Belgian football

I haven’t talked about Belgium football much in this blog, other than occasional glimpses at Belgian teams I play against with FC Irlande. I haven’t been to any league matches here, nor have I had the pleasure of watching the Belgian national side. After all, this is a team that narrowly lost to England in the first knockout round in the last minute of extra time at Italia ’90, and a team that was unlucky to lose to eventual winners Brazil at the same stage of the 2002 tournament.

Those days are long gone though. Marc Wilmot’s disallowed goal in the aforementioned loss to Brazil is all Belgium have had to cling in the seven years hence, and they’ll be clinging to it for at least three more years because qualifying for next year’s World Cup has long been impossible.

Drawn in a tough group with Spain, Turkey and Bosnia & Herzegovina, Belgium started out quite well. They had a creditable draw with Turkey and a very unlucky home loss to Spain. Sadly that was as good as it got. They lost home and away to B&H, were crushed 5-0 by Spain and then lost 2-1 away to Armenia. Yes, Armenia. That last calamity was rather summed up prior to the match when one of the senior players was dropped for showing up without his boots. And if that wasn't bad enough, the fans were so disgusted after the loss to Spain that only one fan showed up to watch.

The former Netherlands and Zenit St. Petersburg manager Dick Advocat had signed a contract to take over at the end of this campaign, but such was the desperation in the camp he had to be brought in just a few days ago to oversee the final two matches. If nothing else it’s a boost for Flemish pride. Advocat is Dutch and doesn’t speak French. And therein lies surely one of the most intractable problems for the BFA: What language does the Belgium manager speak with his team? There are almost certainly Wallons who don’t speak Flemish and vice-versa.

The Premiership has three top Belgian players in Fellani (Everton), Kompany (Manchester City) and Vermaelen (Arsenal). Liverpool and Arsenal fans will tell you that Belgium’s top side, Standard Liege, are no pushovers. Why then is the national side so mediocre?

The language is certainly one aspect, and the national FA is another. Advocat is the third manager this campaign, and he spent his first press conference berating his new employers about how they totally mismanaged his appointment. There is also a schism between the older players and the younger ones. The behaviour of some in the latter group has certainly raised a few eyebrows. After the defeat to Armenia the national team doctor, who had been with the side for 26 years, resigned, along with his entire staff, saying that the younger players were behaving like spoilt children, to such an extent that they were asking him to exaggerate injuries in order to get them excused from training. It’s like something out of Mike Bassett: England Manager.

Still, perhaps it’s all for the best. In Advocat’s first game in charge on Saturday the mighty Diablos Rouge beat Turkey 2-0 in Brussels’ Roi Boudouin stadium. It was a meaningless match, both teams having already been eliminated, but nevertheless it was a good performance from the hosts, with two nicely taken goals from Emile Mpenza. It also ensured that we weren’t treated to hours of car horn beeping in Scharbaek.