Almere City FC vs RKC Predictions

After four wins and a draw from their opening six Eerste Divisie fixtures this season, Almere City are 4^th in the table and riding high going into this Friday’s encounter with RKC Waalwijk. Schappenkoppen have been playing some fantastic attacking football this term, and they’ll fancy their chances of blowing away a faltering RKC side who have claimed just a single point from their last four league outings.

Last Friday’s 1-4 success at Den Bosch was the latest in a series of stunning performances turned in by Almere City so far this term, and they’re bang in the mix at the top of Eerste Divisie thanks to their ruthlessness in front of goal.

City have struck 15 times in their six league outings, and a superb brace from captain Nick Vossebelt ensured Schappenkoppen wrapped up the points in s-Hertogenbosch on match day six with the minimum of fuss.

After a slightly less convincing 1-0 win at home to Dordrecht in the Dutch Cup on Tuesday, Michele Santoni’s side will hope to hit top gear again this Friday against a team who they’ve dominated in recent meetings.

Almere have won four and drawn one of their last five encounters with RKC, scoring a whopping 17 goals in those games. They ran out 0-4 winners in Waalwijk at the end of the last campaign with a brutal display and their strong form and eye for goal has shown no signs of letting up this term.

RKC will be dreading the trip to Yanmar Stadion based on recent results against the hosts and their dwindling form over the past few weeks.

New boss Fred Grim appeared to have made a real impact at the club after back to back wins were landed against Telstar (1-0) and Den Bosch (2-3) on match days one and two, but RKC have picked up just one point since in a 2-2 draw at home to Jong AZ, after a 2-0 defeat at Cambuur and 0-1 reversals at home to Sparta Rotterdam and Roda JC.

Granted, those opponents are hardly easy, with all three expected to be in the promotion shake up this season, but Waalwijk have shown that they are there for the taking for the top sides in the division.

Almere City should clearly be held in that regard based on their results and performances so far this season, and they’re very consistent at Yanmar Stadion with 42 points accrued from their last 22 starts at home.

RKC got back to winning ways with a 2-0 home victory against NAC Breda in the Dutch Cup on Tuesday, but we think they’ll be out of their depth here, as they have been against Almere in recent times.

Almere’s odds just to win the match are very fair here considering the head to head and contrasting recent form of the two sides, but we’re going to push the boat out a little and back the hosts to triumph with both teams to score.

That’s been the outcome on three of City’s last four wins against RKC and we predict a 3-1 success for Michele Santoni’s charges on Friday night.