Dender

Denderleeuw sits on the river that gives the region its name. Verbroedering Denderhoutem, registered with the Belgian football association in 1935, later joined by Denderleeuw's own club and by Eendracht Hekelgem. The 2001 merger of the last two produced FC Denderleeuw EH, and in 2005 that side folded into Denderhoutem to form FCV Dender EH — a club that kept the 1935 registration number and, with it, the right to count that year as its start.

The football has mostly played out below the top flight, promotion and relegation between the third and second tiers rather than sustained time among the elite. The one occasion Dender reached deeper into the Belgian Cup, in 1998-99 as Denderleeuw EH, it beat Anderlecht in the last sixteen before losing to Lokeren. Second-tier titles came in 2006-07 and, after two lower-division championships either side, a runners-up finish in 2023-24 kept the club in that division rather than sending it back down.

None of that carries the weight of the fixture against Eendracht Aalst, a few kilometres down the same river. Denderstreek derby games run hot enough that in January 2016 a 4-4 draw between the two ended with the match halted after trouble on the terraces. It is the one occasion each season when the table goes out of the window and the result matters more than where either side sits in it.

The club now plays at the Dender Football Complex, the ground once known as Florent Beeckmanstadion, holding just over 8,500 in a mix of seats and standing space — a stadium that has outlasted the names of the clubs that have used it, much as the 1935 registration number outlasted every merger that followed.