Belgium

FOOTBALL IN BELGIUM “The Red Devils” earned their nickname in 1906 after an away match against Holland. Playing for the first time in red, they were 2-1 down with 15 minutes left, but scored twice to win 3-2. Arguably Belgium’s most famous footballing moment came with victory in the 1920 Olympics although coming a close second is the 5-1 drubbing of the then world champions Brazil in 1963, by the then amateur Belgians. Professional football did not arrive in Belgium until 1967. The suspension and subsequent banning in 1930 of Belgium’smost “famous” player, Raymond Braine of Beerschot, for opening a pub is our particular highlight! THE STATE OF THE ECONOMY Belgium is an open economy and is not only goods and services that cross the borders to and fro. It is also footballers. The Bosman ruling has seen the majority of the best Belgian players move abroad, primarily to Germany, the Netherlands and France. This must be globalisation atwork. However, the national side has a core of domestic players, mainly drawn from Anderlecht (Glen de Boeck, Walter Baseggio, Yves Vanderhaeghe and Marc Hendrikx) and Club Brugge (Gert Verheyen, Timmy Simons). STATE OF THE NATION State of the national side, we mean. A current world ranking of 21 sees them rated at their highest since 1995. The bookmakers have them at odds of 80-1 but the harsh heat and humidity of the Korean and Japanese summers may prove a leveller and these odds could seem very generous by the end of June. Gilles “Bob” De Bilde, Marc “Mr.1,000 Volts” Wilmots, Danny “the Prof.” Boffin, and Emile “TripleWord Score” Mpenza form the backbone of a talented squad. (For the interested, the first two nicknames were coined, respectively, by fans of Sheffield Wednesday (still a solvent football club when we wrote this) and Schalke 04. The last two are ours.) Whether they can emulate the great 1986 Belgian side containing the likes of Jean-Marie Pfaff, strikers Jan Ceulemans and Nico Claesen and midfielders Enzo Scifo and Franky Van der Elst is debatable. THE 2002 WORLD CUP Belgium looked set to qualify for Japan, as of right, until a loss to Croatia in their final Group 6 game saw them face a tough play-off against a fancied Czech Republic. Victorieshomeand away sawthe Belgians through to their 6th consecutive World Cup finals, the only team to have achieved this without having hosted or won the event. The original “Red Devils” will be confident of progressing to the next stage, through a relatively weak Group H. However, they will need to improve on the three bland score drawsachieved at France ’98, that saw them go out at the group phase. Their previous best result was a creditable fourth in 1986. Previous Appearances: 10 1930, 1934, 1938, 1954, 1970, 1982, 1986, 1990, 1994, 1998 Honours Semifinalists: 1986 (4th)