Cercle Brugge boss hammers Kilmarnock pitch as 'very bad' astro offers Miron Muslic a good omen

Critical Cercle Brugge boss Miron Muslic has hammered Kilmarnock’s Rugby Park pitch. But the Belgians’ coach says his team will cope and relish a physical battle with Derek McInnes’ fired-up troops.

Muslic praised Killie and the manager ahead of the Europa League qualifying first-leg tie and also the romance of the stadium. But the Austrian was far less-complimentary when it came to the non-grass playing surface. He said: “The pitch is in very bad condition. It’s not a new artificial pitch, it’s just an old one. But that’s something we cannot control.

“I cannot put too much energy into this. Of course it’s new and challenging, We can control a strong performance and this is our plan. We have one team in our competition, St Truiden, who play on an artificial pitch, so we face them once a year. The last two games since we won 1-0 and 2-0 so, hopefully, this is a good omen. We have a clear goal, a target and we want to perform in the best-possible way knowing Kilmarnock is a strong team with a strong home record.

“Clearly, able to take advantage of an artificial pitch with dangerous players up front like Watkins, Armstrong, Vassell, Kennedy, players with individual moments. Kilmarnock are playing very direct, verticial, similar to us and we expect a physical game. But if you play versus Cercle, it is always physical, so we are already prepared for this.

“We respect Kilmarnock a lot. This is a team that will give their all, this is a team that will try to make it a real fight. I heard the stadium is sold out. I was already outside and had a look and it has a little bit of football romance. It was really nice. Even if it’s an old stadium, it has an aura and some nice charisma.

“So we’re going to not only challenge Kilmarnock,