Football Season Guide

OH Leuven found out only on 31st July that they will be playing top-flight football. Finishing second in the Second Tier last term meant that promotion was not on the cards, but in order to have 18 and not 17 sides in the top flight Leuven were given major boost. Secretly hoping for such outcome, Leuven appointed experienced manager Marc Brys in charge just in July, with his most recent job as head coach of Sint-Truiden in 2018/19. His knowledge of the league will be relied heavily upon. The situation with the squad is very complicated right now – none of the only 23 players currently in the squad was resigned with no certainty in which division the team would play. This means that in theory 18 of those 23 players become free agents come Monday, but now with top flight football on offer the majority of them are expected to quickly extend their stays at the club. Have some vastly experienced players in the squad that should be helping a lot in the top flight. Amongst those with rich top-flight experience goalkeeper Keet, defenders Kotysch and Tshimanga + vastly experienced midfielders Hubert, Criozet and Mercier. Up front the main hope for goals is French striker Thomas Henry, who scored 15 goals in 25 matches in the Second Tier last term. Undoubtedly OH Leuven will be very busy on the transfer market in the coming weeks and if they can add at least 2-3 more quality players to their ranks, while able to renegotiate extensions with most of their current squad they should be in for a strong season. Having experienced coach like Brys at the helm also major bonus. Defensively had problems last term and also coach Brys lost his last job at Sint-Truiden exactly due to his inability to create stable back line. This suggests that Leuven’s main weakness in 2020/21 will be their ability to keep out opponents.