1966 amidst Franco-Alsatian controversies. More recently, the club has been eager to promote its European vocation along with its strong local ties. In April 2021, the club partnered up with French Esport organization Team Vitality for the FIFA eLigui 1, marking their first step into competitive Esports. History Foundation and early years (1906–1945) The club was founded in 1906 by a group of youngsters in the Neudorf neighbourhood of what was then Straßburg, Elsaß-Lothringen, in the German Empire, but is today Strasbourg, Alsace, in France. With the help of their primary-school teacher, they formed a team called "Erster Fußball Club Neudorf", commonly named "FC Neudorf". At that time, the new 1. FCN was a minor club in a then-remote southern part of the Strasbourg area. Local football had been dominated since the 1890s by the more central and elitist Straßburger Fußball Verein. According to club historian Pierre Perny, the official establishment of the FC Neudorf in 1907 may well have been accelerated by the planned move of FC Frankonia to the Haemmerle Garten, a large park in southern Strasbourg close to the Neudorf. As its name told, FC Frankonia was mainly composed of German-born immigrants from the Franconia region of southwest Germany – some of them soldiers – living in central and northern Strasbourg, while FC Neudorf had clearly Alsatian, popular roots. FC Neudorf joined the southern German league in 1909, starting at its lowest level, Division C. They captured the Division C championship three years later, earning promotion to Division B. In 1914, FC Neudorf was able to evict rivals Frankonia from the Haemmerle Garten for a rent of 300 marks a year. This location would later become the site of the Stade de la Meinau, where the club still plays today. In the aftermath of World War I, the territory of Alsace-Lorraine came back to France and, on 11 January 1919, the club adopted the name "Racing-Club Strasbourg-Neudorf" until becoming simply "Racing Club de Strasbourg" later in the year. The use of the word "Racing" does not denote any association with horse- or car-racing; instead, it is an anglicism that was common in France at the time, as exemplified by the case of the then-famous Racing Club de France, which was a symbolical inspiration for Strasbourg's Racing as Alsace was reintegrated within France. The word is usually pronounced in French ("Le Racing") or in Alsatian ("D'Racing") without any