The Purple & White received Cercle Brugge on Sunday afternoon. The final visit of the team from Brugge at the Astridpark dated from September 2014. Coach Vanhaezebrouck changed his starting line-up in two places in comparison to the match against Zulte Waregem: Andy Najar and Francis Amuzu took the place of Alexis Saelemaekers (suspended) and Kenny Saief. Former Anderlecht players Bart Goor and Guillaume Gillet kicked off the game.
After 7 minutes, the match broke lose. Bornauw was fouled in the box. Landry Dimata converted the penalty. The home team took control of the game and Bakkali almost scored the 2-0, but his attempt hit the side of the net. A header by Dimata also failed to go in. Not much later on, the score became 2-0 via Dimata, who completed an attack via Amuzu and Gerkens with a nice shot in the lower corner after half an hour’s worth of play.
The second half had a spectacular start with 4 goals in 7 minutes. Dimata put the icing on the cake of his match with a hattrick, although he got injured at the same time, and Pieter Gerkens increased the score up to 4-0. Substitute Irvin Cardona put the 4-1 in shortly after that. The young Frenchman was clearly eager, because he scored his second goal a few minutes later. Cardona went looking for more, but Thomas Didillon made a few good saved. The score remained the same, and RSCA took three points against Cercle.
Goals: 7’ Dimata (1-0, pen), 32’ Dimata (2-0), 52’ Dimata (3-0), 54’ Gerkens (4-0), 55’ Cardona (4-1) & 59’ Cardona (4-2)
RSCA: Didillon, Lawrence, Sanneh, Bornauw, Najar, Trebel, Kums, Amuzu (67’ Saief), Gerkens, Bakkali (83’Musona) & Dimata (54’ Santini)
Cercle: Nardi, Taravel, Kone, Mercier, Tormin (81’ Etienne), Hoggas, Lusamba (53’ Cardona), Ueda, Bongiovanni (61’ Hazard), Da Silva & Abud Abud