Rockinghopping: A feast of football on Gibraltar

Words: Harry Tomlinson

Images: Harry Tomlinson

Gibraltar is unique and has a degree of novelty to it. The runway crossing, the Rock and its Barbary macaques, the sense you’re in a ‘Little Britain’ at the very south of western Europe.

The country’s football setup is no less unique.

Sandwiched between the airport runway and the foot of the Rock lies Victoria Stadium, where not just the national team, full UEFA members since 2013, but also the entire 10-club domestic league play.

Due to this, games are staggered across the weekend, with as many as three consecutive matches possible on some days, all being free entry to attend.

After flying into Gibraltar Airport, which is serviced by a handful of flights a day from Gatwick, Heathrow and occasionally Bristol and Manchester, I made the first of several foot crossings into Spain, as at €14 per night, the hotel was infinitely cheaper than anything I could find in Gibraltar.

©Harry Tomlinson/ Terrace Edition. St Joseph’s FC vs Bruno’s Magpies.

After a few beers and lunch in the Spanish town of La Línea de la Conceptión, I headed back over to Gibraltar, this time walking over the runway I’d landed on a few hours earlier.

Saturday’s late afternoon fixture was St Joseph’s FC vs Bruno’s Magpies, the latter named after a bar just around corner from the ground.

Victoria Stadium is an otherwise quite unspectacular venue, with a running track and small stands on two sides. What really makes it fully worth a visit is how the Rock rises behind one of the goals, creating a dramatic backdrop.

A better crowd than I’d anticipated had gathered for this game which was second vs third. A mix of family, friends and some groups of British ex-pats made for a relaxed atmosphere.

The game finished 2-2 and the players gathered in the bar under the stand following its conclusion.

Shared points gave created a bit of daylight between the two chasers and the league leaders, Lincoln Red Imps, who are probably most famous for beating Celtic 1-0 in a Champions League qualifier in Gibraltar eight years ago.

©Harry Tomlinson/ Terrace Edition. Real Balompédica Linense vs Cádiz CF Mirandilla.

Sunday offered up a situation that would make any groundhopper giddy: The chance to watch a game of football in two countries in the same day.

In fact, as Gibraltar’s women team were playing a friendly vs Lichtenstein on the morning, you could actually watch an international game and games in two different countries on the same day. I am not sure that would be possible anywhere else.

In any case, I held back on the women’s international in favour of some time spent on the touristic things Gibraltar has to offer, scaling the Rock to the top and back down in time for a Spanish Fourth Division game between Real Balompédica Linense and Cádiz CF Mirandilla, otherwise known as Cádiz’s B team.

Linense’s ground lies a mere few hundred metres from the border with Gibraltar. It is undergoing a full renovation and quite literally looks half-complete, with no branding on any of the plain grey concrete stands.

The stand to the east side of the ground remains a building site, but this allowed you to get a panoramic view of the south-Eastern Spanish coastline. Familiar holiday destinations like Esteponera and Marbella line up in a row between hills and the sea.

With the home side backed by a vocal group behind the goal with their backs to the Rock, the game never really matched their eagerness as a 0-0 was played out.

The crowd became increasingly animated with Linense missing a number of half-chances in the final moments that would’ve sealed an important win in their promotion push toward the third level of Spanish football.

©Harry Tomlinson/ Terrace Edition. Gibraltar

Following the final whistle, it was a 20 minute walk back across the border alongside a number of Gibraltarians who were returning home after their Spanish football fix. My final game was an evening kick-off,

‘The Europa Derby’ between Europa Point and Europa FC and a derby in name at least. The Rock provided another spectacular backdrop as the sun set, until all that was visible was its imposing shadow hanging over the ground.

A much smaller crowd was in attendance than the previous days’ game as another match plodded towards 0-0 until a very late winner for Europa Point sealed the points.

The most noticeable feature of this game was that Europa Point, playing in sky blue, communicated mainly in English, whilst Europa FC nearly all in Spanish.

Europa FC have a chance to put defeat behind them when they’ll back at the Victoria Stadium in ‘Rock Cup’ action midweek.

But how quickly a good trip can turn sour when the return plane to Heathrow was diverted to Malaga due to a very wet and windy morning in Gibraltar deeming a landing on the short runway too unsafe to attempt.

After a bus to Malaga airport and a near 12 hour delay I was finally back in the UK.

A fantastic trip nonetheless in the most unique of settings.