After Genk, Beerschot, KV Mechelen, Union and Ghent, Cercle becomes the sixth Belgian employer for Dante Vanzeir. The Limburger from Beringen came over from the New York Red Bulls to AA Gent at the end of January last year. It was not a great success, even though Vanzeir scored five times for Ghent, including twice against red lantern Beerschot. But this season things went from bad to worse. Ivan Leko did not like being a pocket striker at all and Vanzeir has barely played in five matches. He did not score once, only in the cup against Patro did the Limburger hit once.
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Big contract
Vanzeir also did not figure in the plans of the new trainer Rik De Mil and also weighed heavily on the budget in Ghent. He earned more than 1 million euros without employer contributions. A big contract and it was also the reason why no deal was reached with Westerlo last summer. That is now available with Cercle. Vanzeir is an atypical transfer for Cercle. The project of owner AS Monaco prescribes that the starting point is to bring young talent from all over the world, make it better and sell it with added value. That won’t work with Vanzeir, but necessity makes laws. Cercle certainly does not want to play the Relegation Playoffs for the second year in a row.
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The Association strongly denies that they are taking over Vanzeir’s contract in full. Ghent will therefore have to pay part of the wages for at least another six months. Cercle does have an option to purchase. In June last year, an identical deal was also concluded with Ghent upon the transition of Pieter Gerkens to green-black.
Favorite system
With Minda, Oumar Diakité, Jurado, Ouattara, Bayo, Kouassi and Ngoura, Cercle has no shortage of attackers. But injuries, international commitments, a lack of experience and especially of scoring ability in this colorful mix were the cause of Cercle ending up at the bottom. It is hoped that this will now be resolved with the arrival of Vanzeir. At Cercle he can already play in his preferred system. Onur Cinel swears by a 4-4-2 and that is also ideal for Vanzeir, who has been in Portugal since Monday and is already training with his new mates in the sunny Algarve.
