Ijsselmeervogels

IJsselmeervogels play in Bunschoten-Spakenburg, and the ground they use, Sportpark De Westmaat, they share with the club they least want to share anything with. A fence and two canteens separate them.

The side began in 1932 as Na Arbeid Sport — sport after work — for men who had done a day's labour first. Five years later a merger with VV IJsselmeer and Strandvogels produced the present name. The fishermen went one way, the farmers and clerks the other, and the fixture is still called Rood tegen Blauw.

As amateurs they knocked FC Groningen out of the KNVB Beker, then took AZ Alkmaar to penalties and won, and only FC Twente stopped them, in the semi-finals. The Netherlands named them Sports Team of the Year — no other amateur club has taken that.

What followed was less romantic and more relentless. The Landelijke Amateurbeker followed in 1996, won 2–0 against BVV/Verachtert. District cups arrived in 1981 and then twice more, in 2014 and 2015.

Players pass through on their way up. Raymond Bronkhorst went the other way — a professional who came to play for the club and later coached it.

White shirts, a broad red stripe down the front, red shorts. In the town they are De Rooien, and the general amateur championship has gone to them seven times.