“It’s happy hour at the SU bar”
FFT hits the Europa League road with the students of Cardiff Met
Maybe the heat’s getting to Fourfourtwo. It’s 35 degrees in Luxembourg, the dehydration is kicking in and some sort of weird hallucination has presented itself: a load of students holding a press conference in front of a massive wasp.
We’re inside the Stade Municipal in the sleepy town of Differdange, a couple of miles from the border with France. The wasp is livid and peering over the students’ shoulders, staring FFT straight in the eye. All while holding a football underneath its arm.
Thankfully, it isn’t real – not least because wasps don’t actually have arms. It’s a giant club crest of host team Progres Niederkorn, and it’s serving as the backdrop for a piece of history. The students are from Cardiff Metropolitan University, and they’re about to become the first British university team to play in the Europa League.
Sadly, that hasn’t attracted journalists in droves for the pre-match media briefing, 24 hours ahead of the preliminary round first leg tie. There are four representatives from the club – three players and boss Christian Edwards – but only three from the press.
Two journalists from Luxembourg ask one question between them, we chip in with a few of our own for politeness, and the conference comes to a rather premature end.
FFT didn’t need to bombard the players with questions at the press conference. We’d just spent the afternoon with the very same people at their hotel in the centre of town – arriving in Luxembourg after an epic nine-hour car journey from the UK, via a Dover-to-calais ferry and the motorways of France and Belgium.
Before we’d even reached the foyer at Differdange’s Gulliver Tower Hotel, we bumped into Edwards and his staff outside. Understandably, given the scorching temperatures, they were staying well away from direct sunlight. “It’s not like this in Cardiff,” chuckled Edwards.
The team had arrived in Luxembourg two days before kick-off, after a journey Edwards had been nervous about. The Dennis Bergkamp of university football management, a fear of flying meant he’d originally planned to drive to Luxembourg from Wales. Instead, he discovered he’d already been booked on the team flight from Heathrow.
“If I can avoid flying, I will,” he tells FFT. “I had a bad experience leaving Italy once, with a thunderstorm on take-off. This time I had a glass of wine beforehand and it was OK, thank goodness.”
A former Swansea, Nottingham Forest and Bristol Rovers defender who made one appearance for Wales in 1996, the flowing locks of the 43-year-old’s playing days are gone, but a steely determination remains. The remarkable story of Cardiff Metropolitan University could not have happened without him.
The team were on the verge of folding when Edwards got involved a decade ago. Cardiff Met were almost kicked out of the Welsh League, but the Football Association of Wales handed them one last chance.
“The club was heading towards the abyss – the university was going to pull the funding,” explains Edwards. “We were in Division Three, the bottom division. We were last of about 90 teams.
“I’d retired from football in 2006 and my plan was to go to university, get a degree and become a PE teacher. I finished my undergraduate degree in 2009, then the university asked if I’d take over the football team. I hadn’t been involved with the team – at that stage, I hadn’t even looked at what division they were in. I said, ‘No, not interested’. Then they said, ‘We’ll pay your masters fees for you’.”
He set about transforming the culture of the side. “If I do something, I dive in 100 per cent,” says the man now known as Dr Edwards, after following his masters degree with a PHD. “The team had showhome footballers – they had all the fittings, the nice boots and haircuts, but functionally it didn’t work. They didn’t have a clue how to play football. We slowly built a club through loyalty and hard work.”
Cardiff Met won three promotions in four years to reach the Welsh Premier League in 2016. In their first top-flight season, they went into a four-way play-off for a Europa League spot but lost the play-off final to Bangor, suffering the same fate 12 months later at Cefn Druids.
Now it was third time lucky. They actually finished in the bottom half of the table last season, 7th of 12 teams, to sneak into the play-offs. But they won 3-2 at Caernarfon Town and then overcame Bala Town on penalties to reach Europe for the first time – all while some of the squad were still completing exams.
History had been made and the uni was inundated with messages, Edwards even receiving a random email of congratulations from the economics department at Moscow State University.
Everything has been been achieved with players drawn only from the university. It’s a principle that Edwards insists upon, although there are no FA rules to prevent him supplementing the line-up with signings from elsewhere, as Cardiff Met’s female team have done en route to qualification for the Women’s Champions League.
Edwards is now a lecturer in sports coaching at the university. “That’s my main job,” he says – he’s just a Europa League manager on the side. “Primarily the players are at the university to study, and football is secondary. People have taken them lightly – they thought they’d be a group of students turning up with skateboards under their arms, but they’re respectful, disciplined and humble.
“We’re a sporting university that looks at sports science, in the most professional era in the history of sport, so there shouldn’t be a surprise that a university team is disciplined and professional.”
Not that they don’t act like typical students occasionally, when the situation justifies it. “When we qualified for Europe, we got back home late and went to a pub,” smiles 19-year-old Rhydian Morgan, as the team start to drift outside to relax in the sunshine.
Players head to the students’ union bar after home matches, and some even live together, but they decided to kibosh a planned group holiday to Rotterdam once they qualified for the Europa League. Their commitment certainly can’t be questioned: not only are they unpaid, they actually pay to play, which might be a first for a team in European competition. Each September, every player pays a £150 membership fee to join the squad for the season.
“It’s the best £150 I’ve ever spent,” says Morgan, who’s on a sports analysis course and has spent the past couple of weeks swotting up on opponents Progres Niederkorn – analysis that officially counts as a work placement as part of his studies. “When I paid the money last year, I thought I might get on in the Welsh Premier League; now I’m in Luxembourg for the Europa League. It’s nuts. I didn’t come to uni to play in Europe. It’s the best university course ever.”
Morgan is an undergraduate but many players have been in the side for several years – staying at uni to study Phds, all on sport-related courses. The squad certainly doesn’t lack intelligence.
“We’re different,” says captain Bradley Woolridge, former president of the students’ union. “At times there’s resentment from other teams. When we came through the leagues, people thought if they kicked us and were physical with us, we wouldn’t want to know.”
Linchpin midfielder Charlie Corsby is in his 10th year with the team and is now a lecturer. Team-mate Will Evans is currently on his course. “I supervised Will’s dissertation – he did a good job!” laughs Corsby.
Evans’ football ambitions haven’t always gone down well with his family, who have a farm in mid-wales. “I grew up as a farmer – I’d play football in the garden, and my dad would always drag me out to do something with the cows or tidy the barn,” smiles the 21-year-old. “I’ve been kicked by multiple cows, and chased sheep around for hours on end. I’ve had a cow poo all over me while I was milking it. I didn’t see myself playing in the Europa League back then!”
Cardiff Met go into the game against Niederkorn as underdogs – the Luxembourg outfit beat Rangers two years ago. That isn’t deterring assistant manager Robyn Jones, part of the Sutton United team that once pulled off an FA Cup giant-killing against Coventry City, although he doesn’t talk to the Cardiff Met players about that particular game. “I don’t think any of them were alive then, it was 1989!” he says. “But there are always surprise results. I’m living proof of that. They’re more than just a bunch of students. They’re good footballers, and Christian brings a massive amount of energy with the standards he demands.”
As he prepares for the club’s Europa League debut, it’s hard not to be impressed by the job Edwards has done. Forward Adam Roscrow recently joined AFC Wimbledon, so could the manager follow in the footsteps of Paul Tisdale, who progressed from a university job with Team Bath to become a Football League manager?
“I would be a liar if I said I didn’t want to be one, but I’m not good enough and I know that,” insists Edwards, even if the evidence might suggest otherwise. “Once my time at Cardiff Met is up, my coaching career will be done. I’ll go and watch rugby again.”
We’re back at the team hotel on matchday, where friends and family have started to arrive. Cardiff Met will have around 50 supporters at the game, many of whom have driven to Luxembourg, just like FFT. “I’m so proud to be here,” says Caroline Spencer, mother of forward Dan Spencer, one of several players let go by a pro club as a youngster. “When he was released by Bournemouth, it was gutting for all of us. It’s a fairytale that he’s playing at this standard now.”
The squad have been for a daytime stroll around town and are now sitting down to eat. They’ve arranged for the hotel chef to make their usual pre-match meal: beans and eggs, to the perplexion of the cook. It’s not a traditional delicacy in Luxembourg.
“Let’s start thinking about what we have to do,” says Edwards as he addresses his players. “We’re not here for a circus, to sit in the sun and have a laugh. It’s great that people are talking about Love Island, but we’re not actually going to Love Island. We’re here to do a job.”
The players are soon making the short coach journey to the stadium, where UEFA flags fly alongside those of Luxembourg and Wales. Now it all seems very real – Cardiff Met’s European bow awaits.
The 2020 Europa League Final is 24 games away in Gdansk, though no one is expecting Cardiff Met to get anywhere near that far. If they can beat Progres Niederkorn, they’ll play Cork City and then potentially Rangers – a logistical operation way beyond anything the club have ever had to deal with. Their home games attract around 250 people.
“We met the people from Rangers at the draw in Switzerland, and they asked where we played our games,” says club chairman Graham Haines. “When I said we play on the campus, they said, ‘Oh… er, how many seats do you have?’ I told them 500, but said that if we played Rangers, we’d attempt to host the game at the Cardiff City Stadium.”
Aided by prize money of £193,000 for European qualification, the club have hired the 5,000-capacity Cardiff International Sports Stadium for the second leg of this tie, with their campus venue falling short of UEFA’S stadium requirements.
Niederkorn also can’t play at their home ground, hence why they’re down the road in Differdange. They borrowed Luxembourg’s national stadium when Rangers visited back in 2017, winning 2-0 to overturn a first-leg deficit. Gers coach Pedro Caixinha was infamously pictured stood in the middle of a bush post-match, debating with angry fans.
With trains frequently passing behind one goal, the Stade Municipal boasts the world’s smallest big screen and only one stand of any size, which has already been occupied by Niederkorn’s ultras. A drummer is competing for volume against Ed Sheeran on the PA system, and soon an audio clip of boxing announcer Michael Buffer declaring, “ARE YOU READY?” bellows around the stadium as the two teams walk out.
Cardiff Met give Niederkorn a scare within seconds. Will Evans surges into the area, but Andorran referee Luis Teixeira waves away penalty appeals. Spencer also sends a first-half shot narrowly wide, but the students’ game plan is more about hard-working containment. It’s working surprisingly well: Niederkorn are dominating possession, and ultras sound a police siren every time they win a corner, but visiting goalkeeper Will Fuller is forced into only one save. The Welsh side’s unity and organisation is obvious – this bunch of students have clearly been well drilled, and they’re not short of physicality either.
FFT heads around to the tiny uncovered stand for the second half, joining a group of Met fans, many of whom are past their first drink of the evening. “I’m the club’s international scout,” says David O’gorman. “I used to coach the second team but moved to Germany, so Christian said I could be his scout. I don’t actually do anything, to be honest!” This is the first bit of international scouting he’s ever done, in fact.
David Warren travelled for 23 hours to be here, taking a night bus to Brussels with his young son, who’s got permission to take two days off school. “We couldn’t miss this,” he says.
Cardiff Met won’t be pulling off a shock win tonight – 17 minutes into the second half, Mayron De Almeida heads home a right-wing cross to put Niederkorn in front. But they don’t show many signs of adding to their tally, and the visiting supporters are growing more buoyant. Like any true citizens of Wales, a drop of alcohol has tempted them to go through their song repertoire.
“Oh Charlie Corsby, you’ve saved my life, oh Charlie Corsby, I’ll let you shag my wife…” they begin, launching into their own version of Andy Williams’ Can’t Take My Eyes Off You. A full rendition of Tom Jones’ Delilah inevitably follows, before a spot of unsophisticated heckling. “Skipper, you’re shit!” one shouts at Niederkorn captain Sebastien Thill.
Another fan has brought a cowbell, while a third waves a big Welsh flag a little too close to the face of a moody steward, who doesn’t see the funny side, snatching the flag and tossing it over a barrier.
The final whistle is greeted by proud applause from the Met faithful. “I think Progres were surprised,” says Edwards. “I set up to frustrate them, and we did. The boys were super and we’ve kept the tie alive.”
Cardiff Met may have lost 1-0, but Rangers lost 2-0 away two years ago. “That’s definitely something to take back as a positive,” enthuses Spencer. “It shows how much effort we’ve put in. People say we’re punching above our weight, but we’ve shown the quality we have.”
For £150, it’s not been a bad experience. “I’d pay £300 to do it all over again!” laughs Spencer. “I’d probably spend all my savings.”
“We’re a bunch of friends, playing together on one of the biggest stages in Europe,” adds goalkeeper Fuller. “This has been incredible.”
A week later, Cardiff Met give Niederkorn a real fright in the second leg. They go 2-0 up thanks to Jordan Lam and Dylan Rees efforts, but Almeida strikes to send the Luxembourg side through on away goals.
The students’ first Europa League adventure consisted of just one away trip, but they proved beyond all doubt they belonged in European competition. It’s been the biggest educational experience they could ever have asked for, and an achievement they can be proud of forever. Given the club’s relentless progress, don’t be surprised if Cardiff Met are back for a longer European tour next year.