In the rural Mater, part of Oudenaarde, life goes on with nothing but peace and quiet. They did have to wait until 1971 before they had their own football team though. Racing Mater filled the vacancy that year.
Most likely, the name Mater won't ring any bells at all. But when we say it's a part of Oudenaarde, many more bells will start to ring. In terms of surface, Mater is the biggest of all the boroughs. You'd say it has plenty of space to have football fields. But still it took until 1971 before a first club started.
That's when Racing Mater was created. Unlike many other teams, they didn't join the Belgian FA immediately. In fact, there is very little information to be found about the club in those first few years. We can only assume they had joined a smaller and local FA. But after 15 years Racing Mater felt it was time to take a big step. In 1986 they eventually became an official member of the Belgian FA after all.
Ever since they have been playing their games in the regional leagues. The national divisions seem very far away, and we'd be amazed if those divisions would actually be their ambition at the moment. This year Racing Mater is active in the lowest regional league. But the club is alive and kicking. In 2017, it looked like their story could have taken a completely different direction. There were many rumours that they would cease activities after their neighbour KFC Nederename did exactly that.
Luckily Racing Mater didn't follow KFC Nederename's example and managed to continue. They basically made sure they could celebrate their 50th anniversary in 2021. And it seems there's no dark cloud anywhere near. We truly hope Racing Mater and their charming ground continues to give football pleasure to the people of Mater for at least as many years to come
If you want to enjoy our articles in Dutch, you can read them here.
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