Chronicles of the Berkshire Pig: Autumn Eurocrankhop

Sporting Charleroi Reserves v Waaslang Beveren Reserves - Belgium Reserve Pro League

So, day one of a 15 day Euro jaunt. In tow was Mad Dai, who in his usual 'I have a watch but no diary' lifestyle, turned up in Swindon a day early for the tour, but with a lovely white tiger phone cover.

First move was off Swindon on the 0828, which gave us a +90 onto the Eurostar. However, the disintegrating competence of Network Rail Western route meant an axle counter failure at Slough turned that into making the Eurostar by two minutes. The Eurostar was full of Spurs fans, heading for Bayer Leverkusen, and included a contingent from Swindon, including a colleague’s husband "don't tell Jackie, she thinks I'm on a week of lodging turns".

Into Brussels bang on time, and the move on to Charleroi was with SNCB, aka fuckingbelgianrailwaystm. They are in terminal decline as a crumbling infrastructure and massive industrial relations issues, has left a fragile network with staff that couldn't give a fuck. Hence this piece of shit rolled in twenty minutes late, with no announcement, and ambled down through Waterloo to Charleroi.

Charleroi is in the south west of Belgium and the countries fifth most populous city. It was a major industrial and coal mining area, but most of this has shut down. Bloody Thatcher. It was also here that the smurfs were discovered in the 1930s. The centre is going through a programme of beautification, symbolised by the rather grand railway station.

We were told that the evenings game was being played at the ground of FC Charleroi, the cities third team, located in the south east of Charleroi. This was adjacent to Bois du Cazier, a closed mine which is now a museum and heritage park. It was the scene of one of Europes worst mining disasters in 1956. Post WW2, a lot of the prisoners of war had stayed on in the area to work the mines. This resulted in scant regard to working conditions, and a ruptured electric cable ignited fuel pipes in one of the shafts, causing an explosion and fumes that killed 263 people of 12 nationalities, primarily Italians. The outcome was European legislation controlling mining that is still the primary governance to this day. My memory card corrupted so here is a library shot of the museum.

We then moved on to the football ground, only to be find it on lock down. The only reference we could find suggested it was being played an hour later, at Sporting Charleroi's main ground. Again, here is a library shot.

So back into the centre and the opportunity to find out what 'extreme speed thirty two gig' translates to in Belgian. The most recent thing Charleroi is memorable for, is that in 2000 it hosted the Finals of the European garden furniture throwing championships. Teams from England and Germany assembled in the town square to throw white plastic chairs. The first round was free throwing, then throwing whilst being bombarded with beer menus by the opposition, and finally throwing whilst being water cannoned by the police. In the evenings, games of football were put on by the national teams, in order to entertain the competitors. Today, the central square was more moderate.

We headed to the city's sole entry in the European good beer guide.

Whilst I stayed off the beer, Dai was determined to sample the local offerings. Having a 200 bottle menu rather bewildered him, and he managed to get three entries down the alphabetical list before choosing one. However, this was an Affligem Tripel, which at 9.6%, didn't meet with Dai's Strongbow weened tastes.

After watching the rest of Venezuela v North Korea in the U18s women's World Cup (none of the Venezuelans looked under 18, none of the Koreans looked like women), we headed off to the football, embracing the euro culture by jumping on a tram.

Dai getting excited about football signage for the first game of the tour.

Being reassured it was at the main stadium, we arrived at Stade du Pays, home of the Zebras. The ground was extensively rebuilt when it hosted three games in Euro 2000.

However, apart from someone plastering, the place was deserted. Eventually we did find someone, who confirmed the game was being played at Stad de la Neuville, home of Olympic Charleroi.

Fortunately this was very close by, and a five minute walk found the ground, with floodlights blazing and the familiar sound of teams warming up. So we wandered in, and 8 euros later.....

....we were in the ice rink located under the main stand.

A brief negotiation for the return of our entrance fee, and directions around the ground, took us to the proper entrance.

This time, 7 euro got us in.

Sporting Charleroi Reserves 1 v Waaslang Beveren Reserves 1, Belgium Pro-League Reserve.

Sporting Charleroi are the cities leading team. They were formed in 1904, and were originally second to Olympic Charleroi, swapping between the first and second divisions with them. Over the last 30 years, Sporting have emerged as the leading team, being in the top division since 1985. It was from Sporting Charleroi that Paul Pogba joined Man Utd the first time around for somewhat less than £80 million.

A lot of teams in Belgium are conglomerates of many teams, with histories that would make Waltham Forest seem straight forward. Waaslang-Beveren are such a team, being formed as Red Star in Haasbank in 1936. They didn't do a lot until a rise up the leagues at the turn of the century saw them take over the bankrupt Sint-Niklaas and move into their stadium, becoming Red Star Waasland, the region the towns are in. Five years later, and a merger with Beveren, saw another ground move, and another name change, which resulted in promotion to the top tier in 2012.

Stand de la Neuville is the home of Olympic Charleroi. They were formed in 1912 and were the top team in the city, but by the 1960s had dropped out of the top league and currently play in the third division B. As is practice, they have merged with a couple of clubs, changed their name and finally went bust in 2012, reforming under their historic name.

The ground has recently been refurbished.

It has a large main stand, which has had a glass lounge added to the back.

On the opposite touchline is a covered terrace.

Behind one goal is a large open terrace...

....but at the other end, the steep terrace has been abandoned to the wilds.

Tucked in one corner is this strange segment of stand, reminiscent of the bits of terracing you could get for Subbuteo.

The ground is hemmed in by housing, so the different areas are connected by a myriad of steep, narrow passages.

The pre-match handshakes were bizarre, in that the teams got in a long line, then just shook hands with their own players.

The game started and Waasland soon took the lead with a good move down the right.

Behind the goal, was a small group who were bang on the gear, with that end in of the ground stinking of weed.

This may have affected the away defence, as a simple centre was completely air kicked, landing at the feet of an attacker, who tapped in the equaliser.