Extreme Football Tourism: BELGIUM: R Wavre Sports (1923-1988) / Racing Jet Wavre (1988-2018) / Wavre Sports FC (2018-2020) / R Wavre Limal (2021-2022)

Stade Justin Peeters, Waver = Wavre (formerly R Wavre Sports / Racing Jet Wavre / Wavre Sports FC / R Wavre Limal)

Belgium, province: Walloon Brabant

2 IV 2010 / Racing Jet Wavre - RFC Sérésien 3-1 / National League 4D (= BE level 4)

30 III 2022 / R Wavre Limal - RCS Brainois B 2-2 / Brabant, ACFF Provincial League 2B (= BE level 7)

Timeline

1920 / Foundation of Wavre Sports, probably the first football club to be formed in the town of Wavre in Walloon Brabant.
1923 / Although sources are conflicting, it seems Wavre Sports settled down at the ground later renamed Stade Justin Peeters (Justin Peeters being a socialist politician and mayor of Wavre between 1953 and 1976) in 1923.
1926 / As the matricule system is introduced by Belgium's Football Association, Wavre Sports acquires matricule 79.
1944 / After a relatively anonymous first quarter of a century of existence, Wavre Sports manages a promotion to Brabant's Provincial League 1 for the first time. The club holds out at that level for three years, eventually dropping back into Provincial League 2 in 1947.
1960 / Wavre Sports becomes a Société Royale, changing its name to become Royal Wavre Sports.
1961 / Clinching the title in Provincial League 2A, Wavre Sports accedes to Provincial League 1 after an absence at that level of 14 years.
1962 / Finishing an impressive second in P1, Wavre Sports wins a second promotion in a row after winning the play-offs. For the first time in its history, the club accedes to the national divisions.
1964 / Winning the title in National Division 4D, Wavre Sports climbs to third tier of Belgium's league pyramid - the club's third promotion in four seasons. The club holds its own in National Division 3 for three seasons - an eighth position in National Division 3B in 1966 constituting the best result in club history.
1968 / After a comet-like rise through the leagues, Wavre Sports suffers back-to-back relegations, tumbling back into Brabant's Provincial League 1 after a spell of six years of national league football.
1969 / Winning the promotion play-offs, Wavre Sports finds its way back to National Division 4 at the first opportunity, heralding a second spell of national league football.
1971 / Finishing in first place in National Division 4B, the club accedes to D3 for a second time. In the following years, the club alternates spells in D3 (1971-72, 1967-78) and D4 (1972-76, 1978-79).
1979 / After its second spell in the national divisions, which lasted ten seasons (1969-79), Wavre Sports drops back into Brabant's provincial league system, never managing a return subsequently. In the 1980s, the club alternates spells in P1 (1979-80, 1981-85, 1986-88) and P2.
1988 / Wavre Sports concludes a merger with R Union Limaloise, forming R Wavre Limal - and moving away to Limal's Stade Martineau and its training pitches at Rue Charles Jaumotte. This merger coincides with the arrival in Wavre of another club, Racing Jet de Bruxelles (matricule 4549); this club had its origins in a 1970 merger between R Stade de Bruxelles (matricule 281) and Racing Club de Jette (matricule 4549). During the first 18 years of its existence, Racing Jet de Bruxelles played at Laeken's Annexe Heysel - eventually climbing up to National League 1, holding its own at that level for three seasons (1984-85, 1986-88) - until eventually tumbling back to National Division 2 in 1988. When Racing Jet Bruxelles was invited to settle down in Wavre by the local town council, the logical decision was taken to change the name to Racing Jet Wavre. Wavre's town council modernised the Stade Justin Peeters with a new grandstand, facing the much smaller old version.
1989 / In its first season after the move from Brussels to Wavre, Racing Jet Wavre finishes ninth in National Division 2 - with hindsight the best result the club would manage after moving into Stade Justin Peeters.
1992 / After four seasons in D2, Racing Jet Wavre drops into Division 3 - the club never managed a return to the second tier of Belgian football in subsequent years.
1993 / Although finishing in an anonymous yet safe eighth position in National Division 3A, Racing Jet Wavre, having run into financial trouble and administrative chaos, is punished with an obligatory relegation by Belgium's FA.
1994 / Finishing second in National Division 4B, Racing Jet Wavre wins the promotion play-offs, thus returning to D3 after an absence of just one season. In the following years, the club alternates spells in National Division 3 (1994-98, 2001-02) and National Division 4 (1998-2001, 2002-03).
2003 / After back-to-back relegations, Racing Jet Wavre tumbles out of the national league system for the first time.
2008 / Following five seasons in Brabant's Provincial League 1, Racing Jet Wavre clinches the title, thus managing a return to National Division 4.
2010 / Finishing in a relegation spot in National Division 4D, Racing Jet Wavre once more has to come to terms with a drop to the provincial league system.
2016 / After six seasons in Provincial League 1, Racing Jet Wavre manages a return to national league football after winning the promotion play-offs. The club is placed in ACFF Amateur Division 3, the newly formed fifth and lowest tier of Belgium's national league ladder.
2017 / Australian-Cameroonian businessman (and former football player) Cyrille Ndongo-Keller takes over Racing Jet Wavre, expressing the ambition to take the club all the way up to National Division 1 in 15 years.
2018 / In an attempt to revive the days of the old R Wavre Sports in the 1960s and 1970s, Racing Jet Wavre takes on the new name of Wavre Sports FC.
2020 / In 16th and last position in Amateur Division 3B in March 2020, when the 2019-20 season is cut short due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Wavre Sports FC receives notification from Wavre's town council that the club is evicted from Stade Justin Peeters from the new season onwards. Municipal authorities claim to have taken the decision due to the club being led unprofessionally, leading to heavy debts. Although the club makes an attempt at starting the 2020-21 season, the lack of a ground heralds its death-knell; no matches are played in the new season and Wavre Sports FC folds. The club's place at Stade Justin Peeters is taken by Provincial League 2 side Royal Wavre-Limal - none other than the merger club formed in 1988 between the old R Wavre Sports and R Union Limaloise. Forced by Wavre's authorities to abandon its Stade Martineau, destined to make way for housing, R Wavre-Limal avidly accepts the invitation to move into the municipal stadium in Wavre proper. For the 2020-21 season, the stadium proper remains unused, though, as first team football is played on one of the side-pitches (terrain 4).
2021 / Having remained unused for competitive football for one year, Stade Justin Peeters hosts the home matches of R Wavre-Limal's first team for the 2021-22 season.
2022 / After having been used by various football clubs for nearly a century, Stade Justin Peeters ceases to be a football stadium. While a new main pitch is being built for R Wavre-Limal at the ground's side-pitches (leading to the club's first team playing at Rue Charles Jaumotte for part of the 2022-23 season), works get underway at the stadium proper, which, upon completion, will be re-inaugurated as Belgium's national field hockey stadium.

Note: Below, a compilation of photos of three different visits: pictures 1, 5-10, 18, 23, 35 & 37 = match visit, April 2010 / pictures 2, 11-13 & 15-17 = non-matchday visit, December 2021 / pictures 3-4, 14, 19-22, 24-34, 36 & 38-42 = match visit, March 2022.