Gent vs Lokeren Predictions

After a reasonably wobbly start, Gent’s season has begun to gather momentum over the last few weeks. Sunday’s hosts first got the better of Waasland in front of a home crowd, while they battled hard to earn victory away at Eupen last time out. Now back in front of their own fans, Yves Vanderhaeghe’s men will be looking to make it three wins on the bounce.

As the weeks pass, Gent are steadily getting strong and stronger. To start with, it appeared that they were struggling to balance Europa League qualifiers with life in the Belgian top flight, but they’ve been ticking along nicely of late. What’s more, after a slightly slow start, Vanderhaeghe’s men have found their scoring touch. They bagged four against Waasland last weekend, while they approach this game having found the net on three occasions away at Eupen last time out in the league.

Having drawn 0-0 at home wth Bordeaux in their Europa League play-off, the hosts may have one eye on their next game in that competition, though securing victory here is likely to be the priority. After scoring plenty of goals against the likes of Waasland and Eupen, Gent ought to fancy their chances against a Lokeren side who’ve been struggling defensively.

While Gent have started to find goals easy to come by at the right end, Lokeren are struggling to keep them out at the other. Sunday’s visitors started the season on the wrong foot by conceding four without reply at home to Gent, and it’s fair to say that things haven’t improved since. Following their rather shocking opening day display, where they were simply too easy to cut apart, Lokeren conceded three goals away against a newly promoted Cercle Brugge side, and while they did do slightly better when drawing 1-1 against St. Truiden after that, it was back to losing ways last time out when St. Liege made light work of slotting three past a back-line that has been terribly easy to breach.

Given the scoring form of the hosts in recent weeks, you really do have to fear for the visitors, who’re making a habit of opening the floodgates as soon as they concede. If Gent can strike early on this occasion, then their forwards will likely have the chance to fill their boots.

In all honesty, this is a massive opportunity for Gent to continue building momentum. They’ve shown plenty in the final third over the last few weeks, while the visitors, who’ve conceded a least three goals in three of their four league matches this season, have been just about the easiest team to score goals against. Having found goals easy to come by against both Waasland and Eupen, Gent are backed to repeat the feat and notch at least three for the third league match in a row.