RC Strasbourg Alsace

Did You Know?

• The club's colours have always been blue and white, though the exact origin is unknown.
• The Stade de la Meinau hosted the 1938 World Cup and Euro 1984.
• Strasbourg has had 47 managers in the professional era, a record in French football only surpassed by Marseille.

History

Founded in 1906 as Fußballclub Neudorf, the club's early decades were shaped by the political dispute over Alsace between France and Germany. In 1909, under president Louis Becker, Neudorf joined the Verband Süddeutscher Fußball-Vereine, the third tier of German football, and achieved double promotion within two years, aided by a highly offensive style that included a 28–0 victory over Erstein. In 1914, the club acquired its first playing field, Hämmerlé's Garten, on which the Meinau Stadium was later built, but all activities were interrupted by the First World War.

In the following decade, Strasbourg won the Alsace regional championship in 1923, 1924 and 1927, and in the 1925–26 Coupe de France eliminated Red Star, then the record holder for national cups. The first wooden stands were built on the field during this period. The club turned professional in 1933 and won its first major trophy, the Coupe de France, in 1951. Its most important achievement came with the Division 1 championship in the 1978–79 season.

After financial liquidation in 2011, the club was demoted to the fifth tier, but won the CFA championship in 2012–13 and the Championnat National in 2015–16, returning to Ligue 1 after winning the 2016–17 Ligue 2 title.

Supporters and rivalries

Racing's support historically comes from the working-class Neudorf, Meinau and Polygone neighbourhoods of southern Strasbourg. As the only professional football club in Alsace, it draws fans from both the Bas-Rhin and Haut-Rhin départements and eastern Moselle, with most outside support limited to those with personal ties to Alsace. Supporter groups include the Ultra Boys 90, the Kop Ciel et Blanc and the Club central des supporters, with the most vocal fans located in the Kop at the Quart de Virage Nord-Ouest.

The Strasbourg public is described as faithful yet critical; former captain Corentin Martins called it demanding but fair. Racing's main rival is Metz, with the fixture known as the Derby de l'Est, though the cities are 150 kilometres apart. The rivalry reflects inter-regional tension between Alsace and Lorraine. The two clubs met in the quarter-finals of the 1995 UEFA Intertoto Cup, the first match between two French teams in a European competition, with Strasbourg winning 2–0.

A rivalry with Mulhouse persists at youth level. The club also has a supporter friendship with Karlsruher SC and plays regular summer friendlies.

Ownership and chairmanship

The club's history has been closely tied to local business and politics. In the 1930s, car manufacturer Emile Mathis, whose factory was opposite the Stade de la Meinau, supported the jump to professionalism, leading to a rivalry with Sochaux, backed by Peugeot. In 1980, André Bord, a former minister under Charles de Gaulle and Georges Pompidou, became chairman. Bord aimed to make Racing a major force but clashed with manager Gilbert Gress, culminating in September 1980 when Gress's departure provoked crowd anger and riots during a game against Nantes. This conflict is seen as a reason the club could not sustain top-level success after the 1979 title.

Players

RCS has no official hall of fame or all-time XI. Twenty-one players have been capped for France while at Strasbourg. The most notable is Oscar Heisserer, who played a record 18 times for France while at the club and was the first Alsatian and only RCS player to captain the national team. Dominique Dropsy, Léonard Specht and Gérard Hausser each earned more than 10 caps.

During the 1978–79 title season, on 7 October 1978, four RCS players (Dropsy, Roger Jouve, Francis Piasecki, Albert Gemmrich) played together for France in a Euro 1980 qualifier against Luxembourg, a record repeated a month later against Spain. Frank Leboeuf and Marc Keller were the last RCS players capped, in the 1995–96 season; Leboeuf and Youri Djorkaeff are former Strasbourg players who won the World Cup with France. Olivier Dacourt and Richard Dutruel played for France in 2004.

Morgan Schneiderlin, a France international, came through Strasbourg's youth system, making five first-team appearances before moving to Southampton. Seven of the ten players with the most appearances for Racing are from Alsace, including record-holder René Hauss. Since 1979, every Racing team to win a trophy or reach a final has featured a Breton as captain, manager or both; Jacky Duguépéroux captained the 1979 team and won the Coupe de la Ligue as manager in 1997 and 2005.