• The Lille Université Club (LUC) celebrates its 100th anniversary with great pomp, from Saturday.

  • The 3rd largest sports club in France wants to show that it still counts in the sporting landscape of the Lille metropolis.

The Lille Université Club (LUC) is celebrating its 100th anniversary with great pomp.

The 3rd largest sports club in France wants to show that it still counts in the sporting landscape of the metropolis.

To launch the festivities, which will last all year, a day of entertainment is organized, Saturday, from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., on the Place de la République, in Lille.

The opportunity to discover the 30 sections and sports activities, in particular those which evolve in elite: water polo whose women's team has dominated France for a few years (seven titles), handibasket, badminton or even hockey-sur -grass.

Towards a professional structure?

A success which today raises the question of a possible mutation.

“We are first and foremost a university club and the growing number of students reduces the availability of our slots to the general public.

In addition, it is necessary to juggle sport for all and the elite ”, explains Sandrine Lemeiter, general director of LUC.

With no less than 8,500 members, management is complicated.

"The professionalization of certain sections is expensive and must not endanger the life of the whole club", specifies Sandrine Lemeiter.

The LUC had to separate from the rugby section about twenty years ago.

“We could no longer follow,” she admits.

The project to create a professional structure is therefore on the table.

A golden age from the 1960s

A further step in the life of this club, founded in 1921 by students as an association.

"It is the opening to the general public, in the 1960s that allowed the club to experience a golden age until 2000. There were more than 10,000 members at that time," slips the director.

To close this centenary year, the LUC will organize in June 2022, the 2nd edition of the Lille corporate challenge, inter-company sports meetings.

The LUC sports garden threatened The LUC threatened by a regime without a hall

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