TUBIZE, Belgium — There is something incongruous about the pregame razzmatazz at the Stade Leburton, about Michael Buffer’s catchphrase — “Let’s get ready to rumble!” — crackling out of the loudspeakers, and the pulsing, earsplitting techno soundtrack that follows.
Tubize’s greatest claim to fame in soccer is as the hometown of Eden Hazard — the Chelsea star grew up just a few streets away — and its second is as the site of the Belgian soccer federation’s training base. Its 64-year-old club, A.F.C. Tubize, ranks a distant third.
There are only a thousand or so fans here today, for the opening game of the Belgian second division season, and many of them are housed in one of only two permanent grandstands.