These ten Belgian football legends are in the first Hall of Fame of the Pro League

It’s about club legends. Players who were not only valuable to the club where they played the most and reached the highest heights, but also served Belgian football as a whole. Anderlecht is best represented in the ten-member Hall of Fame with Vincent Kompany, Pär Zetterberg and Luc Nilis. Club Brugge sends two players with Jan Ceulemans and Franky Van der Elst, just like KRC Genk with Wesley Sonck and Thomas Buffel. Jean-Marie Pfaff (SK Beveren), Michel Preud’homme (KV Mechelen) and Eric Gerets (Standard) complete the first Hall of Fame. At least, the male part of it because Aline Zeler (Standard) is also represented.

Nine of the ten honorees were present at the ceremony in the Brussels Arts Center Bozar. Only Vincent Kompany, currently coach at Bayern Munich, was missing. (Read more below the post)

Clubs chose

Before you stand on your hind legs because your favorite player is missing, let us say that it is the choice of the clubs themselves and the football fans. In recent weeks, the 29 professional teams each put forward at least one candidate to join the Hall of Fame. The more national titles in the last 50 years, the more nominees. To these 49 club candidates, a four-person expert panel including Frank Raes and Mbo Mpenza added another eight legends.

The players who received the most votes will now be in the Hall of Fame. The fact that a four-time Golden Boot winner like Paul Van Himst is not included is due to the fact that his career was as good as over when the Pro League was founded in 1974. Yet greats such as Erwin Vandenbergh, Wilfried Van Moer, Juan Lozano, Philippe Albert, Raoul Lambert, Rob Rensenbrink, Johan Boskamp, ​​Enzo Scifo, Marc Degryse, Kevin De Bruyne and Thibaut Courtois are still missing. The last two may be because they moved abroad at an early age. Don’t worry about the other missing legends, they can still be chosen in the coming years.