Last weekend saw the 50th anniversary match of the Baltic FC playing the Danish Shipbrokers DRFB FC in Copenhagen. Alongside the 1st XI game, teams of veterans and super vets from each side also played in honour of the historic ties of friendship that have existed between the London and Danish based shipping communities for decades if not centuries! David De Rosa of David Bruce, from the London side presented Nils Ole Andersen of Ultrabulk in Denmark, with a crystal plaque commemorating both this long standing fixture between the two sides as well as the 75 year anniversary of the DRFB’s foundation which is also this year.

The London based Baltic guests were treated to an extremely generous weekend by the Danes which Captain Adam Cook thanked them for at the dinner hosted by the DRFB players on Saturday night. He thanked Nils and Kenni Hiesiger of TORM for arranging the weekend and Ultrabulk specifically for their kindness in hosting the welcome party on Friday evening at their offices with games of pool, table tennis, other types of pong laid on, along with bounteous food and drinks. He also thanked the other side for hosting the game and post-game lunch that day. Cook went on to thank Hiesiger who the Baltic team nominated ‘Man of the Match’ and captained the 1st DRFB team, for his drive to maintain this fixture and in particular bringing his side to London in 2016, attributing that trip with reinvigorating the connection between the two sides, during what was a very difficult period for some markets.

In the football; the Baltic XI team were victorious on the pitch for the first time in a decade winning 3-0 owing to goals from Shibu (Marubeni), Tom Buckley (GFI) who was named man of the match by DRFB and some fancy Italian footwork with a goal from Andrea Bologna (Howe Robinson). The DRFB vets team managed to get the better of the Baltic before an amazingly entertaining 5 a side game between the supervets, with a ping-pong-like tally and some incredible shots pebble dashing the cross-bar from Adam Bastin (GFI) amongst others.

Full match reports from these games will be published soon and a selection of photos from this glorious weekend can be found on the Baltic’s Flickr account here.