🏏 Fri, 16 Oct 2026 20:00 CEST
SC Heerenveen
vs
Excelsior
4-2-3-1 vs 4-3-3
Substitutes
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Match Preview
- This is a tight mid-table meeting: Excelsior sit ninth on 11 points from eight games (3W-2D-3L, +2 goal difference), just two clear of 10th-placed Heerenveen on nine (2W-3D-3L, level goal difference). With Feyenoord already up to 20 points at the summit, both sides are scrapping in the pack behind, where Go Ahead Eagles also sit on 11 in eighth. A win here would lift either team into that eighth-place bracket.
- Both teams have been wildly inconsistent. Heerenveen hammered Sparta Rotterdam 4-0 away in round seven, then were beaten 2-0 at PSV a week later, leaving a D-L-D-W-L run over their last five. Excelsior's recent sequence reads W-D-L-D-L: a 3-0 win at Willem II in round five and a battling 2-2 draw at Ajax in round seven, followed by a chastening 1-5 home defeat to Groningen in round eight.
- The statistical profiles could hardly be more different. Excelsior have scored 16 goals in eight matches, five more than Heerenveen's 11, but they have also shipped 14, which is why their goal difference is only +2. Heerenveen are perfectly balanced at 11 scored and 11 conceded, and their goalless round-six draw with Telstar shows how low-scoring their games can get. Whoever dictates the tempo early should get the contest they want.
- Heerenveen's 4-2-3-1 against Excelsior's 4-3-3 makes the midfield numbers the key battleground. The home double pivot pairs 189cm holding midfielder Marcus Linday, a 23-year-old Swede who climbed from the lower divisions with Assyriska and Västerås before a record Swedish transfer fee brought him here, with 19-year-old Nolhan Courtens, a Belgium U17 international whose youth career took in Anderlecht, Union Saint-Gilloise, Mechelen and Antwerp. Excelsior counter with the 170cm Lennard Hartjes and 168cm Georgian Irakli Yegoian, a contrast of height against low-centre-of-gravity agility.
- Heerenveen lead the line with 27-year-old Dylan Vente, a Feyenoord academy product who made his breakthrough in a Champions League tie against Manchester City before spells at Roda JC and Hibernian in Scotland. The right-footed striker lives on positioning in the box, and he will be picked up by a tall Excelsior pairing: 192cm left-footed centre-back Casper Widell, a former Sweden U16 and U17 captain whose brother Melker is at Swansea, and the 190cm, 89kg Rick Meissen.
- Alireza Jahanbakhsh starts on the Excelsior bench, and this is a reunion with one of his former clubs: SC Heerenveen appear in the 33-year-old's CV. The veteran Iran international became the first Asian player to win the Eredivisie golden boot with AZ in 2017-18, later playing for Brighton and Feyenoord, and only joined Excelsior as a free agent in August 2026 after leaving Belgian side Dender.
- The flanks offer plenty of intrigue. Heerenveen field 171cm French right winger Maxence Rivera, a Saint-Étienne youth product who came through Le Puy and Dunkerque, on one side and Greece international left-back Vasilios Zagaritis, a Serie B title winner with Parma whose left-footed delivery is his calling card, on the other. Opposite them, Excelsior's 20-year-old right-back Eric da Silva Moreira is a St. Pauli academy graduate with a spell at Nottingham Forest behind him, and an attacking wing-back by instinct.
- The goalkeeping contrast is worth watching too. Heerenveen trust 21-year-old Bernt Klaverboer, a homegrown Netherlands U21 international who has been first choice since September 2025 and previously played at the U17 Euros. Behind him sits 32-year-old Andries Noppert, the 203cm keeper who was the Netherlands' number one at the 2022 World Cup. Excelsior's Stijn van Gassel is a 29-year-old with miles on the clock, having returned to the club after spells at Helmond Sport and NEC.
- Excelsior's squad is dotted with players shaped by Feyenoord. Aymen Sliti, 20, moved across Rotterdam from Feyenoord in search of minutes and starts in the front three, while 21-year-old Jan Plug, a 188cm defender, also came through the Feyenoord academy via Dordrecht and lines up in the back four. Nesto Groen, 22, is another graduate of the same system waiting on the bench, so there is plenty of young talent here chasing a climb up the table.