Modern Renaissance: Inside Royale Union Saint-Gilloise

This summer, SCOUTED’s Joe Donnohue visited Royale Union Saint-Gilloise.

Despite a glamour tie with Liverpool in this season’s UEFA Europa League, the club are not widely known outside Belgium. But their story is remarkable: engineered by intelligent, left-field recruitment, the community club have journeyed from the depths of Belgium’s third division to European nights at Anfield.

This is that story. This is USG.

Sunday, June 4, 2023. Saint-Gilles. Tucked away in South Brussels’ leafy and aptly-named Forest suburb, the approach to Stade Joseph-Marien is unassuming, accessed through residential streets. You’d miss it if you didn’t know it was there. The stadium, constructed for the 1920 Summer Olympiad, boasts a red-brick, Art Deco facade with sporting iconography carved into its stone. Parc Duden's greenery juxtaposes the jutting veneer on each of its adjoining sides. Most days it’s the very picture of peace.

Not today. Today the Union Bhoys are the soundtrack of Saint-Gilles. Today the park is yellow and blue.

Today is the final day of the season and there are eighty-eight minutes on the clock. Royale Union Saint-Gilloise lead Club Brugge 1-0. USG have been without a major honour for 88 years: they’ve spent 50 of those outside of the top division; it’s been 15 since they almost dropped into the Belgian fourth tier. Now they are minutes away from claiming the Belgian title.

Then Club score.

Then they score again.

And again.

Heartbreak doesn't come more distilled than this.

Three days later, I sit with USG’s directeur sportif Chris O'Loughlin in his office, which feels almost out of place within Stade Joseph-Marien; sleek, bright and modern, less ornate than its adjoining rooms. He reflects on the defeat with admirable perspective, considering how fresh it must feel.  "Sunday was, in that moment, the day after [the defeat], 36 hours after - it was disappointing.

"First of all we have to move on. We're already preparing for the new season. It's coming. The days and the weeks won't stop because we're sad and disappointed.

"Let's take a step back and get some perspective,” O’Loughlin says between mouthfuls, juggling a hasty lunch break and my questions. He raises the fork, pauses and continues to speak. The duration between each bite grows the longer we talk, the deeper we go into topics O’Loughlin is clearly passionate about, as does the guilt I feel for occupying him at this time. 

Our meeting is only scheduled to be a brief exchange. He must soon head to Kevin De Bruyne’s hometown of Drongen to observe USG’s Under-15s in a warm-up fixture against South African side Mamelodi Sundowns at the ‘KDB’ Cup, but he is keen to tell me Union’s story in detail.

“We played 57 football matches in only our second-ever season in the first division, having been out for 48 years. We took in nine new players during the pre-season. We experienced Europe for the first time as a playing group and as a club. I didn't have the experience, the CEO didn't have experience, the President didn't have experience.

"The reality is that we lost in the 89th minute. We had already given everything in the season, that's part of football. Sometimes dramatic moments come in your favour and they can go against you and it went against us."

To understand the context of Club Brugge's three late goals, it is necessary to first return to 2007. Relegated to the third tier, which would come to be known as the Belgian First Amateur Division and where the club languished for the next eight seasons, they almost dropped into the fourth after finishing in the relegation places during 2012/13.