The beautiful city of Lucerne (German: Luzern, French: Lucerne), was to be the next destination on my Swiss football groundhop. The German speaking city, the gateway to central Switzerland as they say, is pretty much smack bang in the middle of the country, with a population just over 81,000 people. Lucerne is the capital of the canton of Lucerne and a nexus of economics, transportation, culture, and media for this region.
The cities foundations are owed to the Benedictine Monastery of St. Leodegar founded in 750, later acquired by Murbach Abbey in Alsace in the middle of the 9th century, and by this time the area was called Luciaria, later to be known in Latin as Lucerna “lantern”, but why so no one exactly knows. In 1178 the city was independent and doing quite well, with a good economy and a rising population (3000). The Habsburgs, one of the most influential and distinguished royal houses of Europe, looked on and decided they would like a piece of the action. In response the residents of Lucerne along with the cantons of Uri, Schwyz and Unterwalden formed the Swiss Confederacy, on November 7, 1332 as a bulwark to an attack. Later the cities of Zürich, Zug and Bern joined the alliance, and thus ending the Austrian rulers influence in Switzerland. This resulted in Lucerne expanding even more free from the fear of an attack from outside forces. The city developed its infrastructure, raised taxes, and appointed its own local officials.
Owing to its location on the shores of Lake Lucerne and within sight of the famous mountains of Rigi, Pilatus and Stanserhorn in the Swiss Alps, Lucerne is truly a city with one heck of an amazing setting. Add to this its well-preserved medieval Altstadt (Old Town), its souvenir and watch shops, which are always full of Chinese visitors, the many high quality restaurants and top of the range bars, and beautiful waterfront promenades. the town is for sure a top destination for many travel groups and individuals on their journey through central Switzerland.
One of the city’s famous landmarks is the Chapel Bridge, a wooden bridge first erected in the 14th century, and hard to miss once you exit the train station, but be forewarned it is always bustling with tourists eager to take the best photo of the bridge. Not like anything I would do at all!! Other things to see and visit is the Lion Monument, or Löwendenkmal, found in a small park just off the Löwenplatz. The carving commemorates the hundreds of Swiss Guards who were massacred in 1792 during the French Revolution. The Swiss Museum of Transport is also well worth a visit, a large and comprehensive museum exhibiting all forms of transport, including locomotives, automobiles, ships, and aircraft. It is to be found beside the lake in the northern-eastern section of the city. but generally the best thing to do in Lucerne is just to walk around the lake shore and take in all the breathtaking views. Or you could also take a boat trip on the lake itself. I have done both options numerous times, and it is great for rebalancing the mind and spirit when the fresh mountain air runs through your nostrils and into your body energising you at the same time. Nothing like it. Love it. Love Lucerne.
Getting to the city is very easy, its central location means it is never too far from Switzerland’s other main cities, either on the motorway or by the extensive rail network in the country. Roughly 40 minutes by car from Basel, Zurich and Bern, and by rail about an hour from these same three cities, showing just how central Lucerne really is.
Pub watch
Anfield Pub
Address: Seehofstrasse 7, 6004 Luzern
First pub of the day for me was to be the Anfield Pub, not that far from the main bridge of the city,crossing the street and down an alley. The exterior of the pub is pretty bland. I actually walked past it looking for it, I figured owing to its name it might have some red colouring, but no a boring black and grey and easy to pass by.
Normally I am mad early for these trips but here I was at the bar and it was 1.30 midday and the whole bar was EMPTY!!!! Just me and the two friendly bar ladies. A Saturday, midday, in a pub with live football on the box, empty. Wow, that’s just crazy to me!!!!
Sat down and ordered an Eichhof beer, a local brew I have tried and liked before. Served quickly (no shit!), from the friendly bar lady, I enjoyed the good pint and took in all the Liverpool themed football memorabilia to which there was a lot, and the bar is quite big.
They have 21 flat screens on the go all the time, showing round the clock football action, darts and table football if you get too bored with all that, they also do food. It’s a good place I guess if you are looking to watch the football for sure.
The bar is fine but something must be up if you can’t entice customers in on a Saturday midday, considering all the people just off the main drag around the corner. It is also a bit cheesy as well, calling a bar after the home ground of an English team considering you are in one of the most scenic cities in Switzerland. Use your local history? No connection, just looks silly, in my opinion.
Anyway pint was good, nice and cold, and service was friendly and fast.
Shamrock Irish Pub
Address: Wagenbachgasse 3, 6004 Lucerne
Next pub was to be the Shamrock Irish Pub not too far from the Anfield, and the differences in size of crowd and atmosphere was very apparent. Two screens for the football here, not 21, with people eating food, others drinking and chatting, and a bit of a midday atmosphere building up. Takes an Irish pub to show you how it is done!!
Could have went for the usual suspects you can get in an Irish bar, Guinness, Smithwicks, or even a Kilkenny, but wanted to try something different so I went for an ale called a Braufrisch from the Feldschlösschen brewery in Rheinfelden. It looked lovely in the glass, and went down better. Very good beer.
Sat down, not at the small bar which was full but at a side table, and took in the scenery. Most people were looking at the football, but there were a few Americans across from me eating some grub. Have to say it looked pretty good, and they were happy for sure, fish and chips all round. Must get food in here the next time I am in Lucerne.
Small, cozy, Irish bar with the usual style one expects from these kind of places, bar man was ok, pint was good, all is well and onto the next bar….
Pickwick Pub Luzern
Address: Rathausquai 6, 6004 Luzern
Again another surprise from one bar to the next. Ventured into Mr Pickwick’s pub, a familiar pub name in Switzerland as this chain is dotted in a few of the nation’s biggest cities. They are British style pubs offering a lot of good beer on tap, with tasty food to boot and football on the TV in the settings of an authentic English pub with added atmosphere. Pub has a great location as it is right on the promenade near the the Chapel Bridge, and offering seating outside with a river view.
Good crowd building up, and many were kitted out in Dutch regalia, as apparently it was the national day of the Netherlands. Kind of interesting to see. But surely they should be all doping up rather than downing the pints?
Sat at bar, got a good seat in the front and ordered a “Fursty Ferret“, an interesting amber ale they had on show. Well poured and looked very appetising, dived in and sure enough it was lovely. Well worth the try, so, so tasty and one to look out for again in the future.
Now I have to say the service in the pub was atrocious, and not just to me. Paying for the pint, the bar man barely noted my service, didn’t even look at me, took my money and that was that. But it wasn’t just me, he did it to every customer I saw. And his wife, I take it it was his wife, wasn’t much better. They looked like they had their minds on other things, absolute zero interaction with customers, stiffness and slightly rude. Did something happen previously with the happy but noisey Dutch drinkers? Either Way, it’s nothing to me and every customer should be made to feel welcome in a bar. Are they even British? A fucking joke. If you can’t run a good jovial and happy pub you have no business in this game my friends. Go to the Irish bar and take notes on how it is done!!! Pathetic.
Found it quite funny to be honest. Amazed on how not run a pub. but still the pint was excellent. Drank up, and out the door I went.
Rathaus Brauerei Luzern
Address: Unter der Egg 2, 6004 Lucerne
Next pub wasn’t too far to find as it was right next to Mr. Pickwicks, Rathaus Brauerei also on the promenade near the Chapel Bridge.
Plenty of seating outside but I went right into the bar, got a seat at the highchair, and ordered one of the Brauerei’s own onsite brews, a Weissbier, not my favourite kind of drink but luckily enough this one was fresh and tasty straight from the tap and tasted so good. Excellent stuff.
The place was quite busy, and people were not only drinking but eating from the extensive menu on show. Food served looked good coming hot from the kitchen, but I was happy enough with the nourishment I was getting from the beer, going down well. Had a nice chat with a lovely gentleman who was telling me that there is actually a 70-meter long underground line through the Rathaus to the fermentation and storage cellar in nearby Eisengasse, piping the wort through. Cool. The copper brew pans are also on show behind the bar and restaurant and there are lots of cellars to be seen on your travels to the toilets!!
Nice friendly ambience, good efficient service, and a lot of history on show in the old Rathaus. Not surprised to learn the place is a listed building, with the date of the build going back to between 1602 and 1606 in the style of the Italian Renaissance.
Read after their sausage’s are to die for. Ah well, missed that, next time so……….
Restaurant/Bar St.Magdalena
Address: Eisengasse 5, 6004 Luzern
Had read that the bar called Hard Rock Down Town on Eisengasse street was meant to be a cool enough place to hang out, so had a look and it was closed. A bit annoying as it was the afternoon but anyway a kind man who noticed that I had tried to open the door suggested St.Magdalena as a good place for a drink, a bar two doors down.
Took his advice and ventured in. Small enough place, really just a tiny circular bar with a few tables and chairs and not much else. Sat at the bar and ordered a Eichhof from the very friendly bar man.
Got chatting to two Lucerne FC supporters, and enjoyed the casual atmosphere in the place, a good friendly vibe to the place, very chilled. Seemed it was made up of mostly locals, which is cool.
They do food here, but it’s on the small scale here, nothing too pretentious all ordinary ware.
One major issue is the hard core porn images they have in the toilet. I do wonder why a certain community always need to appeal to the lowest common denominator, it’s not cool or “edgy”, but crass and I can’t for the life of me see what’s the point of it. Anyway judge for yourself, see pic!
Oops Cafe Bar
Address: Zentralstrasse 10, 6000 Lucerne
Got a bit lost and tired so popped in here to charge the phone and recharge my own batteries. Nice enough place, kind of a cafe type bar, easy going relaxed atmosphere building, with a nice modern interior. Sat at bar and ordered a Feldschlossen beer, just a regular lager on the tap, served fast and with a nice smile by the friendly bar lady.
Not much else to say really, a place for a quick pint and that was that really.
Schützenhaus Allmend Luzern
Address: Horwerstrasse 93, 6005 Lucerne
Followed the music that was coming from afar, it was pumping from the entrance to this bar and restaurant. A DJ was playing some great dance tunes from the 90s and early 2000’s, banging them tunes out. Brilliant.
Food on the barbecue was also on offer, and good beer, Eichhof although in plastic cups, but heh beggars can’t be choosers, right?
The place is situated very close to the football ground, and is the perfect location for a few beers before I head into the arena.
The place is pretty big inside, they do a lot of food and have enough room to pack out a big crowd. I decided to stay outside and have my hot food and beer and enjoy the music from the DJ. Later I read they do good pizza’s, perhaps next time I am this side of the world.
Liked this bar/restaurant, it had a great atmosphere abulding, the bar man and DJ were very friendly and chatty, and the place was well set up with tarpaulin to shelter us from the rain. Definitely worth a visit if here for a football match, recommended.
FC Luzern
Arena/Stadium: Swissporarena
Location: Horwerstrasse 91, 6005 Luzern
Capacity: 17,000
Manager: Thomas Häberli
Founded: 1901
League: Swiss Super League
Honours:
Swiss Championships: 1 (1989)
Swiss Cup: 2 (Last 1992)
info@fcl.ch
Nickname: Die Leuchten (The Luminaries)
Founded in 1901, Fussball-Club Luzern (FCL) play in the Super League, the top tier of the country’s football league system, and have won the Swiss Championship once (1989) and the Swiss Cup twice (1960 and 1992).
The club colours are blue and white, derived from the City of Lucerne and Canton of Lucerne’s coats of arms.
The team is regarded as a bit of a yo-yo club, going up and down every year from relegation to promotion and back again, having done this a record 17 times!!
A club was to be born, called “FC Luzern” and was mentioned in an add in the local paper, the “Luzerner Tagblatt“ in 1897, in which a meeting was called in the Café Alpenclub for ideas on how to get the ball rolling and start up this team in the city. Owing to a slow initial response it was 4 years before that team came into existence in 1901, initiated by friends Adolf Coulin, Ernst Haag and Hans Walter, with its official launch in the Restaurant Seidenhof, near the train station. Two years later they joined the Swiss FA, starting off in the third highest division.
They did get to play in the top two divisions over time, and were constantly moving up and down through the leagues. At one stage they were not even the top team in Lucerne as city rival FC Kickers (who still play today at the 5th level of Swiss football!), often gave them a good hiding results wise. A merger between the two clubs went close, rejected by just one vote. Funny how things change in the end!
The club got a professional manager in 1921, Dionys Schönecker from Rapid Vienna of Austria, and his appointment was an instant success as Luzern faced Servette from Geneva in a title decider on 25 June 1922 in Basel. They were unlucky and bowed out 2-0.
A good few barren years followed that, as from the 30’s right upto the late 50’s nothing too exciting happened at the club, which spent a good portion of that time in the 2nd division with the usual promotion and relegation ups and downs to break up the occasional boredom for the fans.
Things changed in 1960 when the club finally got its hands on some silverware. Luzern won its first major national trophy by winning the Swiss Cup. The final was played against FC Grenchen and they won 1-0.
This success did not last long and the club were once again relegated in 1966. Promoted in 1967 was followed by relegation in 1969, promoted in 1970, relegated in 1972, promoted in 1974, once again relegated on in 1975 and finally promoted in 1979. Had their fans any hair left after all that I do wonder!
The clubs golden years were from 1980–1992. During this period they did the impossible and won the Swiss Championship. Friedel Rausch took over as a manager in 1985, and within a few years brought his very unfancied team to the top of the league, sensationally winning the Swiss championship in 1989. Luzern clinched the title race with a 1–0 home win against Servette in front of 24,000 fans. The deciding goal was scored by German striker Jürgen Mohr. They also won the Cup in 1992, beating FC Lugano 3–1 in the Swiss Cup final, under their German manager, but as so common with this club, of course they were also relegated in the same reason! What a club!!!
Afterwards the club did nothing of substance for many years and even skirted with the idea of going out of business as the debts racked up. In 2001, their centenary year, they entered administration and had to be rebranded and repackaged in order to continue, with much thanks to the effort of their supporters who helped financially when the call was put out for help.
Since then the club have had a good few appearance in the Swiss cup final, but always losing, and finished second in the league in 2011, but with the club nearly going bust in 2001 I guess the supporters are happy to have a few years at the top table in the league, as it certainly beats no football in the city of Lucerne, and with their new stadium, the Swissporarena, they can be happy in the knowledge that at least the clubs foundations are more solid these days, even if success is still far away for the moment at least.
The club play at home in the Swissporarena which was newly built in 2011, at the cost of EUR €60 million, on the site of the old stadium, Stadion Allmend. The stadium is used mostly for football matches of FC Lucerne, but the Swiss national team use it at least once in every qualifying campaign for the World Cup or Euros. Its capacity is of 16,800 spectators.
The club is fairly well followed with the 4th highest attendance record in the country (from 11,00 to 14,000), owing to the fact that it is centrally located and can hoover up fans from its surrounding areas. Their main rivals would be SC Kriens, who play in the 2nd division and are about 5 minutes drive away, stadium to stadium.
Well known players to have played for the club include two time CL winning manager Ottmar Hitzfeld, Swiss stars Alex Frei, Adrian Knup, Hakan Yakin and Kubilay Türkyılmaz, man mountain Ike Shorunmu, a very much underrated goalkeeper, from Nigeria, and Ricardo Costa a solid Defender from Portugal who could always be relied upon at the back.
To the game
FC Luzern 3 – 1 FC Thun
27.04.2019 • Swissporarena
• Roy Gelmi (OG. 3′)
• Pascal Schürpf (34′)
• Marvin Spielmann (Thun 50′)
• Blessing Chibuike Eleke (88′)
Attendance: 8’064
Getting to the Swissporarena is not so difficult and can be walked to from the city centre, as it is not much more than 2 kilometres south of Luzern’s city centre and main railway station.
The walk from the southern side of Luzern’s city centre takes about 20 minutes.
Alternatively, one can always take the commuter rail (S-Bahn) line S4 or S5 from the main railway station, and get off at stop Luzern Allmend / Messe, which is right at the arena.
Another option is bus 20 from the main railway station or the Bundesplatz in the direction of Technikumstrasse. Get off at stop Allmend/Messe. Buses go four times an hour, the ride takes about 8 minutes.
Tickets for FC Luzern matches can be bought online, at the Fanshop at the stadium, or at the Neue Luzerner Zeitung at the Pilatusstrasse 12 (about 200 metres from the main railway station). Don’t worry about not getting a ticket, as so often with Swiss football, Luzern will only sell out at the very odd high-profile match.
Ticket prices range from CHF 28.00 for the standing area, to CHF 33.00 for a seat in one of the corners, and CHF 100.00 for one at the main stand (if you are loaded!).
The ground itself is all modern and kind of funny looking, with golden looking stands formed all round, it’s kind of shit looking to be honest. Not the most attractive stadium I have ever seen for sure. Inside it looks a little better, all seats decked out in the club colours of blue.
Wasn’t long in settling down to my seat when Luzern went one nil up with an own goal headed in by Thun player Roy Gelmi after about 3 minutes on the clock. From a long throw in, he couldn’t avoid the ball connecting with his head as the penalty box was quite crowded at the time. Unlucky for him but a good start to the home team.
Thun had a goal correctly disallowed for offside, and then not long after Luzern get their second when Pascal Schürpf took a shot from outside the box that somehow went in. From such a distance and with not that much pace, the Thun goalkeeper could have done a little better in his effort to save it, I think!! But I should give him the benefit of been unsighted and it was bucketing down with rain. Good build up play from Eleke to the goal, to add.
Not long after the second half got underway Thun were right back in it with a well taken goal by Marvin Spielmann, rifling it into the net. Nice one, game on. Now at this stage a lot of the fans were further retreating back into the stands due to how bad the weather was. It was near torrential at this stage, making it hard to stay focused on the game, for us the supporters never mind what it was like for the players to kick the ball around the soggy pitch!!
After that not a whole lot happened to be fair with many of the fans just wishing that the game could go quickly as the rain was making everyone pretty miserable. Blessing Chibuike Eleke scored near the end, a real cracker, took the defender on, feigned and shot from his left in the far corner. Excellent goal to top off a real good performance from the player who looked dangerous anytime he had the ball.
Overall, good game but the conditions were so bad that to be honest I wouldn’t say this was a very enjoyable match day experience for me. The Luzern fans were fine and the stadium is ok, the pre match atmosphere was very good, and it was easy to find my seat and all but man it was one wet evening!! Totally soaked as I made my way home…..
Highlights of the game here.
Overall
Lucerne is a great city, just so pretty and has plenty of good drinking establishments, and other touristy things to do! The ground was fine, I especially enjoyed the pre match entertainment outside, and the footballing experience was ok. But perhaps next time I will pick a day when there is not so much rain! I know I am from ireland, but that doesnt mean I enjoy standing in showers and getting wet. Next time I will visit FC Luzern during the summer!
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