Ahead of the Europa League last-16 tie between Borussia Dortmund and FC Red Bull Salzburg, supporters of the German club have announced they intend to boycott next week’s second leg in Austria.
The decision to boycott comes just days after large parts of the “Bündnis Südbtribüne Dortmund,” an alliance of Dortmund fan groups on the club’s famous Yellow Wall, including the three hardcore ultra groups, boycotted their team’s Bundesliga away game against RB Leipzig.
It also comes a week after over 20,000 Dortmund fans boycotted the club’s home game against Augsburg in protest at the introduction of Monday-night kick-offs.
“In the last few weeks, matches without our presence have been stacking up,” said the alliance in a statement. “But the reasons remain the same: we cannot and will not accept test tube clubs from Salzburg and Leipzig who trample all over the values that we associate with football.”
“One of these values is the integrity of the competition which is more than compromised by the participation of both company clubs in the last-16 of the Europa League.”
Both “RasenBallsport” Leipzig and Red Bull Salzburg were permitted to compete in European competition this season after convincing UEFA that they had sufficiently disentangled their operations in order to comply with article five of the federation’s rules and regulations which states that "no individual or legal entity may have control or influence over more than one club participating in a UEFA club competition."
Officially, FC Red Bull Salzburg are competing in the Europa League as “FC Salzburg” and with a slightly modified crest. They may be going into their tie with Dortmund as underdogs, but the chance of a direct meeting with RB Leipzig, who face Zenit St Petersburg, remains.
“Should the two teams meet in the knock-out stage of a European competition, the game and competition would be reduced to a farce,” wrote Borussia Dortmund’s official fan department on Tuesday in an article criticising the role of Red Bull in professional football. “According to company doctrine, RB Leipzig would effectively have a bye.”
Symbolic tickets for Austria Salzburg
In addition to their boycott of the game in Salzburg, Dortmund fans are selling symbolic tickets to the return leg, the proceeds of which will be donated entirely to SV Austria Salzburg.
Originally founded in 1933, Austria Salzburg was taken over by Red Bull in 2005 and re-branded as FC Red Bull Salzburg. In response, hardcore supporters re-registered the original SV Austria Salzburg at the lowest level of the Austrian pyramid in 2006. Despite fighting their way up to the Austrian second division by 2015, Austria have since been relegated back to the fourth tier amid substantial financial problems.
“Instead of travelling to the soft drink club, we would rather our money went to the city’s real club: SV Austria!” continued the statement from Bündnis Südtribüne, who are also producing t-shirts with the motto “Tradition trumps any trend.”
In December 2016, fans of Bundesliga side SC Freiburg carried out a similar initiative, raising 1,000 euros from the sale of food and drink at their game against “RasenBallsport” Leipzig and donating the money to Austria Salzburg.
In February 2017, the English fan-owned side FC United of Manchester played a friendly against Austria Salzburg and will travel to Austria for a “return leg” in July 2018.
Sinking attendances in Salzburg…
In the first season after the re-brand, FC Red Bull Salzburg attracted an average attendance of over 16,500 for their home games, a figure which has since sunk to around 6,500.
Last week, only 1,553 fans turned up at the 30,000-capacity Red Bull Arena to see RB Salzburg’s 7-0 cup quarter-final win over SK Austria Klagenfurt.
Despite team winning the Austrian Bundesliga eight times in their 12-year history, they have failed to progress beyond the Champions League qualification round on ten occasions – the low point being a defeat to F91 Düdelingen of Luxembourg in 2012.
Fans also appear to have been put off by RB Salzburg’s role within the Red Bull organisation as an unofficial farm team for RB Leipzig. Since the creation of the German franchise in 2009, 14 players have made the jump from Salzburg to Leipzig, including future Liverpool midfielder Naby Keita.
Following the sudden announcement of Brazilian full-back Bernardo’s move to Leipzig in August 2016, then Salzburg coach Oscar Garcia raged: “I was informed yesterday that there’s a new target: we’re now more of a farm team.”
… and in Leipzig?
Questions have been raised over attendance figures in Leipzig, too. Despite playing in international competition for the first time in the club’s short history – the first Leipzig-based team to play in Europe since Lokomotive Leipzig in 1988 – ticket sales at RB Leipzig in both the Champions League and Europa League have been slow.
As of Wednesday, only 18,000 tickets had been sold for Thursday’s Europa League match against 2008 winners Zenit St Petersburg, leading one prominent fan club to complain on their Facebook page:
“People, what’s wrong with you? We’re playing in the last-16 of the Europa League. It’s incredible that tickets for all blocks are on general sale. In a city the size of Leipzig, there must be more than 10,000 fans who want to support their team,” wrote “Südkurve Leipzig” on Tuesday in a message which has since been deleted but was documented by German portal “Faszination Fankurve.”
“We thought we wanted to prove the critics wrong and show that Leipzig is a football city. But at this rate, we can rank ourselves somewhere below Wolfsburg.”
Two weeks ago, only 31,793 fans attended RB Leipzig’s home game against Cologne – the lowest figure since the team’s promotion to the Bundesliga in 2016. The following game against Borussia Dortmund was, however, sold out, as is the upcoming home game against Bayern Munich.
“Finally Bundesliga football in Leipzig again”
“The fans yearn for top level football”
#RBLKOE
