Antwerp has flushed the elimination in Europe with a win in the competition against KV Oostende. In the standings, tribe number 1 is approaching 4 points from leader Union, the coastal team sinks deeper after 5 defeats in a row.
Antwerp – KV Oostende in a nutshell:
- Key moment: Ostend runs after the fact after the early goal just after the break and around the hour the spring is completely broken with the coastal team. Frey makes it 2-0 with a striking header and thus puts the match in a definitive fold.
- Man of the match: Viktor Fischer drowned in the terrible first half, but the Dane was the driving force behind Antwerp in the second half. He showed the home team the way to victory with his goal shortly after the break and his assist for Frey’s 2-0.
- Remarkable: Antwerp is the best home team of 1A after 16 match days. Since the defeat in the first home game of the season against Kortrijk, it recorded 5 wins in the next 7 home games and drew 2 times.
View the goals from Antwerp – Ostend (3-0)
Dragon of a first half
Antwerp had not yet recovered from the painful European elimination when it immediately got a new damper tonight. After barely 6 minutes, Nainggolan was already injured. It turned out to be the harbinger of a dramatic first half.
Neither Antwerp nor Ostend managed to create a target danger. An almost unemployed Butez was allowed to warm up to a distant bang from Gueye, while Frey with poor ball control ruined a beckoning opportunity for the home team.
Both teams piled up the ball losses, while the many interruptions in the game ensured that the game never got underway. One ball between the posts for Antwerp and one for Ostend, that was the sad score after a desolate first half.
Nainggolan has to leave after a few minutes with a muscle injury
Antwerp undergoes metamorphosis after the rest
In the second half it could only get better and Antwerp came out of the dressing room as if reborn, with Fischer as the driving force. Hubert immediately had to work on a shot from the Dane and was also ready for Frey’s resumption.
A promising start by the home team and that promise was already fulfilled after just 3 minutes. After losing the ball at Ostend, Verstraete launched a counter with a wonderful deep pass on Samatta. He laid well wide to the advancing Fischer and the Dane could simply tap the ball into the empty goal: 1-0.
Around the hour Antwerp doubled its margin and again Verstraete was at the base. His deflected shot resulted in a corner. Fischer painted it on Frey’s head and with his 15th league goal, the Swiss made it 2-0.
Ostend could no longer make a fist and 10 minutes before the end the books went all the way. Capon missed his intervention on a long ball to Benson and the substitute finished it off nicely with a lob over Hubert.
Antwerp straightens its back after the league defeat at STVV and the European elimination and is approaching Union to 4 points. After the 1-7 pandoering against Union, Ostend takes another solid defeat and is left behind with 0 to 15.
De Laet shows D’Arpino with clean panna
Priske: “Very satisfied with the second half”
- Brian Priske (trainer Antwerp): “The first half was difficult. Sometimes we played too slow, Ostend was also fairly low with many players behind the ball. But I am very satisfied with the second half, it was very good. We played with a lot of quality, power, a lot of deep balls behind the defense and a lot of crosses in the box. I’m not busy with the other teams now, the focus is on my team. We are obviously disappointed that the cup story and European football are over, even though our European campaign was quite good if you just look at performance. But the big goal is of course to fight for the title at the end of May.”
- Viktor Fischer (Antwerp): “In the first half I had the feeling that they were very close at Ostend. It was 2 blocks and we had some trouble with that. We discussed that well during the break and made a good plan for the second half. Then we were very dangerous with our strikers who went well in the depth. That gave us a lot more space and we also scored some nice goals. I had a good feeling when we went into halftime and knew that we would score that opening goal in the second half.”
- Alexander Blessin (trainer KV Oostende): “The 1-0 was the defining moment in this match. We played well in the first half, we didn’t give up any chances. I told the team that we had to carry on like this in the second half, but after a few minutes everything fell apart. That was the shot in the neck for us. There was no pressure on the ball with us and we gave away too much space for them to score. At the moment we don’t have the confidence to get out of such a situation. After a 1-7 defeat you have to straighten your back, but you can always lose at Antwerp. We now have to analyze this well and continue to work hard to make progress.”
