Racing Club Luxembourg (Luxembourg)
Here is the story of Racing Club Luxembourg and CA Spora, two
‘Forgotten Clubs’ of Luxembourg.
One of the first clubs in the country, Racing was founded in 1907,
meaning that they could already compete in the first-ever National Division in
1909/10, held in a knockout rounds structure because there weren’t enough clubs
to play a league at the time. Racing Club did well, moreover, they won the
whole thing, beating Hollerich 3-2 in the final. The next year they didn’t
enter the league, but they tried again in 1911/12 when they even gave several
players to the national team, who played their first-ever match at the time
(1-4 vs. France). In the league, though, they finished a disappointing 3rd out
of 4, with 7 points in 6 matches. Then – for still unknown reasons – the league
wasn’t held in 1912/13. In the next season though, relative success came for
both the team and the country. While Luxembourg finally got their first win in
a friendly in a 5-4 thriller against France. Racing Club Luxembourg meanwhile
finished in third place behind Hollerich and Sporting Club Luxembourg.
However, in 1914 World War I started. That forced the FLF to organize
the league with a tournament structure (groups and knockout), with groups of
two/three. Racing was got into the only three-team group after the regional
allocation and finished second after Sporting Club (still 4 points higher than
Hollerich), meaning that the competition ended for them after just two matches.
It was a big disappointment because they simply couldn’t have been nearer to
the first place. In their match against SCL, they lost 6-5. If that one was a
draw, they would have gone through on better goal difference. Next year the
league had time to plan the league structure so the six teams were able to play
against each other twice, just like before the war. Every supporter of Racing
was waiting for a resurrection of the team, instead, it happened to be
Hollerich’s resurgence. After the disappointing 1914/15 season, the navy blue
team managed to win the title with 7 wins out of 10, including an 11-1 record
victory to Jeunesse Esch. Racing finished a disappointing 4th, missing out on
the podium by goal difference only.
In 1916, Stade Dudelange got relegated from the league and was replaced
by a new club Young Boys Diekirch, who even exists in 2020 which is a rarity
among these teams. The league table didn’t change significantly though –
Hollerich now won the league winning every single match. Racing only managed to
collect 8 points in 10 matches, but surprisingly that was enough to secure them
the third place, furthermore, they could finally finish above city rivals
Sporting Club. The contest between Racing and SCL was tight again, with one of
their matches resulting in a 4-6 Racing win. In 1917/18, Jeunesse Esch’s place
was taken by CS Pétange, who clearly wasn’t ready for the first division,
finishing last and forfeited a match, even suffering a 0-13 defeat once.
Unfortunately, this year wasn’t Racing’s year, again. They could finish only
one place above relegated Pétange, the 5th place was the club’s worst result in
their first 10 years.
In the first post-war season, Racing fans and players were optimistic
about their chances, despite the club just drifting down the places every year
since foundation. Sadly, that year wasn’t an exception, and Racing only
survived because of Young Boys going winless for the whole campaign, even
forfeiting the last couple of matches. Moreover, Sporting won the title, which
was an even bigger problem for RCL supporters than their own team’s form. In
the tenth season of Luxembourgish football, Racing suffered the biggest defeat
of their history, an 8-1 against Stade Dudelange. With 2 wins and 8 losses,
they came in last. And if it wasn’t for rules change from the federation, they
would have been relegated and maybe even dissolved. But with the league being
expanded to 8 teams, that meant no one was going to be relegated. One of the
promoted teams, Rumelange, holds the worst league campaign record. They ended
the season with 14 losses out of 14, and a -75-goal difference, and several
two-digit defeats. The other side to be relegated was Racing, and this time
even the Luxembourgish FA couldn’t help them.
The second tier proved to be of no challenge for the team, who won
every game and scored 75 in 14 matches. And the good performances gave a
motivation boost for the team, who even got to the cup final from the second
division. And in the final they successfully beat Jeunesse 2-0, to become the
first-ever team to lift the newly created Luxembourgish Cup. The fans did not
know that this cup is going to be their last trophy. And they couldn’t even
guess the reason. After another unsuccessful season from Racing (7th place, 11
points) they found themselves in the bottom two come to the end of the season
and they had to go down to try and fight their way back to the top. But in the
summer of 1923, something happened in the minnow’s capital. Something which
wasn’t expected by a single fan at the time. Something, which helped Racing
staying in the league, but had a huge drawback. After the 1922/23
season Racing fans were pessimistic. They would start the following season in
the second division, once again, and with the number of clubs rapidly growing
in the country, the 2nd division title was nowhere near guaranteed.
However, the club could still participate in the National Division the
year after. How was it possible? No, there were no rule changes or receding
teams, but the solution is a merge. Well, the club merged with whom the
supporters wanted the least: their biggest enemies, Sporting. With this
solution, the merger team Spora became financially stable, got a decent little
ground (Racing’s former pitch) and of course Racing didn’t have to go down
because of that. We now see that it was truly a blessing in
disguise.
The new team’s name
Spora came from the first three letters of ’Sporting’ and the first two of
’Racing’. Similarly, the club colors came from Racing’s blue and Sporting’s
yellow kits. They started off with a second place in 1924 behind Fola, and that
was the beginning of the club’s best era, whole decades of success, and even a
historical European Cup match – but don’t rush forward, go back to 1925. The
second place was the ending in all of the club’s first three seasons – with
three different champions (Fola Esch, US Dudelange and Red Boys Differdange).
In 1925 they only lost the league by goal difference as Dudelange scored one
more goal than Spora. CASL even played a cup final in 1925,
forfeiting the second match against Red Boys after a 1-1 draw. After being used
to finishing second, they were finally able to break the curse in 1927 – but
unfortunately they didn’t move to the wanted direction, finishing on the bottom
of the podium this time, with Union Luxembourg winning the league. Union
Luxembourg, does this name sound familiar? I guess not, or at least not from
this or the previous article. That’s because Union is also amerger team,
arising from two successful clubs of the previous decade, Hollerich and
Jeunesse SV. Next year Spora also had to accept third place, and such
honourable places in the first years of a club’s history is definitely an
exceptional start, but because of the history of both clubs, fans weren’t that
patient and obviously they wanted the highest feats in the least time possible.
Well, they only had to wait a year and the first title of CA Spora Luxembourg
arrived, furthermore, they swooped it up with an 8-point lead. The ’Blo-a-Giel’
(Blue-and-yellows) also won the cup, in their second rematch after two draws
against Dudelange. In the next five years, they always finished in the top
three in the league, even winning it once, while in the domestic cup they lost
3 finals in the time of just half a decade. Three consecutive National Division
titles then were enough proof for even the most skeptical fans that long-term
consistent success is written in the club’s DNA. Even their 6th place finish
coming as a bolt from the blue in 1937 wasn’t enough to upset their apple cart.
The next time when they didn’t appear in the podium was in 1940 – the last year
before WWII.
From August 1942,
all male Luxembourgers of draft age were conscripted into the German armed
forces. Altogether, 12,000 Luxembourgers served in the German military, of
whom
nearly 3,000 died during the war, and a further 1,500 were wounded. The country
was officially made part of Germany. Over 2,100 homes in Luxembourg were
destroyed in the fighting and more than 1,400 others seriously damaged. It is
also estimated that some 500 Luxembourgish non-combatants lost their lives
during the Battle of the Bulge. Besides the
dead, over 45,000 Luxembourgers became refugees during the battle. The team
also had to change its name for the 5 years of German invasion, to Moselland
Luxemburg,
and were also forced to participate in the Gauliga Moselland (Nazi regional
league). The team played 3 seasons in that championship and achieved a standout
2nd place in 1942. After years of struggle, poverty and bereavement, naturally
football was of low priority for both the government and the people. In 1945
Luxembourg became independent again and Spora could join back to that league
system. In the first season back, Spora enjoyed great success right away: in a
knockout round format tournament they managed to make it to the final, where
they were unfortunately thrashed by Stade Dudelange 0-6 (they had to accept the
silver medal in the cup too that year, losing 0-2 to Progrés Niedercorn in the
final).
After the war Spora
enjoyed some less fruitful decades, with several extraordinary results but no
consistent dominance. Despite winning the National Division in 1948/49, the
club was relegated in just 5 years’ time. Then came the miraculous years:
back-to-back titles which meant a place in the 1956/57 European Cup (the first
one was held in 1955/56, but with Luxembourgish teams not getting invitations
for the tournament). In the preliminary round, Spora was drawn a massive team:
Borussia Dortmund from Germany. Although the Luxembourgish side couldn’t get
through, nobody can say they didn’t try everything: after a narrow 3-4 defeat,
the Blue Yellows managed to somehow beat the Schwarzgelben 2-1. The 5-5
aggregate meant that the teams had to play a third fixture to decide a winner,
and BVB pulled off an easy 7-0 victory there (under the current away goal rule,
Spora
would have gone through). Nowadays, that win is still considered as one of, if
not the best single result a team from the Grand Duchy have ever achieved in
Europe. A narrow defeat against a much bigger ranked team can hardly be
considered a turning point in the club’s life, but in some respects, it was
something like that. They only won the league twice in the 1956-2005 period.
And, although in the ’60s the club was still able to finish in a UEFA Cup place
several times, similar successes didn’t follow.
Their next EC appearance was in 1961-62, after winning the ’60/61 domestic
championship. Even with the most famous manager the club ever had (András
Béres, went on to manage Belgian powerhouses Club Brugge and Anderlecht), the
Danish side Boldklubben sent them home with a disastrous 2-15 aggregate.
Important to note that it was Boldklubben’s only season in the European Cup,
and in their following tie were knocked out 0-12.
In that decade Spora
became a strong mid-table team in the 12-team league, finishing in the 5th-7th
positions except for one or two standout results (2nd or 3rd places). Even in
the cup, they could only win the title twice in the 10 years. After the cup
wins they obviously always got the opportunity of playing in the European Cup
Winners’ Cup (for the sake of younger followers: this was a tournament where
most of Europe’s domestic cup winner teams could compete. It went bust in
1999). However, defeats against Magdeburg and Shamrock Rovers cut both their
cup runs short. If it wasn’t enough, the big rival Union came back from the
hell’s deepest pit (after a title drought of more than 20 years), and became
hugely dominant in both the league and the cup (in fact, they went invincible
for the whole 1970/10 campaign). The boot was on the other foot: Union fought
back to the very top and were capable of staying there consistently, while for
Spora, even a 3rd place meant a surprisingly good finish in the ’70s and from
then on. There was another remarkable fairy tale story in the ’60s: the one of
Aris de Bonnevoie. Another club from the capital, the team won the league and
played in the cup final of the 63/64 season – in their 5th season in the top
tier! Unfortunately, Aris was never able to reassert these successes (apart
from a cup win in 1967) and didn’t win another piece of silverware in the rest
of their history.
The next time Spora played in Europe was in 1980 (except the Fairs Cup tie
versus Leeds in 1967) but a lot of things happened until that. For first, a
relegation and two years spent in the Division of Honor; then relegation again,
this time followed up by instant promotion. The first year back turned into a
great campaign, which ended in a cup victory: Spora beat Progrés Niedercorn 3-2
after extra time. They didn’t really have a chance next year in the ECWC
though: they only had to focus on the league from then on after suffering a
pair of 0-6 defeats against then-Czechoslovakian Sparta Prague. Things still
looked good in the capital of Luxembourg, until they realized that their 7th
place wasn’t an average feat: it was the biggest this squad could achieve. In
the season following their cup win, they only managed to gain 15 points in 22
matches, thus only staying up by a single point. The team wasn’t that lucky in
81/82. Disastrous season, only 2 wins, -31 goal difference and several big-
margin losses (such as a 0-4, a 1-6, and a 0-5) meant another season down in
the second tier.
At all, we could
still say though that the ’80s was a superb decade for the club. After
achieving the expected promotion, Spora finished 5th on two occasions before
stepping on the podium several times to crown the decade with a league title.
After finishing in fourth place, they progressed to the playoff round between
the top 6 teams (similar to that of the Belgian Pro League now). What’s even
more incredible is their 10-match undefeated streak against the other 5 biggest
teams in the country! They got the title of course by overcoming their 2.5
points handicap. For that accolade, they got an amazing prize: the opportunity
to play Real Madrid, as they were drawn as Spora’s EC opponent. Unfortunately,
it ended in a 0-9 aggregate but avoiding two-digit aggregated scoreline was
still something Spora could be proud of (after losing 2-11 to Feyenoord the
year before, and a few years later they were also beaten by Sheffield Wed and
Frankfurt, both by two-digit margins). 79-80
In the ’90s no
extreme things happened to Spora – despite almost getting relegated once, but
winning their playoff match to stay up. A few second and third places were
achieved, mainly in the first years of the decade, followed up by quick
eliminations from UEFA Cup both times. From 1995 their aim was to stay near
mid-table while executing a generational change in the squad. Although the
latter is hard to do without a mistake or a downward spiral in the team’s
performances. Spora committed a mistake: they tried to take two steps at once, from
having an experienced squad to signing and promoting several 16-18-year-old
players every year.
Needless to say,
things went wrong. Spora came last, with only 8 points collected in 22 matches.
Remember, in 1998/99, a win already meant 3 points, which makes it look even
worse. But the cherry on the top was the 0-5 defeat. At home. To Union. I
believe Spora fans didn’t even want to leave their house because of the shame,
but life went on. Spora got relegated but the club didn’t feel the urge of
signing a few more experienced players to help the club get back to its
well-deserved place. Unfortunately, it turned out that they had no other
options: teams in the country had been living beyond their means for years so
they had to reduce costs and focus on making a profit instead of pulling off
dream transfers. Indeed, Spora had a smart plan: they were one of the first
teams to go through that generational change and they did it in only a few
years’ time, which is a relatively short period – while other clubs, despite
staying in the division, struggled with the process for long years which made
various teams settle for midtable, even if they could have been capable of a
bronze
medal or better. We also must note another thing:
Spora was known to
have the strongest under 23 team”, says Alen Dautbasic, a former player of the
club. „We made Jeunesse Esch, Dudelange and Union look like small teams
compared to us. We taught them huge lessons. And we were all taken a chance. A
few months ago, we honoured the passage of our late coach Gaetano Mella. He was
like a father for all the young players, making an unbeatable youth team from
us.” As you could guess, Alen was still in the youth age when he joined the
club in 2004. When he was signed from Union’s youth team, his brother had
already been in Spora for two years. He’s not active more, but still plays
futsal occasionally. He’s more active as a player agent”, Alen resumes.
By 2004, the club
was back in the BGL Ligue – the first tier. That was their second season back
after three years of playing in the Ehrenpromotion league. Before the season,
there were no signs. „The aim was to play a role in the middle of the table.
Regarding the fact that back then we had [a lot of] young players. In the
beginning, we received our salaries” – tells the Bosnian-Luxembourgish right-
back, who, in Spora, even played right-winger occasionally, but as he’s over 30
now, he took on a more defensive role. „Yeah, I’m still active. I play for the
second team of FC Schifflange – the former team of Miralem Pjanic. At the same
time, I’m the assistant coach of the second team.”
“The season didn’t
start well for the Blue and Yellows. In the first rounds, Spora suffered a 0-7
hammering against Dudelange. There were several 0-4 demolitions too, and
midtable looked as far as it could. After the 22 matches, they were standing in
10th place, heading to the relegation playoff. The 8 worst teams were split
into two groups, with one club relegated from each. However, the teams carried
on their points tally from the regular season, so all they had to do is to
avoid being overtaken by Avenir Beggen. I remember it was during the last games
of playoffs when this merger came into discussion. Even before [that] a lot of
players started to argue about a possible merger and a lot of strange things
happened in the absence of some members who were not present at some training
sessions or games. With the absence of salaries, we knew this was the end.”
The team also played
horribly in the playoffs. After 2 points in five matches, the situation looked
as: 11th Avenir Beggen 21pts 12th (rel.) Spora 20pts and the two teams faced
each other on the last matchday. „There had not been any good training sessions
between these last games and a lot of players weren’t at that level. Beggen was
playing for their future and needed the points. I was always motivated but we
had a lot of key players who unfortunately weren’t.” – recalls Alen. „We had
several players who only lived from the salary from Spora – 2 or 3, that’s what
we call semi-pro today. Mostly the older players were professional, like José
Gomes. Old but gold” The Cape Verdean striker (also known as José Andrade or Zé
de Angola) was a cult hero at Stoke City but had also played for Portuguese
teams like Académica or Gil Vicente, before spending the last 8 years of his
career in the Grand Duchy. Here he became the deadliest player of the team,
scoring a whopping 53 goals in 52 games for Spora in three seasons. But Alen
has some information about him which can be new for even the die-hard Stoke
fans: „Came high to the games, played high on the field… Incredible and
unstoppable! I wondered how he can play, his eyes were red like blood, he was singing
non-stop but as soon as the attack started, the opposition defense started to
sing too”, well, he still managed to produce a goal/match ratio of more than
one, so let’s move on without discussing his work ethic in any more details.
For their last
match, the average age of Spora’s lineup was a ridiculous 22.6, with the
34-year-old José Andrade included. In the half-time, Spora was trailing 0-2,
after an early goal conceded in the 6′, followed up by another one 13 minutes
later. In the second half, Avenir found the third, for which the Blue Yellows,
fortunately, reacted quickly, in the form of an Andrade-penalty. In fact, this
happened to be Spora’s last official goal. Avenir was fighting for their lives,
and that instinct took them forward, which helped them proceed to score the 4th
and the 5th, while in the 76′, Spora even had to sub their goalkeeper off,
thanks to an injury. The match (and the club’s history) ended with a scoreline
of 1-5 for the visitors in the Stade Josy Barthel (current stadium of the
national team).
In that last year,
Spora’s senior squad contained 12 under-21 players, and when asked who had the
most potential among this group, Alen under-21 players, and when asked who had
the most potential among this group, Alen quickly reacted: „My brother. I don’t
want to offend the others, but my brother made the difference. Later, he played
two games in the Bosnian national team with Edin Dzeko. He was discovered
during a game in Bosnia, and the press then took him to the national team,
where he went on to play 2 games against Croatia and players like Luka Modric!”
It’s sad to see that he couldn’t fulfill his potential. The reason makes it
feel even worse: „In those years corruption played a huge role in the
federation. My father wasn’t willing to pay an extra fee to the coaches.”
Fortunately, this bunch of youth players got a lot of help from the more
experienced ones: „With the most of them (the older players) we had a really
good connection. They helped us a lot, they didn’t stop to teach the young,
even when they became uninterested near the end.”
However, Spora was
more than a club. The players hated the decision which forced them to move
clubs, or become free agents, as the team cohesion was over the top. As Alen
said before, many of the squad’s younger players also featured for the youth
teams. He has a special memory from the last days of the club. Everyone knew
that was the end, but they still had to play in Coupe de Prince. The
competition’s structure was the following: the league was separated into two
different phases, then Phase 1 winner would go on to play Phase 2 winner in the
final – the only exception to the rule would be if the same team wins both
phases (obviously they win the title without a final then). „We won the first
phase and were first. We could finish as champions if we won the second phase
of the
league above Jeunesse. In the second phase, we were still first. That meant
that we would be the champions. We were playing them like cat and mouse, but we
decided to lose the game on purpose, in order to have a final game with my
mates. In the match, I took a penalty and shoot it wide over the goal. Jeunesse
was first so we got our final. And of course, we made them pay, [it ended]
5-2.” I don’t think anything else could express the relationship between the
players better than this story. „With most [of my former teammates] I’m still
in contact, we have a drink together and things like that.”
For these younger
players, Spora didn’t just mean a club. It meant their first (and maybe the
only) chance to make a name for themselves in senior football, and after the
merger, not all the players were given contracts at the new club Racing FC
Union Luxembourg. „Some players didn’t receive any offers nor communication,
most of them weren’t interested in them anyway as they had other big offers.
Some already received offers during the playoffs, young players had more
interesting offers that could change their lives (like mine) and they didn’t
hesitate to take it.” Alen’s next club was Strassen, where he went with two of
his Spora teammates and friends.
In all, the club’s
11 U21- players of the first team went to 8 different clubs, two of them got an
offer from abroad, but they couldn’t make it to the senior sides in Portugal
and Germany, respectively. So, what we see there is a big sliding doors moment.
Only God knows what could have happened, were the best youth players of the
country not scattered to the four winds. What I can say with certainty though,
is that it was a huge blow for Luxembourgish football. Two of the biggest
historical clubs of the country – Spora and Union, the rivals once again
(Alliance was the third team involved in the merger) disappeared from one day
to the next, while the most talented group of players didn’t get the chance to
play together anymore. Spora’s youth team were capable, if the club hadn’t
disappeared, to reach the heights of the recent Dudelange team who participated
in two consecutive UEL group stages. Spora maybe could have been the first
Grand Duchy side ever to reach those feet, but these are just imaginations.
However, I’m sure that Spora team must have been a big favourite of football
hipsters and there could’ve been a lot of articles produced about them, if only
footballing Twitter existed back then.
Football is a
worldwide game, played at all different levels and under so many different
circumstances. Just because there aren’t millions of euro or pounds or whatever
currency involved doesn’t lessen the impact of the game in that country or in
certain communities. Luxembourgish football clearly has its own interesting
history and shouldn’t be forgotten about, and neither should it’s ‘Forgotten Clubs’.
Every football club that has existed should be remembered and that is what I am
aiming to do. Thankfully, there are others out there who are trying to do the
same, and in these so-called smaller nations. Keep up the good work Bence.