 On 20 February 2011 Stijnen was relegated to the B-team, after it became known that he and his family members had engaged in an anonymous campaign on the club's message board, where they were bashing both the club management and fellow team members while simultaneously hailing Stijnen as the "club hero" in order to promote his profile.The following day, both parties agreed to dissolve the contract which bound the player to the club until 2015.Stijnen retired in the 2013 summer at the age of 32, after two top flight seasons with Beerschot AC.