Leicester City and it's popularity in Scandinavia

[haraven]

Søren, one of the people referred to in this article, tipped me about it tonight. I met Søren myself a few years back "coincidentally" in a pub in Leicester and reacted when I heard Swedish on the neighbouring table. Since then we've kept in touch on email.

Link: Link: http://www.thisisleicestershire.co.uk/news/l-ve-y-u-City/article-2896382-detail/article.html

Artic

They löve yöu, City,

As the snow falls softly on a typical Saturday afternoon, trains rattle unnoticed through the Swedish town of Hallsberg's deserted central junction.

The streets are empty.

However, its inhabitants are not busy re-assembling flat-packed coffee tables, instead they're locked away in front of their televisions cheering on a football team based almost 1,000 miles away.

A cry of "come on, Leicester, come on, Leicester!" rings through the small suburban estates of Hallsberg.

There are about 9,000 people and no pubs in the blustery, snow-covered town.

The nearest Nordic ale-house stands 19 miles away, in Örebro, leaving its football loving fraternity little choice but to sit at home and watch the beautiful game from the comfort of their living rooms.

There is no Swedish league football during the winter, either – the weather makes sure of that. So between October and March the soccer-mad Swedes must look to the rest of Europe for their fix of football.

This has been their way of life since 1969 – when the first live English games were beamed over to Scandinavia, and as luck would have it one of the first teams to be broadcast were Leicester City.

Forty-one years ago Sören Filipsson, then a 14-year-old schoolboy, sat cross-legged in front of his mum and dad's black and white television, watching a league game between Cardiff City and a feisty, yet unlucky, Leicester side.

"We were all teenagers at the time and all the kids had their favourite teams, Arsenal, Man Utd, Liverpool, Chelsea, West Bromwich and Wolverhampton," explains Sören, now a 53-year-old railway inspector and still a dedicated Leicester fan.

"The third game to be shown on TV in 1969 was Leicester against Cardiff. Leicester played some very good football in their blue and white kit, and I remember that despite the good football, they lost. But we liked what we saw – and that's how it started."

Sören was smitten with City, and like many other football fans around Sweden, and indeed the rest of Scandinavia, he made the decision to become a true blue – a lifestyle choice which he and many others have honoured to this day.

He and a group of Swedish Leicester City supporters, including his 21-year-old son Mikael, pay hundreds of pounds to make the eight-hour trip to the East Midlands between five and ten times a season. "If we could afford to come over more we would," says Sören.

They watch the remaining fixtures on TV – unlike the UK they have a channel dedicated to Championship football (as well as two for the Premiership).

Last Wednesday Sören and his friend Per-Olov Ferm, 53, traveled almost 1,000 miles to sit in the East Stand of the Walkers Stadium to watch Leicester draw 2-2 with Sheffield United – while many local City supporters listened to game on the radio.

After the game, the pair went in to town, sampling real ale at the Criterion, the Shakespeare's Head and the Ale Wagon – carefully noting each name, measure and strength of beer in a small black pocket book.

"When your home town doesn't have a pub there's two things we look forward to when we come to Leicester," said Per.

"Our wives think it's good we have a hobby, and when they ask what we've been doing and how much we've had to drink we can take out our books and show them exactly."

After contacting the club last week, Sören and Per were also given a rare opportunity to steal a few minutes with Sven-Göran Eriksson at the Walkers Stadium before the press conference ahead of the Derby game.

It was Friday afternoon, and they waited pitch-side – snapping away with their compact cameras.

The gentle Swede emerged from the tunnel and sauntered over to his open-mouthed visiting countrymen, greeting them with a warm handshake.

Straight away they resembled old pals, and spoke in Swedish for most of the conversation, only breaking into English every now and then to explain the occasional moment of humour.

After about five minutes of excited chatter, Sven was told the media were waiting, and bid the pair farewell – they shook hands a second time and the Foxes manager turned to face the cameras.

Sören and Per mouth's remained agape.

"Wow," they said. "I'm glad we got photos, because no one is going to believe that."

The Scandinavian obsession with Leicester City spreads far and wide and includes equally dedicated fans in Norway, Denmark and Finland.

Between 1971 and 1989, Leicester City toured Sweden on 10 occasions, playing 39 times in various pre-season tournaments.

But it wasn't the first time Leicestershire footballers had played on Swedish soil – Leicester Fosse first toured the country in 1913.

Foxes legend Alan Birchenall, although not there in 1913, was part of the 1976 squad who traveled to Gothenburg for pre-season training.

He said: "I had two years where the squad traveled out to a training camp called Hinders Garden and it was absolutely fantastic – and we've had people from Scandinavia come over since then.

"Now Sven's here I imagine the support will probably quadruple, and I know football fans – they'll travel almost anywhere to support their team."

Former England, Roma, Fiorentina, Lazio, Benfica and Manchester City manager Sven was full of praise for his fellow countrymen's dedication to the club and is hoping to make a triumphant return to his home country with the club's first pre-season tour of Sweden in more than 20 years.

He said: "We are in talks at the minute about a tour of Sweden in July, but nothing is confirmed yet.

"It would include Gothenburg, Rosenburg and Zenit [st Petersburg].

"Building a fan base abroad is very important to a football club, and I admire the dedication of fans like Sören and Per who travel very long distances to watch Leicester play."

Sven hopes that the trip to Scandinavia will ignite even more interest in the Foxes, adding to the small number of supporters clubs already dotted around the Nordic states.

Blue Army Sweden was founded in 1999 and gets hundreds of hits on its website each month.

The Cunning Fox is another Norwegian-based website, run by Foxes fan Ivar Tisthammer, who has been to scores of home and away games.

Ivar, 49, who was at the Walkers Stadium on Saturday watching the 2-0 victory over bitter rivals Derby, recalls the moment he became a Leicester City supporter.

"It was late December 1972 and I just joined a local football club," he said.

"Everyone had a bag for training and I also wanted one with my favourite English club on.

"I remember Liverpool was on my mind at the time and that was the bag I wanted, but with so many Liverpool fans around it was hard to get one.

"The guy in the sports shop had the bags high up on the shelf. He started to look for Liverpool, but there were none left.

"He asked if I wanted Tottenham, Arsenal, West Ham, but I said 'no, I don't really fancy them'.

"Then I spotted this blue bag in the back and I asked if he could bring that down. I knew it was Leicester."

[themotivator]

sensible swedes.

[Jackirius]

Good read. 10 matches a year from sweden, that's a good effort.

[Lillehamring]

hopefully, they'll hold the tourney here:

[Lillehamring]

there's an earlier, similar story here, which passed me by:

http://www.thisisleicestershire.co.uk/news/Sven-boost-Foxes-keen-fans-Scandinavia/article-2734765-detail/article.html

[MPH]

I feel slightly honored having read that. Of all the teams to choose.

and yes indeed, i think having Sven as manager will make a huge impact on our support over there...

[MC Prussian]

Wonder what dirty jokes Sven was telling his mad countrymen...