Willem II vs Excelsior Predictions

Willem II entertain Excelsior at Koning Willem II Stadion in Eredivisie this Saturday night, as both teams look to hit back after suffering comprehensive defeats before the international break. The hosts will be favourites to register a third win of the season, but can they justify the odds in Tilburg?

After two wins from their three opening Eredivisie matches, Willem II were enjoying a promising start to the new campaign – especially after hammering Heracles 5-0 at home on match day three.

There were brought crashing down to earth before the international break however, as PSV put six past them in a devastating display at the Phillips Stadion.

Adrie Koster’s charges were blown away in the 6-1 romp, which was by no means flattering for the champions who had raced into a 4-0 lead at half time.

Teams like Willem II rarely expect to come away from the likes of Ajax and PSV with any points, but the manner of defeat was quite shocking, considering the way they’d played themselves in outclassing Heracles just a few days earlier.

Six points from a possible 12 is still good enough for 7^th place in the table for Willem at this early stage, but Tricolores supporters will be worried that the hiding their team faced could have a lasting effect.

Victory this weekend would of course erase those doubts, but it won’t be easy for the hosts to get back on track against an Excelsior team who’ve got the better of them in recent times.

The visitors claimed a league double over Willem II last season, winning both fixtures 2-1, and they’ve not lost to the Tilburg outfit since 2007.

Excelsior are 13^th heading into Saturday’s encounter and they too need to get back on track after a 2-4 loss at home to ADO Den Haag a fortnight ago.

The score line in that contest may look far more respectable than Willem’s beating in Eindhoven, but Excelsior were 0-4 down and only pulled a couple of goals back through Anderson and Mahmudov after Den Haag eased off in the latter stages.

Coming immediately after Excelsior bagged their first success of the season away at NAC Breda on match day three (0-2), fans of the Rotterdam side will be equally concerned about a lack of consistency and left wondering which SBV team will turn up this weekend.

This is a difficult game to approach based on the sides’ performances last time out, and it’s a bit of guesswork as to how each will respond and what progress may have been made behind the scenes in the international break.

But we feel that the hosts look extremely weak favourites here. Odds-on to land the spoils at time of press, Willem have already lost at home this term to VVV (0-1) and as mentioned, their recent record against Excelsior is poor.

The away side are likely to feel less pressure on Saturday evening and we think they’re a good proposition at lengthy odds for the win.

Nonetheless, we’re going to approach things with a bit more caution – the teams have drawn a third of their previous meetings and that outcome on Saturday wouldn’t be a surprise.

So we’re siding with Excelsior but with a goal start in the handicap, giving us a return should they come away from Tilburg with at least a point as expected.

And we’re also going with a 1-2 success for Adrie Poldervaart’s men in the correct score market, which could realistically land for the third time in a row between the teams after last season’s results.