Extreme Football Tourism: BELGIUM: Sporting Tisselt

Saturday 20 August 2022

BELGIUM: Sporting Tisselt

Terreinen 'Leon Van den Bergh', Tisselt (Sporting Tisselt)

Belgium, province: Antwerp

20 VIII 2022 / Sporting Tisselt - KSV Bornem 4-1 / Antwerp, Provincial Cup - group stage, group 1

Timeline

1945 / Foundation of Football Club Tisselt. FC Tisselt joins the Belgian Football Association under matricule 4318. The club's ground, Den Disser, is situated near the Brussels-Scheldt Maritime Canal which bisects the village of Tisselt.
1959 / After back-to-back relegations from Provincial League 2 to Provincial League 4, FC Tisselt folds, ceasing all activities. In the 1959-60 season, Den Disser is used as a makeshift ground by P3 club Oranje Boven Breendonk due to the lack of a pitch in Breendonk itself. That year, OB Breendonk's chairman loses his life in the most tragic of fashions, accidentally slipping into the canal.
1966 / Foundation of a new football club in Leon Van den Bergh's café along the canal in Tisselt. The newly founded Racing Traplust Tisselt starts up life playing in Arbeidersvoetbal, a recreational league. Football is played at Cois van de Lat's pasture at Statiestraat (modern-day Baeckelmansstraat). Leon Van den Bergh, who apart from his café also runs a barber's shop, is elected Racing Trappers Tisselt's first chairman.
1971 / Having decided to switch from Arbeidersvoetbal to the regular Belgian Football Association, Racing Trappers Tisselt changes its name to become Sporting Tisselt, receiving membership matricule 7565. That summer, a new ground is inaugurated just north of the village, at Blaasveldstraat. For the first season, Sporting Tisselt only participates in the Belgian FA's leagues with several youth teams.
1972 / After one more year in Arbeidersvoetbal, Sporting Tisselt's first team finally makes the switch to Antwerp's Provincial League 4. In its first season, the club achieves promotion to Provincial League 3 by winning the play-off final against Achter Olen VV. In the following two decades, the club alternates spells in P3 and P4.
1988 / News comes through that Sporting Tisselt's ground will have to make way for a manufacturing location, more specifically for Mazda's European headquarters, in some years time. On the condition that Sporting Tisselt will build a new clubhouse with means from their own pocket, Willebroek's municipal council allows the club to settle at a new ground in the village's centre, on a pasture hemmed in between Blaasveldstraat and the canal. A design for a two-storey clubhouse is made by an architect from Willebroek, Walter Schaerlaken. Construction works, taken care of entirely by volunteers, commence in the spring of 1989.
1990 / Inauguration of the new clubhouse with a Christmas party. For the time being, though, the football club remains at its old ground.
1992 / After a long wait, finally two pitches are being put in place, one at each side of the clubhouse. Sporting Tisselt's moves to the new ground, which is inaugurated with a gala match between top flight teams KV Mechelen and K Boom FC, attended by some 2,000 spectators.
1996 / At its 25th anniversary, Sporting Tisselt achieves a first-ever promotion to Provincial League 2. Maintaining itself at that level until 2002, the club alternates spells in P3 and P2 in the following seasons.
2005 / The premises at Blaasveldstraat are renamed Terreinen Leon Van den Bergh in honour of the club's co-founder and first chairman.
2006 / François De Keersmaecker, member of Sporting Tisselt since 1980, is elected president of Belgium's Football Association. Remaining FA chairman for eleven years, De Keersmaecker later (2019) takes over the chairmanship at KRC Mechelen.
2015 / Sporting Tisselt's main pitch is equipped with a synthetic surface. The new pitch is inaugurated with a game against derby rivals Willebroekse SV on November 14th.
2017 / The club's honorary chairman Leon Van den Bergh passes away.
2022 / Sporting Tisselt manages a historic promotion to Provincial League 1, the highest level the club's first team ever achieved.
2023 / In a historic first season, Sporting Tisselt finishes in 4th place in P1, qualifying automatically for the interprovincial play-offs. Seeing off Sassport Boezinge and Fenixx Beighem Humbeek in the first two rounds, Tisselt is eventually eliminated in the semi-finals, away at KFC Eksel (1-0), thus missing out on promotion to the national divisions.

Note: The main source for the overview above is Leo Meysmans 1996 publication '25 jaar Sporting Tisselt'. Thanks to Leo Meysmans for his help in bringing together all relevant information.