BACK IN 1971, Chelsea played a two-legged European Cup-Winners’ Cup tie against Jeunesse Hautcharage, a village club from Luxembourg that had, rather surprisingly, won the domestic cup and qualified for Europe. It was a team that had four brothers, a bespectacled defender and a one-armed forward. Chelsea, needless to say, won 8-0 in Luxembourg and then thrashed the plucky amateurs 13-0 to run-up a record-breaking 21-0 aggregate score.
Luxembourg were minnows in 1971, in fact they have always been regarded as one of Europe’s no-hopers. With a population of 660,000 they could be nothing more than makeweights. The Grand Duchy has always a good head for business, though, and has long been considered an excellent destination for top talent. They are now developing young footballers that may soon be attracting the attention of clubs around the continent.
But in the European Championship qualifiers, Luxembourg made it through to the play-off games with the ultimate prize one of the remaining places in EURO 2024. They lost to Georgia 2-0, but five years ago, the prospect of Luxembourg even getting as far as they did would have been laughed at.
Luxembourg has become football mad, although most fans inevitably follow Europe’s big clubs. There are 40,000 registered players and plenty of clubs and the national stadium, Stade de Luxembourg is an impressive structure, but the country is surrounded by more glamorous distractions from the football world.
The national squad, headed by Luc Holtz, comprises players who are plying their trade abroad. Only two of Luxembourg’s recent call-ups are employed by domestic clubs; David Sinani of F91 Dudelange and Raplh Schon of Wiltz 71. The rest are usually in Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, Poland and other European nations.
The domestic game in Luxembourg was always dominated by the likes of Jeunesse Esch and F91 Dudelange, who have won the league 28 and 16 times respectively. Jeunesse Esch last won the title in 2010, but Dudelange were champions as recently as 2022. The last team from Esch-sur-Alzette to finish top of the National Division was Fola in 2021.
This season, Differdange 03 are top of the table and seven points clear of last year’s champions, Swift Hesperange, who lifted their first title after a barnstorming campaign in which they scored 100 goals in 30 games and lost just once. Differdange won the Luxembourg Cup in 2023 with a team drawn from all over the world, including players from Argentina, Brazil, Congo and France. Luxembourg’s 16-team top flight has a relatively high level of foreign players – 59% – with teams like Swift, Differdange, Mondercange and Schifflange with well over 70%.
Swift appear to have the most coveted players in the league, such as the Austrian Raphael Holzhauser, Simào Martins of Portugal and France’s Clément Corturier. The club is owned by Prince Sébastien of Luxembourg and, in 2022, filed a lawsuit against UEFA for blocking a proposal for a cross-border Benelux league.
Swift were among Luxembourg’s hopefuls in European competition but were knocked out of the Champions League in the first qualifying round by Slovan Bratislava. They then tried their luck in the Conference League and managed to get past The New Saints of Wales before losing to Macedonia’s Struga in the third qualifying round. Progres Niederkorn, Differdange and F91 Dudelange both went out of the Conference League at the second qualifying round stage.
Spora were the first Luxembourg representative in Europe, but they found, like all teams from the Grand Duchy in those days, the opposition was far too strong. Spora were beaten in a play-off against Borussia Dortmund in 1956-57 by 7-0 and shortly afterwards, Stade Dudelange were thrashed 14-1 on aggregate by Red Star Belgrade. In the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup, US Luxembourg suffered a 17-0 defeat at the hands of Köln and Leeds United inflicted upon Spora a 16-0 humbling. Likewise, the Cup-Winners’ Cup also highlighted the gulf between Luxembourg’s clubs and the rest of Europe; as well as the Chelsea game in 1971, Union were beaten 10-0 by TSV 1860 Munich. Such results are a thing of the past today.
Unsurprisingly, crowds are low in the Luxembourg National Division. The average in 2023-24 is currently 442, with Differdange and Jeunesse Esch enjoying crowds of 900 and 840 respectively. Whether the national team’s recent success can drive up greater interest in the local game remains to be seen, but at least Luxembourg have started to make an impact on the game.
GAME OF THE PEOPLE 