SC Telstar host Heracles Almelo in the VriendenLoterij Eredivisie on Sunday evening, 10 May 2026, with both clubs staring at very different realities. Telstar sit 15th on 31 points and have done enough to keep some breathing space between themselves and real trouble, while Heracles are 18th on 19 points and deep in the relegation mire. For Anthony Correia’s side, this is about keeping their heads above water and taking another step towards safety. For Ernest Faber’s team, it’s fast becoming a rescue mission.
There’s still time for Heracles to turn this around on paper, but the numbers are grim. They’ve won only five league matches all season and have been beaten 23 times. Telstar aren’t flying, yet they’ve been miles steadier and, at home, they’ve usually been competitive. That matters here. A home game against the division’s bottom side is the sort of fixture where you’d expect Telstar to lean forward and attack the three points.
The mood around both camps is shaped by recent results. Telstar have at least mixed some good moments with the bad, while Heracles arrive on the back of another defeat and a long winless run that’s become hard to ignore. One side has enough attacking edge to cause problems. The other is leaking goals at a dreadful rate. That combination usually produces chances, and often plenty of them.
SC Telstar Form & Analysis
Telstar’s last six league matches tell a fairly messy but encouraging story. They drew 1-1 away at NEC Nijmegen on 2 May, which followed a much-needed 4-1 home win over Sparta Rotterdam on 22 April. Before that, they were thumped 4-1 at FC Utrecht, lost 2-0 at home to FC Groningen, beat PSV Eindhoven 3-1 in one of the season’s bigger surprises, and came unstuck 3-0 away to SC Heerenveen. It’s the sort of run that keeps you guessing. They’re not reliable, but they’re certainly not timid.
The 4-1 win over Sparta and the 3-1 defeat of PSV were the standout moments. That’s the Telstar in this team: capable of opening up games, especially at home, but also vulnerable when the pressure comes back at them. Their draw at NEC was a decent away point, and the detail matters there too. They were outshot 21-10 and faced seven shots on target, yet still found a way to score twice through Sem van Duijn and Tjaronn Chery before a late VAR intervention chopped one back. That tells you they can carry a threat even when not on top.
At their own ground, Telstar have been respectable rather than spectacular. Their home record reads four wins, five draws and seven losses, with 28 goals scored and 28 conceded. Even that balance has a familiar feel: they’ll score, they’ll concede, and you’re rarely watching a closed game. They’ve been without a clean sheet in eight league matches, which is the kind of streak that drags a team towards BTTS and goal-heavy contests. Fine margins aren’t really their thing. Open games are.
The flip side is that Telstar do have enough attacking structure to trouble a side as fragile as Heracles. They’ve scored 44 league goals overall, which is not bad for a team sitting in the lower half, and at home they’re averaging exactly two goals scored and conceded combined per match from the season split. That suits a matchup like this. They don’t need to dominate every phase. They just need to keep the tempo high and let Heracles’ defensive nerves do some of the work.
Heracles Almelo Form & Analysis
Heracles arrive in worse shape than the table alone suggests. Their last six matches have produced five defeats and one draw, and the one point came against Excelsior on 20 March. Since then, it’s been collapse after collapse: a 4-0 defeat at AZ Alkmaar, a 1-1 draw at home to Excelsior, a 4-1 loss at SC Heerenveen, a 0-3 home defeat to Ajax, a 0-2 loss to FC Volendam, and most recently a 1-0 defeat away to PEC Zwolle on 3 May. That’s a miserable sequence. Eleven league games without a win now. It’s a serious problem.
The away defeat at Zwolle was especially telling. Heracles actually edged the shot count 14-9 and produced two big chances apiece, but they still lost 1-0 after conceding early and failing to find a way back. A second yellow for Sem Scheperman didn’t help, yet the broader issue is the same one they’ve had all season: they don’t finish chances and they don’t stay organised for long enough. One decent away performance doesn’t fix a record like theirs.
Their away numbers are brutal. One win, one draw and 14 defeats from 16 league trips, with only 12 goals scored and 46 conceded. That’s the sort of record that gets exposed quickly, especially against a home side with some punch. They’ve conceded 80 league goals in total, which is the number that jumps off the page. You don’t need to dress it up. That’s a team that spends too much time chasing matches and too little time controlling them.
There are individual signs of fight, but they’re too isolated. The 1-0 defeat at Zwolle wasn’t a total wipeout in performance terms, and the 1-1 draw with Excelsior showed they can hang around if the game remains tight. Still, they’ve scored only 34 goals in the league and have gone three matches without finding the net in their last four outings. That’s not a platform you’d want away from home in a fixture where Telstar should come out with intent.
Head-to-Head
These two have already met this season, drawing 1-1 at Heracles on 6 December 2025. That result fits the recent edge in the fixture for goals rather than control. Heracles have gone five meetings without losing to Telstar, and Telstar haven’t kept a clean sheet against them in that sequence. There’s a pattern here, and it’s not subtle. Heracles tend to get chances in this matchup, and the games usually aren’t cagey.
The broader head-to-head picture is even less forgiving for Telstar. Heracles beat them 7-0 in February 2023 and 3-0 in September 2022, with other meetings also going their way. That doesn’t mean history decides Sunday’s game, but it does reinforce a simple point: Telstar often find this opponent awkward, and Heracles have had their number more often than not. Even so, the current versions of these sides look very different. This time, the balance feels more open.
We Predict: Over 2.5 Goals
We’re backing Over 2.5 Goals at 2/5 for this one. If you want to dig a bit deeper here, the Bet365 early payout page covers Bet365 early payout rules if you want the details behind that feature. It’s short, sure, but it’s still the strongest angle. Telstar’s home matches have been lively, Heracles’ defence has been a leak all season, and both teams come into the game with enough evidence to expect chances at either end. The recent meetings between them have also leaned that way, with four of the last five clearing the line.
A 2-1 home win feels the likeliest scoreline. Telstar have the better overall shape, they’ve been stronger at home, and Heracles’ away record is simply too weak to trust. But the visitors should still get moments — Telstar haven’t been keeping clean sheets, and Heracles have at least shown enough to nick something in games like this. If you want a slightly bigger price, Both Teams to Score is the obvious alternative.
