Football | Bohemian adventures

The club crest at the Juliska Stadium Photo: imago/CTK Photo When September sends its mild light, it's time to head to Prague to pay attention to the beloved Juliska. The home of the current second division team Dukla Prague, or rather its fantastic location on a hill on the northwestern edge of the city, particularly delights the tired travelers on an evening when, exhausted from the journey, they take a seat in the stands to completely immerse themselves in the illuminated pearl of Bohemia.

The Stadion na Julisce consists of a large covered grandstand with a view of the city, the other stadium buildings can be neglected, everything is concentrated on the spacious grandstand. Tourists and Dukla fans are chilling with the Klobasa in their left hand and a fine Prague beer in the right, while below the red and yellow Dukla kickers are storming the opponent's hut in a somewhat passable manner.

Frank Willmann looks at the football between Leipzig, Łódź and Ljubljana.

As always when in Prague, I was traveling with my travel companion Ecki, who knows almost everything about Czech football and Prague. From 1948 onwards, Dukla was the pampered flagship club of the Czechoslovak Army. After the gentle revolution and the end of Czechoslovakia, the military's interest cooled down, and now Dukla is only number four in Prague. Nevertheless, there is a small fan base that was busy drumming and singing about Dukla's heroic deeds on the occasion of our visit.

Ecki has a tiny NVA trauma of his own since he had to guard this and that with his grandfather Kalashnikov in East Berlin for a few years wearing a stone gray costume. In this respect, I treat his occasionally bubbling military enthusiasm with indulgence, especially since the main target the next day was to be Bohemians Prague's Ďolíček Stadium. Ecki has been a fan of the green and white Bohemka for as long as he can remember, to whom, along with Chemie Leipzig, half his heart belongs. Of course he has season tickets for both clubs.

We were really looking forward to the next day, but unfortunately while watching Dukla we received the bitter news that the game would be canceled because the opponent would be suffering from flatulence and worse. Horror & horror! Spejbl and Hurvínek again! Three green-yellow Becherovka!

Of course, Ecki had an alternative idea with Pardubice. In the hometown of the legendary Czech plastic explosives Semtex, we wanted to see the explosives masters take on the upstarts Artis Brno in the Czech Republic's top division. Military experts versus artists, yeah. Ecki saluted, I breathed “Soldiers are murderers!” and sang little white doves of peace. Ecki smiled mildly and inspected the situation with a commander's eye.

In a duel: The artists from Brno with Adam Carlen (l.) against the demolition experts from Pardubice with Daniel Smekal. Photo: imago/CTK Photo/David Tanecek The next day we boarded the train and headed for Pardubice. Travel squad Ecki consolingly promised a city tour lasting several hours, which was accomplished with flying colors. The evening before we took the stadium by storm, I enjoyed another Klobasa while Ecki was preparing for a late dinner in Prague. The artists (who certainly weren't) won against the demolitionists (who certainly weren't), we watched the spectacle from the stands and showed a lot of forbearance in judging the two days of meager football fare.

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