In the 2023/24 season, under manager Miron Muslić, Cercle Brugge enjoyed their best season in over a decade and a half.
Groen en Zwart managed to finish in fifth position, which was enough to see them earn a return to continental football for the first time in 14 years via the UEFA Europa League qualifiers.
Cercle enjoyed steady growth over the previous couple of seasons after nearly falling a level in 2020/21.
They finished 10th and eighth in the subsequent campaigns, respectively, before their highest league finish since 2008 last term.
We are almost at the halfway point in the current Belgian Pro League season, and 2024/25 has been a much different story so far for Cercle, who are sitting second from bottom in the league only ahead of newly promoted Beerschot.
This tactical analysis and team-focused scout report will examine the reasons behind Cercles poor start in Belgium this campaign and whether its just a rough patch or something deeper going wrong with the teams tactics at the Jan Breydelstadion.
Cercle Brugge Changes From Last Season
This Cercle Brugee analysis will examine the final 12 league games of the 2023/24 season and the first 12 played so far this term for a more even comparison.
In the final 12 games of last season, under Miron Muslićs formation, Cercle set up in a 4-2-3-1 scheme, using 17 different players in their starting lineup.
So far this season, they have alternated between multiple setups and schemes, with 3-4-3, 3-5-2, and 4-4-2 diamond being some other formations theyve deployed in addition to their standard 4-2-3-1 approach.
Theyve also used 23 different players at some point in the starting lineup, which is six more than last years sample used in this comparison.
Theyve also lost five of the 17 players they used in those games last term.
Three of those who left were defenders, with mainstays Hugo Siquet and Jesper Daland joining Club Brugge and Cardiff City, respectively.
The former had only been on loan at Cercle last year.
The other defender was Boris Popović, who went on loan to Portuguese club Arouca.
Attacking midfielder Félix Lemaréchal also returned to Monaco from a loan spell before eventually joining Strasbourg.
Central midfielder Leonardo Lopes deal wasnt renewed, so he left on a free.
Cercle was also busy in the summer market acquiring players, with nine new players coming in and left-back Nazinhos loan from Sporting CP being made permanent.
With a relatively big turnover of half the squad, frequent tactical changes, and a balancing act between the league and Europe that wasnt there last year, perhaps these are all factors in the stark difference between Cercles performances in the Belgian Pro League between these two seasons.
But lets examine some data to make further comparisons and see if theres more evidence of what else has changed.
Cercle Brugge Data Analysis
Last year, Total Football Analysis analysed Miron Muslićs coaching style at Cercle Brugge, highlighting their high pressing and direct approach under the Bosnian-born manager.
Lets examine how or if those principles have been altered since the business end of last season.
The data viz above displays Cercles high regains, and defensive actions from the last 12 league games of 2023/24 and the first 12 played so far in the current season.
The two sets of maps are pretty identical, and the numbers also support that, as they look similar across both documented periods, particularly in counter-pressing and dangerous recoveries.
Despite these similarities across both periods, Cercle have conceded an average of 1.73 goals a game in
