch
- D – Below average in this match
For a match report covering Albert Sambi Lokonga, Landry Dimata, Jérémy Doku and Killian Sardella click here.
Lukas Nmecha
Player profile:
- Nationality: German/English
- Age: 21
- Date of birth: 14/12/1998
- Current club: RSC Anderlecht (On loan from Manchester City)
- Career: Manchester City (Y), Preston NE (L), VfL Wolfsburg (L), Middlesbrough (L), RSC Anderlecht (L)
- Position: Striker
- Preferred foot: Right
Even though RSC Anderlecht barely had possession in the final third this game, Lukas Nmecha still found his ways to get involved in the game. The striker often dropped back to pick up the ball and play a first touch pass to try and speed up the tempo, but with little effect as the two central midfielders Lokonga and Zulj struggled to find a forward pass. The German striker worked very hard throughout the whole game and also helped his team defensively at times dropping all the way back.
Lukas Nmecha stands at 6’1” and showed that he can hold the ball quite well for his team. He used his body quite well to hold off the defenders, but still ended up losing too many of his offensive duels. The often played with his back turned towards the goal, but showed he is more than just a target man. He tried to carry the ball forward a couple of times and showed that he has decent dribbling, but missed a little technique or acceleration to easily get past the defenders. Nmecha has quite a high top speed, but didn’t look like a super fast player on the first few meters.
In the 6th minute Nmecha scored the first goal of the game. After Kortrijk’s goalkeeper struggled with a shot from Zulj Lukas Nmecha was alert in the box and scored from close range. An hour later in the game in the game Nmecha was in the right place at the right time again. After Percy Tau got the ball on the left and gave a good low cross Nmecha scored his second goal of the game near the far post.
Rating – B1
Nmecha isn’t the fastest or most technical striker, but he positions himself well in the box and does his job; scoring goals. He is a good striker for the Belgian Pro League, but he has to improve if he wants to succeed in the top 5 leagues.
Yari Verschaeren
Player profile:
- Nationality: Belgian
- Age: 19
- Date of birth: 12/07/2001
- Current club: RSC Anderlecht
- Career: RSC Anderlecht
- Position: Attacking Midfield
- Secondary position: Right Wing, Left Wing
- Preferred foot: Right
Yari Verschaeren started this game as the right winger for Anderlecht and played as the left winger in the second half. He showed some glimpses of his class, but I really felt like his talents went to waste on the wings. Especially in the first half he didn’t see that much of the ball and when he did, he struggled to create anything from the right side. The 5’8” midfielder has a low centre of gravity making him very agile and showed some very good technique. Verschaeren didn’t look like the fastest player and didn’t really make any runs behind Kortijk’s defense, but mostly dropped back to collect the ball. RSC Anderlecht often overloaded the wings however with their attacking fullbacks and Percy Tau roaming to the wings, which often gave him little space to manoeuvre.
Verschaeren looked like a very intelligent player who always positioned himself well to get the ball and play simple one-twos. He scanned the areas around him very well before taking a touch and also did very well spotting the runs of his teammates. Verschaeren had a difficult first half on the right and wasn’t involved that often. He often sat a little narrow, which gave Percy Tau a lot of space on the right. In the second half on the left side he came alive a little more. In the 65th minute he played a lovely deep pass to Percy Tau who then played the ball to Nmecha who scored the 0-3. He also showed that he has a decent shot when his cracking half volley hit the crossbar.
The 19-year old worked very hard for the full 90 minutes, even when some of his teammates got a bit complacent. Defensively he was quite patient, forcing his opponents to take him on or just play it back and not going in duels often. In duels his physicality showed at times. He only won one out of five duels this game.
Rating – B2
Yari Verschaeren is Anderlecht’s next hot prospect and you can certainly see why he is so highly rated. He is a very technical and smart player that can use both feet, but needs to make steps physically. I also hope for him that he gets used centrally more often, as he struggled a little from the wings.
Hannes Delcroix
Player profile:
- Nationality: Belgian
- Age: 21
- Date of birth: 02/02/1999
- Current club: RSC Anderlecht
- Career: RSC Anderlecht, RKC Waalwijk (L)
- Position: Centre Back
- Preferred foot: Left
Hannes Delcroix started for the first time for Anderlecht this season, but didn’t really impress. Delcroix played as the left centre back in Anderlecht’s back four and didn’t look confident. Especially in the first half Delcroix looked very nervous on the ball. He was often involved in Anderlecht’s poor build up play and mostly played easy passes towards the other centre back Miazga. There was one occasion where Delcroix stepped out of the defense line with the ball and played a great diagonal long pass, but he didn’t do this a single time after that.
Overall his passing looked quite decent. His forward passes weren’t perfect, but almost all of them reached their target and he only misplaced two paces throughout the game, but still he didn’t look too confident. Delcroix had okay technique, but looked quite static once he had the ball at his feet.
Defensively Delcroix also showed some signs of weakness against the KV Kortrijk’s attackers. In his aerial duels the 6’1” tall defender did fine winning 80% of them showing a decent jumping range. In his ground duels he didn’t look so strong however. His opponents turned away from him quite easily and Delcroix didn’t look very agile or explosive on the first few meters. He also lacked some intensity in his duels and wasn’t very aggressive.
Rating – C
Delcroix really didn’t look comfortable against Kortrijk. He seemed decent on the ball, but played really simple. Defensively also seemed to lack a bit, but this didn’t get exploited by Kortrijk very often.
Mustapha Bundu
Player profile:
- Nationality: Sierra Leonean
- Age: 23
- Date of birth: 27/02/1997
- Current club: RSC Anderlecht
- Career: Hereford, AGF Aarhus, RSC Anderlecht
- Position: Right Wing
- Secondary position: Left Wing, Striker
- Preferred foot: Right
Mustapha Bundu got his second start for Anderlecht after coming over from the Danish side AGF Aarhus. The winger got a solid B1 rating in a game in the Danish league earlier this year, but barely showed me any positive signs this game. Bundu played the first half as Anderlecht’s left winger and got subbed off after playing the first ten minutes of the second half on the right.
The Sierra Leonean winger made a couple of good runs behind his defender, but besides one good cross he did after cutting in from the left it was a very poor performance from him. The winger had a good opportunity to score in the first half for his team, but his only shot of the game with his right foot was very poor and lacked power and direction. Bundu was often very sloppy in his passes and made a lot of wrong decisions, but showed in the second half that he can be pretty composed in front of the goal. In the 50th minute he got the ball on the right side just inside the box and he played a good pass to Verschaeren who hit the crossbar with his half volley. Bundu did his defensive work, but didn’t do so very well. He tracked back to his own half, but did quite poor following the full back, which created danger two times.
Rating – D
Bundu was below average this game for Anderlecht. He was barely involved in the game and very sloppy when he finally got the ball.
Target Scouting 