BELGIAN SECOND DIVISION
BOSUIL STADION
SUNDAY 30TH SEPTEMBER 2012
ATTENDANCE: 5,500
In May 2013 the great and good of European football will congregate at Wembley Stadium for the UEFA Champions League final. But long before the symbolic twin towers became New Wembley with its giant arch the final of Europe’s premier football tournaments were played at the old stadium with its towers.
The 1960’s saw Milan at Wembley and the 1970’s witnessed the famous Ajax v Panathinaikos final.
Meanwhile, the 1990’s saw the European Cup final between Barcelona and Sampdoria. This match was decided by a rocket of a free kick from the boot of Dutchman Ronald Koeman.
Lesser remembered is the 1993 European Cup Winners Final contested at Wembley between Royal Antwerp and Parma.
The Italians beat Antwerp 3–1 and in doing so became the eighth different Italian team to win a European football trophy. The final was also the last ever time a team from Belgium played in a UEFA organized final.
The goal scorer for Antwerp that day was Francis Severeyns whilst in goal for Antwerp was the former Red Star Belgrade goalkeeper Stojanovic. Also in the line up for Antwerp was the Belgian international striker Alex Czerniatynski.
That final at Wembley feels like an lifetime ago now for many if not all Antwerp supporters.
The club now lurk almost resigned in the lower depths of the Belgian second division with the domestic cup win in 1992 being the last piece of serious silverware that the club has won. Antwerp is a large city and despite a vague link with Manchester United the shoddy condition of the home ground hints at a club who have went severely backwards since 1993.
Royal Antwerp
The club are known as the ‘Great Old’ due to being the first football club to register to the Royal Belgian Football Association in 1895. They consequently received the matriculate number one with a large ‘1’ being visible on the club logo.
In the hierarchy of Belgian football they are at the top.
Belgian club rivals are numerous and will always be the traditional clubs at Standard Liege and Anderlecht. However local rivals Beerschot and another side KV Mechelen who are based in the greater Antwerp area also provide stern tests and a sense of rivalry for Antwerp.
Generally the ‘tie in’ with Manchester United looks tired especially so at the Bosuil Stadium which nowadays retains its traditional feel but is very shabby and rundown. It is said that the home ground of Royal Antwerp is possibly one of the oldest football stadiums still being used in mainland Europe.
Essentially the Bosuil looks and feels like a Scottish League ground from the 1950’s.
The older traditional stands either side of the halfway line still stand but behind the goals are new creations. The older main stand is very rundown and looks ready to collapse with terracing areas below the main stand area and a media platform.
Outside leading up to the stadium is what once was a grand formal approach way that surrounds a rectangular tree lined pond. Once upon a time the pond might have been clear and a well kept garden but nowadays it’s full of litter, looks dirty and in desperate need of renovation.
During the 1960’s the open surrounds and wide approaches at Antwerp would have been ahead of its time. With the addition of floodlights in 1961 it did manage to stage the 1964 European Cup Winners Cup Final replay between Sporting Lisbon and MTK Budapest.
Although many glory in older traditional grounds the Antwerp ground feels disjointed and out of sync with the surroundings.
Nowadays these traditional characteristics and features make the Antwerp ground feel like a crumbling out of date ancient relic. The toilets and catering facilities inside the main stand area can feel dank, dark and wholly inadequate. The shape of the Antwerp stadium has been adjusted to create some sort of new corporate feel with the business stand behind the goal but it simply makes the ground feel mismatched.
It seems sad that a ground that hosted a European final and a UEFA European Championship semi-final has more or less become a dark gloomy and eerie place. It all adds up to a grim stadium only characterized by neglect and shoddy patched up new stand efforts.
The decline of the home stadia facilities has been matched by a decline in the team. The on-field malfunctions and lack of form has meant that efforts and plans to create a new super dome stadium have been shelved. The UEFA European Championships in 2000 passed by Antwerp as the towns of Charleroi, Bruges and Brussels reveled in the tournament.
As it is, Antwerp will be drawing castles in the sky for some time before they are able to lay any foundations of a new stadium. That conclusion may be slightly unfair on Royal Antwerp given that Belgium tends to lag behind its neighbors in France and Holland in terms of new stadia development.
Even the supposed Premier grounds in Belgium located in Brussels and Bruges feel out of touch with modern themes and change. Essentially given the size of Belgium and the size of the repair bills one idea might be two new super stadiums built either side of the Flemish/Walloon cultural divide.
Speaking of cultural and traditional divides the opponents for Royal Antwerp were the newer FC Brussels and its happy band of 30 travelling supporters. Based in the Brussels municipality of Moleenbeek Saint Jean the club play at the Stade Edmond Machtens the one time home of RWD Molenbeek.
The Match
In terms of the fixture it felt just like it was billed i.e. a match-up between two struggling second division sides.
Both teams strived to attack but not a lot happened until the 16th minute when Dom unleashed a blistering shot that completely eluded the FC Brussels goalkeeper.
Half-time saw fans of Royal Antwerp chase out for chips and mayonnaise the traditional Belgian favorite, and numerous beers were purchased. The sounds of the local Flemish accents were thick in the air once again in the standing terracing areas as the second half started.
FC Brussels could do nothing to prevent another defeat when the ball was won in midfield. When a cross comes into the box Van Velzen stabs a boot at it to make it 2-0 to the home side.
At Royal Antwerp I expected to find a tight compact traditional ground that provided memories of the football stadia of old.
Instead what was encountered at Antwerp was a stadium with little character that was in many ways shabby and grim.
Stadium signage looked like it was falling to pieces and the exteriors of the stadium are very downtrodden. Antwerp themselves feels like a club that will struggle to reach the heights of Belgian football ever again. Even with the assistance of some Manchester United players in a joint venture link up the club very much feels like one that is going nowhere fast.
If ever a club needed a stork to fly through the air and drop a new stadium on its doorstep then Antwerp are probably one of these clubs. Unable to progress due to a lack of finance and stuck in one of European football’s weaker league systems, Antwerp as a city has a hell of a lot going for it.
However, the same currently cannot be said for the main football club from the city which continues to hover around the Belgian second division and going nowhere fast.
*This first appeared in 2012 within voicesinfootball