Life and death of Excelsior

I started this text in 2007. I was far, at the time, to suspect that I was writing about a future dead football club... My passion for football has long been wiped, I don’t never finish it.
But the events of late 2009 and the visit, late last year, of my football friend of the time convinced me to finally complete it. I thank Mickaël for his help in writing this paper and for his pictures.

img > Canonnier Stadion

img > Josh Josh | Webmaster
En français
Posted on October 26, 2011

Difficult beginnings

The beginnings of football in Mouscron were represented by an obscure FC Mouscron, founded in 1901. This club competed in the Division 2 championship (in the West Flanders Group) during the seasons 1904-1905 (3rd of 4), 1905-1906 (2nd of 3), 1906-1907 (5th of 6) and 1907-1908 (7th of 7). After, the club seems to have stopped its activities and the First World War has probably definitively buried FC Mouscron. It will be necessary to wait until 1922 to find the certain existence of a football club in Mouscron : it is the Association Royale Athlétique Mouscron (number 224), then in 1925 with the Royal Stade Mouscron (number 508). These two clubs will never grow higher than Division 3.

img > Royal Excelsior Mouscron The Royal Excelsior Mouscron was created out of a merger in 1964 between the Association Royale Athlétique Mouscron and the Royal Stade Mouscron, and this merger was to provide the city with an ambitious club capable of playing at the highest level. Alas, the results don't follow and the Excelsior does little better than its predecessors. Anonymous Division 3 club, he fell to 1st Provincial in the 1970's. His only outstanding feat was an eighth of final of the Belgian Cup in 1964.
But in 1990, the providential man finally arrives at the Stade du Canonnier : Walter Elleegeert is replaced during the season by André Van Maldeghem. The latter had a certain prestige (notably trainer in Kortrijk and Waregem in D1) and accepted the challenge launched by the then president, François Sénéchal. To raise the Excelsior in Division 2 at first, and then, to maintain it there. The club also wanted to work in the long term by keeping his coach as long as possible. The bet seemed unlikely but the miracle took place.

The beginnings in the second level were nevertheless laborious but little by little, the Reds & Whites find their marks and maintained without problem. From year to year, the Excelsior becomes a safe bet in the second national. The club even paid the luxury of eliminating the great Standard Liège managed by Robert Waseige in the Belgian Cup, before falling with the honors against KV Mechelen.
In 1994, the number 224 finished - totally unexpectedly - second overall and best attack all national divisions combined (92 goals). With this ranking, the club qualifies for the first time for the final round. During this mini-tournament, Mouscron continues its momentum and is at the gates of the D1. Remains a match to play against the Beerschot, already eliminated. Eight thousand spectators (for a stadium of 7,000 places...) in a trance are waiting for the final whistle.
Olivier Baudry opens the scoring and triggers a real madness in the stands. The Excelsior is about to reach Division 1. Alas, seven minutes from the end, the Beerschotman Yaron Drori crucified the keeper Marc Bourgeois at close range : 1-1, final score. A dead silence reigns in the spans of the stadium, the players are shot down.
The Excelsior will not go that year to nirvana. Eendracht Aalst takes the place of Mouscron in D1.

img > Filip Verbeke & Georges Leekens

President Filip Verbeke & coach Georges Leekens

img > Royal Mouscron-Péruwelz It was said at the time that, ultimately, this failure would only be beneficial for the club. Indeed, it was absolutely not ready to access the D1, both sporting, infrastructure and organizational aspects. Nevertheless, the enthusiasm generated by this final round will give good ideas to some...
During the 1994-1995 season, Jean-Pierre Detremmerie, already mayor of Mouscron and MP, became more and more essential in the life of the club. Before, he was content to be president of the youth school and then honorary president. He ousted Sénéchal and placed one of his men at the head of the club, Filip VerbekeNote1, businessman from East Flanders, having, among other things, taken over a textile factory in Roubaix, France.
That same season saw the Excelsior club finish once again in the places of honor but totally misses its final round. André Van Maldeghem arrived at the end of the cycle, his authority was no longer effective on the group. The assistant coach, Daniel Besengez, is acting during this mini-tournament but fails. Harelbeke's neighbors are more regular and access the national elite. Caramba, still missed !

img > Royal Excelsior Mouscron

The stranglehold of the city of Mouscron on the Excelsior, represented by the president-mayor Detremmerie

Final ranking of the Final round 1994
1. Eendracht Aalst 6 4 2 0 12-6 14
2. Excelsior Mouscron 6 3 3 0 7-3 12
3. Sporting Lokeren 6 1 1 4 6-10 4
4. Beerschot VAC 6 0 2 4 4-10 2
Final ranking of the Final round 1995
1. Racing Harelbeke 6 4 1 1 12-9 13
2. Racing Genk 6 3 3 0 10-4 12
3. Excelsior Mouscron 6 1 2 3 8-10 5
4. Beerschot VAC 6 0 2 4 4-11 2
Final ranking of the Final round 1996
1. Excelsior Mouscron 6 4 1 1 14-7 13
2. Beerschot VAC 6 3 0 3 10-13 9
3. KV Oostende 6 2 1 3 13-10 7
4. KV Kortrijk 6 2 0 4 6-13 6

Division 1

The club matured further during the 1995-1996 season with the arrival of Georges Leekens. The latter remained on a bitter experience at Sporting Charleroi and wanted to rebuild a moral health in a simple but ambitious club. The Reds & Whites will be led by an iron fist in a velvet glove and the results arrive immediately. Less show than before but a flawless organization.
And, finally, the consecration : the Royal Excelsior accedes to the Belgian elite for the first time, triumphing, always in the final round, with the Beerschot, Ostend and Kortrijk, three former members of D1.

Below, a report from local TV NoTélé concerning the final tour 1996 (in French).

Final round 1996, part 1
Video found on Youtube

Final round 1996, part 2
Video found on Youtube

Its first season in Division 1 creates a real surge of sympathy around this small club from nowhere. The Reds & Whites have even almost finished champion at the end of the season. But the Belgian Federation has lured Georges Leekens - who will qualify, against all odds, Belgium for the 1998 World Cup.
Following this unfortunate episode, Verbeke "resigns" and is replaced at short notice by Detremmerie.
No matter the final result (3rd place, with a qualification for the UEFA Cup), the Excelsior could become a real propaganda machine for the local power.
Bread and games.

In seven years, the Excelsior will have a budget of one billion Belgian francs, play the Champions League and will have a stadium of 15,000 places.

Jean-Pierre Detremmerie in 1997

To retain the public and sponsors, the club must keep its sporting level. For this, the club hires Hugo Broos (double champion of Belgium with Club Brugge, just that...) and inaugurates a policy of high salaries to attract the best players in the kingdom. But Mouscron is a small club without a solid financial base, or powerful or stable financial partners, and with a rather limited pool of supporters. And that's where the problem lies.
The club will have as main sponsor successively :

  • Monument Hainaut (renovation and restoration of buildings),
  • Cuisines Hans Verkerk (Dutch company that will go bankrupt during its sponsorship for Mouscron),
  • ToffNote2 Furniture (local furniture store located in Dottignies),
  • De Post,
  • Toff returns on the jerseys.
Only De Post was a truly lucrative sponsor.

img > Royal Excelsior Mouscron

The stadium is modernized and enlarged in three years : the tribune built in 1991 is extended over the entire length of the pitch, the bleachers on the railway side are transformed into a covered terrace for the Kop and the old stand of 1934 is demolished and gives way to a new construction that can accommodate 4,000 people. The total capacity goes up to 10,830 places. The stadium is modern and relatively comfortable (except for away fans !).
But the Canonnier Stadium is trapped in a neighborhood of villas and can't be enlarged. Yet until the 80's, the stadium was located in the middle of countryside. But Mouscron likes to cover all its territory with residential buildings (or industrial zones).

img > Jean-Pierre Detremmerie

Jean-Pierre Detremmerie

But why worry ? Detremmerie, president-bourgmestre-deputy then has all the powers. He doesn't hesitate to appoint the alderman of finance (the socialist Jacques Fervaille) to the post of treasurer of the club, which will facilitate a lot of things. Similarly, dozens of communal employees will now be exclusively attached to the club, the gas bills, water and electricity will be paid by the City, players will be housed in social housing of the City... The list of club abuses is long.
To summarize, it is the taxes paid by the inhabitants of Mouscron that allow the club to live largely beyond its means. It isn't useless to recall the catastrophic budgetary situation of the City (put under guardianship of the CRACNote3 twice, all taxes to the maximum to try to fill the deficit, seizure of the IEGNote4 in the communal management, waste of the communal heritage, etc.)...


The end of Hugo Broos era

img > Royal Excelsior Mouscron After a stay of five years in Mouscron, Hugo Broos joins Sporting Anderlecht. His sporting record cannot be more positive, including a final of the Belgian Cup, a new qualification for the UEFA Cup and a regular presence in the top 6 of the D1. The Excelsior is, at that time, considered a safe bet for the D1 and the matches in the Cannoneer are never synonymous with pleasure.
But these sports successes will leave an indelible mark in the finances of the clubs. The number 224 is obliged, year after year, to sell his most beautiful jewels in order to keep his head out of the water.

It’s at this moment that the Belgian Federation introduces the licensing system : each club wishing to play in Division 1 must provide proof of being financially and legally in good standing (legal status, financial arrangement, payment of wages, social welfare, etc.) and to have infrastructures that meet a series of relatively strict criteria (minimum capacity, number of seats, lighting, security, professional medical office, car parks, access, etc.).
We see appear from then the first problems. The very lucrative sponsorship deal with The Post isn't renewed and the communal political opposition (MR-Ecolo, headed by Liberal Philippe Bracaval) begins to disclose the unclear relations between the club and the City, to the great displeasure of the majority PSC/CDH-PS. The opposition is immediately demonized to want to prevent the club from fiddling.

img > Canonnier Stadion

The Canonnier Stadium during a match against Standard Liège in 2007

Another sign that does not deceive the instability of the club : while the Excelsior didn't have the habit of changing coach regularly, since the departure of Broos have succeeded between 2002 and 2009 no less than eleven coaches : Lorenzo Staelens, Georges Leekens (a second time), Philippe Saint-Jean, Geert Broeckaert, Gil Vandenbrouck, Paul Put, Ariel Jacobs, Marc Brys, Enzo Scifo, Miroslav Ðukic and Hans Galje, changes of sports directors followed the same path. Stability is only a distant memory...


The "withdrawal" of Detremmerie

All of a sudden, a colossal debt appears (several million €), the Walloon region sum the City to disengage the communal workers working for the club, which has more and more difficulties to obtain the license. The intercommunal IEG then proposes to turn the debt into sponsorship (which must have been very pleasing to all societies in difficulties, with a magic wand, we erase the debts).
Feeling the wind turn, the mayor begins (finally!) to prepare his succession. After a sham vote, a triumvirate is set up and is composed of Maitre Edward Van Daele (former club lawyer), Francis D'Haese (a sidekick of Detremmerie and former director of the City's stewards) and Roland Louf (sports director having worked in Mons and La Louvière, with more than mixed results).
The change in continuity seemed appropriate but Van Daele does not see the future of the club under this eye. He takes the risk of rowing against the current by proposing to gather around the club all the forces of the region to save the club from bankruptcy. At the same time, Detremmerie, although officially off the club, also had a plan to "help" the Excelsior.
Van Daele being quickly put on the side for his attempted coup, the club is found now without an official commander. The opportunity will be too good for the mayor to return to the charge and present his recovery plan with his contacts very unsavory...

img > Canonnier Stadion

The new stand (1999), located Rue du Stade


The Kazakh adventure, the mirage and the fall

In 2006, the big boss of Mouscron then proposes to give the club management to a group of Kazakh investors, led by the president of the national federation of Kazakhstan. The filming of the movie 'Borat' is now underway and the whole City believes in a joke of the leader of the socio-Christian. Especially since no one is fooled : Kazakh money smells bad and an end of non-receipt is politely addressed to Detremmerie.
The club sails then in troubled waters before appearing in April 2007, as a messiah, Philippe Dufermont.
The man has a pretty reputation : starting from scratch, he founded the holding Dufermont and has business in Spain and China. The man is active in real estate and selling bathrooms. Born in Mouscron, honest and rich : the ideal mix. Being very little present in Mouscron and knowing nothing about football, he will delegate to his right arm, Benoit Roul, all powers. Moving from the status of president to patron, he will invest 9 million € in the club, in pure loss...
Via his real estate company, he bought the Sarma building in the city in the city center to develop luxury apartments. This chancre rotted for almost 20 years ... Unfortunately, the operation turns out to be a rude trick between the club and the City. While the sale involves an amount of € 660,000, the money will finally end up in the coffers of the Excelsior. The City is once again depleted by the football club.
From then on, the days of the club are counted : Detremmerie is pushed out of the communal administration, Dufermont places his brother Jean-Pierre in the presidency of the club and the inevitable arrives...

On October 30, 2009, against the Standard Liege, the large crowd gathered at the Canonnier Stadium for what will be for the ultimate match. The game is weak and ends with a sad 0-0. But in the stadium's stands, the sad reality is no longer in doubt. Like a funeral oration, the Kop stays more than an hour to sing while the rest of the stadium is empty and the floodlights have gone out. It was the last session. A last 'You Never Walk Alone' sounds and...
In truth, other matches will still take place but the encephalogram is flat. Therapeutic relentlessness has been futile. The last opponents will be Racing Genk, Sporting Lokeren, SV Roeselare and KV Mechelen.
Supporters of the latter club will also show their support to the Excelsior's fans who had made the trip to the Mechelen stadium. It must be said that the prestigious Malinois Club had experienced the same situation as the Excelsior. But the KaVé has managed to cope...
During a SV Roeselare - Excelsior of sinister memory, it is the young of the Excelsior that will play on the lawn. Pro players preferred not to take any risk and declined the invitation (that of the insurance in case of injury, salary, etc.). We cannot hold them against them, of course. The match ended with a victory for Excel. A very last sporting victory.
On December 28, 2009, the Extraordinary General Assembly of the club voted voluntary liquidation, the club forfeits the last three championship matches and the employees are fired. All the results of the club are canceled for the 2009-2010 season by the Belgian Federation. The Excelsior finished last with 0 points and the club was struck off June 2010. An agreement with the federation still allows the youth teams to finish the season.
But the number 224 is no more.

The Kop, after the match against Standard in 2009
Video found on Youtube

Same, but from a different angle
Also visible on Youtube


What do I think of it

img > Royal Racing Club Péruwelz Difficult to take sides for me.
Indeed, during the period 1991-1998, I was what we can call a real fan.
Present at all matches (both in the league and the Belgian Cup, not to mention the friendly) and making most trips (Aalst, Anderlecht, Beerschot, Beveren, Charleroi, Kortrijk, Genk, Harelbeke, Ingelmunster, La Louviere, Lierse, Ostend, RWDM, Standard, Tongeren, Villeneuve-d'Ascq and I forget), I was proud to wear the colors of my club and my city. Finally, Belgium could locate Mouscron on a map.
When Detremmerie took power, and even if the club went from victory to victory, I had already left the club. Being fundamentally against the City's policy, I could no longer tell the difference between the City and the Excelsior. I spent at the time to be a bad citizen... Football in general, I also turned away. Only the national team still made me vibrate a little. But given its results, as much to say that football enthusiasm had become a rare commodity...
My scarf remained for many years in the back of the closet so much that I had forgotten its existence. I even wanted to see the Excelsior perform the tumble in D2. But from there to imagine his disappearance...

Yet in October 2009, I did what I thought was a thing of the past : I attended this famous match against Standard. A decade of absence to the Canonnier Stadium but immediately all my memories resurface. Nostalgia when you hold us...
Since the creation of RMP-thing, I attended a few matches. But nothing more. I go there as some go to Ikea on Sunday. To kill time.


Failed rebirth

img > Royal Mouscron-Péruwelz If the club is only old history, the infrastructures still exist.
A modern stadium and a renowned training center, the City could not leave its heritage abandoned. A solution was quickly found : moving the club of Péruwelz (also struggling) in Mouscron, change of Royal Racing Club Péruwelzi to Royal Mouscron-Péruwelz and a club plays back on the field of the Canonnier Stadium.
But all this is artificial. We try to erase the memories of the past but nothing helps. The 'Excelsior' coat of arms still adorns the walls of the stadium, the players are decked out in magnificent blue and red jerseys meaningless, the previously loyal and friendly public is no longer the same.

The ghosts of the Mpenza brothers, Broeckaert, De Vreese, Baudry, Besengez, Bourgeois, Dauwe, De Koeyer, Delbeeke, Dugardein, Dupont, Ewane, Gaziano, Huyghelier, Jestrović, Kasperek, Lemoine, Lenie, Martić, Mestdagh, Moock, Pieroni, Pierre, Raes, Thibaut, Van Durme, Vidovic, Vanderhaeghe, Vandooren, Verbeeck, Verschelde, Verspaille and VlcekNote5 will long haunt the empty spans of what was an impregnable place feared by the tenors of Belgian football...


2022 : history serves the same dish up again

img > Royal Excel Mouscron Royal Mouscron-Péruwelz manages, over the years, to make a name for itself and to climb into the First Division. But club officials have failed to learn the lessons of the past.
The city of Mouscron has never been big enough to house a club of the highest level and to continue to artificially maintain the registration number 216, the club will continue to pass through different hands : Israeli or Thai investors will land at the Canonnier, or even become the property of a French club, namely LOSC Lille.
In 2016, perhaps in an attempt to seduce former supporters of number 224, the club was renamed Royal Excel Mouscron (the name Royal Excelsior Mouscron could not have been resumed until 10 years after the bankruptcy, namely in 2019) and a new logo is created, a logo incorporating the former Excelsior's codes. Alas, the Excel can only be considered as a pale ersatz of the Excelsior.

Faced with increasingly wobbly finances, bankruptcy was declared on May 31, 2022. In almost total indifference.
It must be said that Mouscron has already experienced this situation and that in any case, this new club dissolution had become obvious for some time.. After number 224, 216 is buried.

Since then, the old Canonnier stadium has no longer been used.
From “the place to be” at the end of the 90's, the stadium fell into oblivion. The stadium could have found a usefulness by temporarily hosting the KMSK Deinze (East Flanders club) whose facilities will undergo work, but Belgium obliges, a stupid regulation prevented this temporary move : the Canonnier and the city of Deinze are too far away of 5 small kilometers. Yes, this is not a joke.

In the meantime, the sacrificial lambs are the people of Péruwelz. We move their club, which until then lived a peaceful existence, we promise them that the name "Péruwelz" will be kept and in the end, we erase the contribution of the small club and everything ends up sinking.
Meanwhile, a new club is founded in Péruwelz : the Péruwelz Football Club, founded in 2010 with the number 9540.


We raise the dead !

img > Stade Mouscronnois No longer having a club in Division 1 is one thing, no longer having a club at all is another. To fill the void left by the disappearance of Excelsior, Excel, ARA and the Stade, a futsal club will join forces with Futurosport, the Excelsior training center which has been able to remain active despite the various bankruptcies.
This new club, with registration number 9072, will be named after... "Stade Mouscronnois Squadra". Obviously, the will is to put an end to the long Excelsior episode and it is perhaps not so badly.
Beginning in the 3rd Provincial (the penultimate level of Belgian football), the club includes a men's section, a women's section, increased collaboration with Squadra Mouscron (futsal club playing in Division 1) and an investment company (SRL Football Flanders Hainaut Invest), all under the umbrella of the Moeskroen Kampioen Foundation. But for the moment, there is no question of treading the lawn of the Canonnier : the neophyte club plays on a Futurosport ground, far from Mouscron.
To be seen if the new club will avoid the temptation to want to climb all the ladders or, on the contrary, will be content to live within its means.


Some pictures...

To end in beauty this evocation of the Excelsior, some views on the stadium of the Canonnier Stadium (former stadium of... Stade Mouscronnois).
All the photos were made by Mickaël (both those of 1998 and 2007).

Pictures

Canonnier Stadium

1998 - The former main entrance, dating from Division 3.
© Mickaël Lamoot

Canonnier Stadium

Canonnier Stadium

1998 - The training ground and the old main stand.
© Mickaël Lamoot

Canonnier Stadium

Canonnier Stadium

1998 - The standing tribune of 1947 (left) and the stand of 1932.
© Mickaël Lamoot

Canonnier Stadium

Canonnier Stadium

1998 - The "La Pastorale" refreshment bar, as well as the visitor's cage.
© Mickaël Lamoot

Canonnier Stadium

Canonnier Stadium

1998 - The east main stand, just after the installation of the seats instead of the Kop.
© Mickaël Lamoot

Canonnier Stadium

Canonnier Stadium

1998 - The rudimentary stand of the Kop.
© Mickaël Lamoot

Canonnier Stadium

Canonnier Stadium

1998 - The same stand, seen from the other side of the field.
© Mickaël Lamoot

Canonnier Stadium

Canonnier Stadium

1998 - The old-fashioned charm of the old stand.
© Mickaël Lamoot

Canonnier Stadium

Canonnier Stadium

1999 – Beginning of the demolition of the old gallery dating from 1932.
 

Canonnier Stadium

Canonnier Stadium

1999 - Construction of the new West stand.
 

Canonnier Stadium

Canonnier Stadium

2007 - The main entrance, Rue du Stade.
© Mickaël Lamoot

Canonnier Stadium

Canonnier Stadium

2007 - The West stand dating from 1999.
© Mickaël Lamoot

Canonnier Stadium

Canonnier Stadium

2007 - The East stand, built in 1991 and enlarged in 1996.
© Mickaël Lamoot

Canonnier Stadium

Canonnier Stadium

2007 - The new stand, seen from inside the stadium.
© Mickaël Lamoot

Canonnier Stadium

Canonnier Stadium

2007 - The Spion Kop, built in 1998.
© Mickaël Lamoot

Canonnier Stadium

Canonnier Stadium

2007 - The former Spion Kop, in the East stand.
© Mickaël Lamoot

Canonnier Stadium

Canonnier Stadium

2007 - The cage reserved for visitors, as well as the scoreboard.
© Mickaël Lamoot



Notes

  1. Strangely enough, Filip Verbeke's legal wrangling has never been publicized by the club, although the latter has remained president for several years. He was finally sentenced by the Criminal Court of Lille to three years in prison suspended and 150,000 € fine for fraudulent bankruptcy and abuse of corporate property. He was on the run in Germany.
    Two press articles presenting Verbeke in a less favorable light than at Excelsior : here and here (both in French).
  2. The boss of the furniture Toff seems to get along so well with the City that it was able to build a branch without a building permit (rumor of the time).
  3. Regional Center of Assistance to the communes, mission and organization on the website of the Walloon Region.
  4. Intercommunal Study and Management, grouping Mouscron, Comines-Warneton and Estaimpuis, cf. the website. This intermunicipal company owns, among other things, part of the stadium and Futurosport, the club's training center. Since the end of the Excel, the stadium no longer appears on the website.
  5. I would be remiss not to also put in the pantheon of local football Ban, Bassegio, Casto, Claeys, Čustović, De Vleeschauwer, Feys, Grégoire, Seynhaeve, Tanghe, Teklak, Vandendrieesche, Vidovic, Volders or the Żewłakow brothers.

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