Zero Points, Zero Goals: Can Kortrijk Avoid Disaster Against In-Form Zulte-Waregem?
SportSignals Match Desk · Football analysis desk ·
There are bad starts to a season. And then there is what KV Kortrijk have managed in the opening two games of the 2026 Belgian Pro League campaign. No wins. No draws. No goals. Six conceded. Bottom of the table with a goal difference of minus six. That is not a slow start. That is a crisis, and Sunday's home fixture against Zulte-Waregem is not the game you want when you are in one.
Kortrijk: A Team With Nothing To Show
The numbers for Kortrijk are brutal in their simplicity. Two games played. Two losses. Zero goals for. Six goals against. That is the full picture at the bottom of the Belgian Pro League table, and you do not need anything complicated to understand what it means. This team is not competing at the level required.
The thing is, it is not just the results. It is the manner of them. Both defeats came by a margin of three goals. Kortrijk have not managed a single clean effort in either match. Their overall form string reads L, L. There is no moral victory hiding in there. There is no encouraging sign buried in the numbers. There is a team that has been turned over twice and cannot score.
A home record that shows one game played, one loss, and three goals conceded tells you the crowd at the Guldensporenstadion have had nothing to cheer. When your home form is as bad as your away form before you have even played a home game that you can be proud of, accountability has to be the starting point. Not excuses. Accountability. Standards have to be set, and right now Kortrijk have none.
Zulte-Waregem: Eight Wins in Ten and Coming Here
Zulte-Waregem's overall form over the last ten games reads W, D, W, W, W, W, W, W, D, W. Eight wins. Two draws. Zero defeats. Nineteen goals scored. Seven conceded. That is the form of a side that knows how to compete, how to turn up, and how to grind out results when it matters.
Away from home specifically, Zulte have taken three wins, one draw, and one loss in their last five on the road. They have scored seven away goals in that period and kept three clean sheets in five attempts. They carry a genuine threat. They defend when they need to. That is a dangerous combination for a Kortrijk side that has not kept a clean sheet in either of their opening fixtures.
In the current 2026 season standings, Zulte sit sixth with four points from two games. One win, one draw, one goal against. They are steady. They are functional. They have not been spectacular, but they have been solid enough. Coming to face the league's bottom side, you would back them to impose themselves from the first whistle.
Their recent goal-scoring numbers speak clearly too. Eleven goals in five games overall, with a clean sheet rate of forty per cent on the road. This is not a side that turns up to sit in and take a point. They come to win matches.
The Gap Between These Two Sides
Listen, this is not a fixture between two evenly matched teams right now. One team has not scored in two games. The other has scored nineteen in ten. One team is bottom of the table with zero points. The other has four points and positive momentum. The gap in quality and confidence is significant, and confidence matters enormously in football at this level.
Kortrijk are playing in front of their own supporters on Sunday, and that matters to a point. Home advantage is real. A crowd can lift a team. But a crowd cannot do your defending for you, and Kortrijk's defensive record this season suggests that when the pressure comes, they fold. Conceding six goals in two games is not bad luck. That is an attitude and organisation problem. End of.
Zulte-Waregem have the desire, the form, and the confidence to make this a very uncomfortable afternoon for the hosts. They will not need to reinvent anything. They just need to compete at their normal level, and against a Kortrijk side that has looked shell-shocked in the early weeks of the campaign, that will likely be enough.
What Kortrijk Need
The basics. That is it. Kortrijk need someone to stand up, organise the defensive line, and put in a proper shift. They need desire. They need players who refuse to accept that this result is already written before kick-off. A home fixture against a team they will see as reachable opposition is exactly the kind of game where a beaten-up squad can either find something or fall further into trouble.
The thing is, they have had two weeks of results to look at and respond to. If there is any accountability in that dressing room, Sunday is the day to show it. If there is not, the table will only get harder to look at.
The Verdict
Zulte-Waregem are the better team in better form against opposition that has not scored yet this season. The logic here is straightforward. Zulte have the quality to win this game without producing anything extraordinary. Kortrijk need to find something they have not shown yet. Until they prove otherwise, backing them to do so on Sunday is a stretch.
Zulte-Waregem to win. Back it with conviction. Keep it simple.