Spanjaardslaan

The ground at Spanjaardslaan sits quietly in the Haarlemmerhoutkwartier, a place where the date 1899 is not just a number but the year Koninklijke HFC moved its boots from De Koekamp to this patch of grass. It is a club founded in 1879 by Pim Mulier.

The real story here is the New Year’s match, a tradition started in 1923 by Karel Lotsy and Nico Bouvy. The crowd has grown over time, with the 2009 edition drawing a record of about 4,500 people. It is a day when the history of the sport in Haarlem is measured in feet and voices.

The ground has not been immune to change. A fire in 1974 burned down the main stand and changing rooms, forcing a rebuild the following year. That 1975 structure stood until 2024, when it came down for new construction. While the brickwork was being raised, the first team had to play their home games at Sportpark Groenendaal in Heemstede. The capacity sits at 1,500, though the main stand itself holds only 500.

It was not always just football. The cricket club Rood en Wit played here until 2017, sharing the turf with the footballers. During the Second World War, in 1944, the New Year’s match was played under occupation rules that forbade the Dutch team from wearing orange or singing the national anthem. That is a different kind of pressure, one that lay heavy on the players.

The site is marked by the address Emauslaan 2, and the club still maintains its own website.