"Marseille, is a football city where L'OM is like a religion. It’s a cosmopolitan, passionate city and the people live for football."
With this quote Éric Cantona described his chaotic city of birth quite well. Marseille is the most pure football city of France: when you've been there, you'll understand what Cantona meant.
There aren't many cities that tickle your senses like Marseille does.. One the one hand, it's a beautiful port city with wonderful architecture, great beaches and the sun glittering on the sea. On the other hand, some parts of the city aren't known as being the most friendly boroughs of France, held into a strong grip of organized crime, drug trafficking and assassinations that seem to be the order of the day. Marseille is well-known for it's temper, in positive and negative ways. For years, the city had been the gateway to the French colonies in Africa, whose influences you still clearly see in Marseille's populations. Christians, muslims and jews live together here, but no matter which religion you belong to, and wherever you originally come from, there is one belief that everyone shares: Olympique de Marseille.
What Olympique de Marseille (L'OM) means for the city is something you feel and see everywhere in town. Wherever you are, there's always a waving flag nearby, kids in Marseille-kits or a couple of guys in a baby blue tracksuit. The love for L'OM has got no counterpart in France, and is probably best comparable with the admiration for teams like Napoli and Boca Juniors. Some chairmans had to run for their lives here, others will be heroes forever. The most fanatics supporter groups are still believed to have a certain level of power in the club, and there's always a bit crazyness about L'OM. It's something you feel in the stands of the Stade Vélodrome too - love it or hate it.
The Stade Vélodrome had always been known for it's famous arch shaped and roofless stands, but with the coming EURO 2016 it surely could use some refurbishing. For the loyal Marseille-crowd, the changes to their church were quite a shock initially, but in the end no sad faces. Of course, they had to turn in the nostalgic feeling of playing in such a historical stadium, but thanks to the impressive roof their vocal support doesn't fade away anymore, making the Vélodrome even more intimidating than it already was. And it makes the revamped stadium visible from almost every part of town.
The Vélodrome lies in a lively area of Marseille, which shows it's best side on match days. From the Rond-Point du Prado (the roundabout next to the stadium) the Boulevard Michelet is closed for traffic and transforms in a giant fair with lots of stands where you can buy a kebab-frites, beer or a L'OM souvenir. From the inside, the Orange Velodrome (even stadiums like this can't avoid a sponsor name) is very impressive, especially the waving roof, with the sideline stands going straight up and the fanatics supporter groups behind both goals.
From all over the city you can see the Notre-Dame de la Garde, the most famous building of Marseille. The beautiful basilica is built on top of a rocky hill and offers the most amazing view of of Marseille. The golden statue of Mary on the tower is affectionately called 'La Bonne Mère' (The Good Mother) by the Marseillais and watches over the city. Before every match, there are several fans who come up to the basilica to light a candle and pray for a good result. In 1993, even the whole Marseille-squad turned up at the Notre-Dame to pray to higher powers for a good result in the Champions League Final against AC Milan, resulting in a famous 1-0 win and a first European trophy for a French team ever. Maybe La Bonne Mère really has some magic after all: surely Marseille has got the eternal bragging rights now by saying that they are 'à jamais les premiers', forever the first.
You get to the Notre-Dame by car or by bus (line 60), and you can even take a little tourist train at the corner of Canebière/Vieux Port. Because of the steep incline, a walk up to the top of the rock is not recommended.
Paris has got the Champs-Elysées, Marseille has got the Canebière. This busy avenue cuts the city center in half and ends at the Vieux Port, the old, square harbour. When L'OM is crowned champions, it floods with people, especially the day after when the squad cruises over the quays in an open bus. It's just a short drive to the town hall at the Quai du Port, but it usually takes hours: the whole of Marseille comes to a standstill.
The same thing happened in 1998, when almost 100.000 people turned up to get a glimpse of an extraordinary group of players. Not L'OM, but Marseille-born Zinédine Zidane and some of his Les Blues teammates came to the city to celebrate their just captured World Cup in the south of France.
How often do you see that a football club has it's own restaurant on the most beautiful place of a city? Well, in Marseille you can. In the old harbour on the Quai des Belges you find the club's crest above the door of the OM Café. The brasserie is furnished in typical 'OM style', with pictures of great players who wore the famous white and blue shirt.
La Villa is one of the best restaurants of Marseille, even though it's a little bit hidden in the 8th arrondissement (113 Rue Jean Mermoz), not far from the Vélodrome. The players of L'OM like to come here and even president Macron's wife loves to stop by whenever she's in town. Dining on certain means comes with a certain price tag as well, but that's something you forget quickly on a lovely summer night, sitting in the beautiful garden of the restaurant. Don't forget to book a table, especially on match days the restaurant easily get's full.
Like anywhere in France, it's best if you buy tickets through the official website of the club. Normally, the ticket windows are open before the match as well. When the match is already sold out, you can always try your luck at the touts who are always around at the Boulevard Michelet. But watch out, there are a lot of fake tickets out there as well.
When visiting the Stade Vélodrome, don't bring your car. Because of it's location close to the city center and road closures on match day, it's a hell to get there and limiting parking space as well.
Better is it to take the metro, from the city center a ride of less than ten minutes. You have to take line 2 (the red line) to Rond-Point du Prado, right next to the stadium. Do you have a ticket for the Tribune Ganay? Remained seated one stop further, till Saint-Marguerite Dromel, the line's terminus. Do you prefer a good walk over public transport? From the city centre it's approximately a 25 minute-walk to the stadium.
Beeld: Reinaldo Coddou, Shutterstock
