Explain your relationship to your sportsclub

[Tooting Carmen]

Most Germans are football fans lol

Even our 3rd league has a greater attendance than the first league of most nations.

One thing that surprised me when I looked into this was how poorly-attended football matches are in Latin America (even Brazil and Argentina) compared to Europe and even parts of Asia. Perhaps part of the explanation is that the rich European (and latterly Asian) clubs buying up the best players from Latin America has thus lowered the standard of the latters' domestic leagues.

[Tooting Carmen]

My two local pro rugby teams (I love them both):

[RogueState]

Most Germans are football fans lol

Even our 3rd league has a greater attendance than the first league of most nations.

Yeah I know, every Bundesliga match is full of supporters with flags and jerseys of their teams, true passion

[frankhammer]

I have only ever once wasted money to watch one rugby match. The finals of the super 12 at Eden park 20 years ago. People around me seemed enthralled and rapturous.

Since then, I have watched my son play soccer when he was interested as a preteen. Skin in the game and all. This I enjoyed. Since then, our lives have moved on.

[placebo]

My relationship to Fenerbahçe is almost same with your relationship to Leverkusen. We haven't been champions for 8 years.

KÖKSAL KÖKSAL BABA

KÖKSAL KÖKSAL BABAAAAAA

I am Trabzonfan

This season, after 38 years, they became champions.

[SilverKnight]

Jesus Christ FC - It's sweet, and getting sweeter each and every day...

[Tutankhamun]

My relationship with Corinthians is something familiar, my father, my grandfather, my uncles, they are all Corinthians fans. We are almost 4 years without winning a title, but currently we have a good team and I am confident that we can win some title like the Brazilian league, Brazil Cup or Copa Libertadores.

[Jana]

Two teams I support - Orijent and BVB

NK Orijent is local club from my city that is currently into second division. They are pretty special little club with strong identity and my grandmother, who lived near their stadium, was their supporter. I also trained on their ground in a female team.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HNK_Orijent_1919

It was always a dream my city will have two first division clubs and a city derby but it didn't happen so far.
I also attended Gymnasium in that eastern side of city which has it's own Identity and entire east side supports Orijent (which obv means East)

Club went trough tough times like bankrupcy and regional leagues but now it is back into second division after decades.

Orijent was always a club of youth, students, intellectuals and nationally very hard line Croatian (their colors are from Croatian tricolor), which reflects different history and demographics of Rijeka east side, and quite different from their bigger rival Rijeka. Also, Orijent always had good relationship with Dalmatian giant Hajduk which is seen as heresy by Rijeka fans, who absolutely loathe Hajduk, their main rival.

BVB - as little girl I played Pro Evolution Soccer on Playstation 2. For some reason, I immediately became obsessed and enchanted with Dortmund, and I always played with them against my friends. Why? Main reason is quite bizzare. Their uniforms. Their socks, in particular. They had, at that time, zebra like black and yellow socks that made players look like bees. I was totally in love. Than I saw their incredible stadium Westfalen, which was completely to my taste and linking of how should a proper football ground look like. Next? Imagine when I found out about Yellow Wall, when I was older? That was insane. You could even smoke and drink beer there and there was no seating for local games, all standing.
And as cherry on top, my favorite football player Tomas Rosicky played for Dortmund than. Love was born. I remained BVB fan ever since. My best friend promised me to take me to yellow wall one day.

This friend of mine is hard core fan of Rijeka, main team of my city. He's also deep-rooted native of that region. Him and me always attended Rijeka games as teens, on west stand behind goal where ultras are. He is hard core fan and goes to away games still and is a season ticket holder. Despite I love him like a brother and we grew up on Rijeka west stand, I never felt deep connection to that club. So even when Rijeka won first ever Croatian League title few years back, I celebrated with him, but deep down it was not a genuine emotion. I even feel ashamed because of that. My best friend knows this, but does not fully understand, and neither do I. It's painful topic for me. My mother's late boyfriend was also hard core Rijeka fan and former sport director of the club (he played in golden generation of Orijent however, and I could connect to that much more!)

So it will always remain just Orijent and BVB for me. Results don't matter, but every success is of course sweet.

[Jana]

I found my reply from one Croatian forum which is few years old (on a topic why you support this and that club). translate to English.

I guess it doesn't matter for the topic, but I want to mention that I'm a girl from Rijeka, I've been in love with football since I was little and I trained the same at the club

HR- no one. That's weird. I was born and raised in Rijeka and I remember the end of the 90's, the stolen championship, the collection of the album forza fiume, then the total decline of the early 00's, our children's obsession with Rijeka. By the way, I was born in 92 and my first encounter with football was the World Cup 98, the Rijeka championship that never happened. I remember the ecstasy in the city, disbelief over the doomed offside, crowded Kantrida (and on the rocks), hatred towards Croatia and the judge from Šibenik.

I went to Kantrida many times, to the West, to the Armada. I never went to Rujevica [new stadium], it means nothing to me. We still go to Kantrida when a fan game is played.

I don't support Rijeka, and the best friend I love more than my husband is the kind of boy who is one of the most loyal fans of Rijeka, he doesn't miss a single home game and goes on tours whenever he can.

I have never felt that true love for that club, not even because of it, and yet I have emotion towards Rijeka, I am sorry when they lose and I am happy with their success. I tried it because of my best friend, but it doesn't work. Their songs mean little to me, a strange accent, it's not as emotional as down south, in Dalmatia, where my roots are, there is no chemistry. Rijeka has always been underwhelming for me, a small club from an ugly city (which I still love) without the charisma and passion of Hajduk, without the Croatianhood of Dinamo.

I’ve always been missing something, and it’s hard to say what. Probably the thing is that I never felt Rijeka as a home, a city or a club, and I was born and raised there.

My grandmother lived in Sušak and cheered for the Orient, I trained football at their stadium and I prefer them to Rijeka, but it is not a serious love. I sympathize with them.

Hajduk was a concept to me as a child, and I dreamed of playing for them that there is a women's league like the HNL. The first thing I asked my dad when I had a serious accident with a bicycle was to buy me a spare Hajduk jersey, the one with red and blue stripes, which he had refused until then, and I knew that he would take pity on me then. Poljud was magical to me, the cathedral of football at least I adore Kantrida. Hajduk was the notion of the biggest HR club for me, and Dinamo sucks, a regime club with an ugly stadium and too much money that robbed Rijeka of the championship.

My dad was born in ZG and has been a Zagreb fan since he was a child.

However, Hajduk disgusted me. Once when my cousin and I were returning home to RI from the sea in Dalmatia, we were mistreated and slapped on the bus, pinched and insulted by two much older guys who were Hajduk fans, when they realized we were from Rijeka. We were maybe 10-12 years old and they were at least 18 if not more. It’s one of my most horrific childhood traumas and I can’t remember how it started, but out of pure peace. They insulted Rijeka and when the bus came in front of the city they sang shitty Rijeka smelly city ... Then I hated them, I was from Rijeka and not a Dalmatian and I crossed Hajduk for all time. The underestimating comments of the citizens of Split and Hajduk towards RI (both the club and the city) that I listened to in later years confirmed my decision.

Again, when I listen to Torcida and Dalmatian songs on Poljud, they evoke emotions in me that, unfortunately, those in Rijeka will never be able to.

From foreign clubs BVB, always. I fell in love as a child with their yellow-and-black jerseys, especially socks, like bumblebees, and then with Westphalen and the magical yellow wall.

My favorite player was Tomas Rosicky and later Marco Reus
Little Mozart is probably my favorite player of all time, I absorbed his every move and he was irresistible with that mower, I was desperate when he was sold to Arsenal. What a virtuoso.

I love BvB more than any HR club and that's right, and my best friend from childhood promised that one day we will be part of the same yellow wall that once won me over.