Week 16 brings us a match on Jan 14th where Sparta Rotterdam hosts Excelsior in a clash of the Eredivisie in the ever popular Rotterdam derby. Weather on match day is looking like a cloudy and cool day, with daytime temperatures of only 9 degrees, making for an unpleasant day. 6th placed Sparta Rotterdam is fresh off their 1-2 loss against PSV. Xavi Simons scored the first goal for PSV in the 34th minute, then Noni Madueke added another in the 1st minute of the first half’s stoppage time on a feed from Ibrahim Sangaré. Sparta Rotterdam should be reasonably happy with their recent performance, earning 18 points in their last 10 matches, while in their last match, Excelsior recorded a 1-0 shutout win against FC Groningen. El Yaakoubi scored the first goal for Excelsior in the 69th minute, and that was all the excitement the two teams could muster In the end, FC Groningen was frustrated by Excelsior’s defence and couldn’t put any tallies on the board. Excelsior ended the match with the shutout victory. They’re hoping to improve on their recent performance, having lost 6 of their last 10.
These two teams have not yet played each other this season, so it will be interesting how the match turns out.
Excelsior hasn’t been successful in netting any goals lately. Their top scorers in the last 5 matches are Kenzo Goudmijn and Nikolas Agrafiotis, and they each have 1 goal. Arno Verschueren has been the most prolific scorer on Sparta Rotterdam in the last five matches with two goals
Tim Coremans, Younes Namli and Jonathan de Guzmán are unavailable to play for Maurice Steijn’s team, while Jacky Donkor and Kik Pierie are unavailable to play for Marinus Dijkhuizen’s team.