A Cold War-era football match, cancelled 65 years ago due to heightened political tensions, was finally completed on Saturday in Northern Ireland. Glenavon FC, from Northern Ireland, hosted FC Erzgebirge Aue, formerly known as Wismut Karl-Marx-Stadt during the communist era, in Lurgan, 25 miles west of Belfast. Over 1,000 fans traveled from Germany to support the visiting team, who were the East German champions in 1960.
The original match was called off because both teams, being on opposite sides of the Iron Curtain after World War II, were denied entry visas. According to John Duggan, 91, who played for Glenavon in 1960, "Those were hard times, governments weren't talking, no one was let in or out". Duggan was a member of the strong Glenavon team that won the 1959-60 Irish League title, which qualified them for the European Cup. Despite UEFA's offer to hold the matches in neutral countries, Glenavon had to withdraw due to a lack of funds.
The unique match was organized as a pre-season friendly after fans from both teams discussed the possibility of fulfilling the long-forgotten fixture. Erzgebirge Aue won the game 2-0. The "first leg" of the rematch took place last year in Aue, 185 miles south of Berlin, with the German side winning 5-0.
Adam Carson, a lifelong Glenavon fan and the club's supporter liaison officer, said that completing the tie was "a missing chapter for both club's histories, it's great to finally get it played". Carson initiated the idea after noticing the unplayed 1960 European Cup game when Glenavon qualified for European competition in 2014. He posted a couple of tweets about it, suggesting it would be great to play the game 60 years later.
Carson's social media posts were seen by people at the German club, which now plays in the third division of the Bundesliga, creating a connection between the two clubs. According to Carson, "Politics paused it, but football endured". Roughly 10 years ago, Carson had the idea to stage the famous fixture that was cancelled because of the Cold War.
The match in Lurgan was the culmination of a significant collective effort by both clubs. Glenavon traveled to Germany last summer, and Erzgebirge Aue visited them on Saturday. Over 1,100 fans have arrived in Northern Ireland throughout this week, including about 300 members of Erzgebirge's motorbike supporters' club.
Leigh McClune, who was on the board when the idea first emerged, played a key role in organizing the event, along with an army of volunteers. Carson initially anticipated around 500 Erzgebirge supporters to attend, but the German club sold out their allocation of 800 tickets within an hour, highlighting the event's importance.
The two clubs' supporters reconnected in the early part of this decade. They decided to play the tie over two years, starting in 2024, and Glenavon and Erzgebirge Aue (formerly Wismut Karl-Marx-Stadt, renamed after German reunification) completed the task on Saturday. "When we first started talking about having this game it was basically to celebrate two championship winning teams that didn't get the chance to play against each other," Carson told BBC's Ralph Hewitt before the match.
