There’s a story about a Christian Egyptian man named Maurice: a soldier in the Roman army during the second half of the second century who became the commander of what was known as the Theban legion and was executed because he refused to kill other Christians. He became a martyr, then a saint. At the location where he was killed an abbey was built, and later a town that bear his name.
The announcement in the train is not telling all of this, it’s only saying: Prochain arrêt Saint-Maurice, Nächster Halt Saint-Maurice, Next Stop Saint-Maurice, which means the same thing in French, German and English. Which in return means one thing: the train has now arrived in Valais.
Valais, or more formally the Canton du Valais, or Wallis, is one of the twenty-six Swiss canton, specifically the third largest in area, approximately the size of Delaware, for a population of 350 thousand. Mostly known for its mountains and valleys, it looks like the idea most people have of what Switzerland is. It’s postcard Switzerland: the Matterhorn — of, among other things, Toblerone fame — one of the forty-six summits above 4,000 meters (or the seventeen above 140,000 ft, depending on the unit systems and the symbols associated) is often told to be the most photographed mountain in the world. It is also a bilingual Canton (hence the name Wallis, in German), French being spoken in the western part, called Bas-Valais, and German in the eastern part, called Oberwallis, respectively lower and upper Valais.
All of this, at least for Swiss people, is basic knowledge. What most people don’t know, even all the tourists coming each year for the aforementioned mountains and valleys is that the two biggest towns in Oberwallis are called Brig and Visp, home to respectively 14,000 and 9,000 inhabitants, each with a club in the Swiss Second Interregional Football League, which despite its name is the 6th division. The towns are only separated by ten kilometers along the Rhône River, and most importantly, at least for me, because this is the reason I woke up this morning and decided to seat myself in a train going there, they are the birthplaces of all FIFA presidents since 1998, all meaning here, both: Sepp Blatter and Gianni Infantino.
The IR95 train to Brig left on time at 08h24 from Geneva, it follows the water, first the Geneva Lake, then the Rhône River, from West to East. There are, among others, stops in Nyon, where UEFA is headquartered, and Gianni Infantino, had its first contacts with fame, as the bald guy from the Champions League’s Draws, a position officially known as Secretary General of the organization. Then Lausanne, where the IOC is headquartered. You may have heard about chocolate, watches, and cheese, hosting International Sports Organizations is another Swiss specialty: FIFA headquarters are in Zürich, but you have to take another line to go there. The train continues along the Lake, croissant shaped. It is early Spring in Switzerland, the sun shines on the snow which seems well rigged to the summits, and on the lake. Seeing it like through the train window, there is a desire to swim but the sun is a trap, the air and water are still cold. At the end of the Lake, the train starts to follow the Rhône River and will not leave it until the terminus.
From the lake, the Rhône goes to southeast, then make a bend to the east. The Rhône valley is at the heart of the Valais, whose name comes from the latin vallis, meaning, you guessed it, valley. After the bend of the river, it’s a straight line through the valley, a straight line along the A9 Highway, where everyone is driving 20 km/h faster than the limit, through the fruit trees — apricots from Valais are famous —and vineyards. It is among the sunniest places in the country, the moutains acting as natural barrier against the clouds, who rarely pass above them.
At 10h19, the train stops in Sion, the Canton Capital and home to the only football club from Valais playing in the Super League, the Swiss first division: FC Sion, know for its thirteen Cup victories, the same number as the thirteen stars on the Valais Flag. Like the other famous flag with stars on it, each star represents a district, meaning the flag has changed through time. The FC Sion hasn’t won the Cup (or the League, for the matter, but no French speaking team as won in the 21st century) since 2015, its longest drought ever, and maybe they need to add a district and a star to be able to win a fourteenth title and restore the balance. I would prefer if they didn’t. I was born in Geneva and raised less than a mile from the stadium where their biggest rivals, the Servette FC, play, so it’s not hard to guess which side I’m rooting for.
The FC Sion is also known for its president Christian Constantin, who could be considered the archetype of a certain kind of Valaisan, known mostly for the more than sixty managers he signed, then fired in the 21st century, including Gennaro Gattuso, of wining the 2006 World Cup and then not qualifying Italy to the 2026 World Cup fame, and two Swiss national team managers. Another one of his signature move is transfers that make the headlines but do not produce much on the field, among them: Gennaro Gattuso (as a player), Mario Balotelli, and the brother of Ronaldinho.
After Sierre, the order of the languages in the train announcements changes: German first, then French and English. You cannot see the language barrier (unless you read the signs) but you can hear it. At last, we hear: Nächster Halt Brig, End station, Prochain arrêt Brigue, Terminus. Next station, Brig, Terminus. The train arrives on time at 11h02. From there, you cannot really continue straight. There are only smaller regional trains going up the mountains, or trains going under the mountains in tunnels to the Cantons of Uri and Bern or Italy. When you’ve gone as far, you can only go back.
Terminus Brig. Gianni Infantino was born here in 1970, the son of Italian immigrants. In front of the train station, perpendicular to the rails is — as is the case of most Swiss German towns and cities — the Bahnhofstrasse (Train station street), usually the main street of a town or city, leading to the old part of town. It’s quiet, except for the tourists and the sound of their rolling luggage on the cobblestones. It’s around midday, and on the main square, every restaurant terrace is full, people enjoying the sun, wanting to believe that the winter is over. There are still heaps of snow waiting to melt across the square.
The stadium is a bit outside the town next to the river Saltina, a tributary of the Rhône, and the municipal pool. The pool is empty and there are construction works all around the field. Through a wire fence, I see the grass and a sign: Platz gesperrt (Field closed). In 2017, in his first year as FIFA president, a Gala Match was organized in celebration of Gianni Infantino: Clarence Seedorf, Alessandro del Piero and Maradona played there. It’s on this same field that the FC Brig-Glis plays its home game in the Second Regional League against other amateur teams from Valais, amongst them Visp. Last time they played each other they won 2-1. A ticket to a game is eight Swiss franc (10 USD, but it has changed a lot these past few years), a beer is four. The Bratwurst mit Pommes (grilled sausage with fries) is ten. A tarp is tied to another fence, it looks beaten up by the years of sun and snow: the team thanks the true fans for the support.
On the way back, I stop at the castle, whose three onion domes can be seen from everywhere in town. Built in the 17th century by a rich silk merchant, Kaspar Stockalper, it is the main attraction of the town. I sit on a bench in the garden in front of the castle. On the bin, there are FC Sion Ultras stickers. As the only Super League club, their territory encompasses the whole Canton, over the language barrier. I go back to the station and take the next train to Visp.
For tourists, Visp may only be the place where you have to change trains to go to Zermatt. As Zermatt sees two hundred times more hotel nights than Visp has inhabitants, statistically, on average, Visp IS only the place where you change train. But there’s more than statistics. There is what the numbers tell you, and what you see on the field.
Like in Brig, I go through the Bahnhofstrasse. My first stop is the Primaschulhaus Sepp Blatter (the House of the primary school) . In front of it are two small football fields. The ground is concrete; there are goalposts but no nets. It is not the school that is named after him, a man mostly known for the scandals associated with his presidency, but the building in which the school, or part of it, is. The building and not the school. There is maybe a metaphor there — or is it a metonymy? — about football and where it is housed. But symbols and meanings do not interest me, I just want to see things as they stand, as they are, here in those small towns in the middle of both nowhere and Switzerland.
This is where Blatter went to school, between the 1930s and 40s. Did he play football there and then? The goalposts are definitively newer, the concrete ground as well. What did it look like when young Sepp was just a kid from Oberwallis playing football during recess and after school. He played for the FC Visp, starting when he was a junior through his thirties, the stadium is my next stop. On the way I pass under the rails, on the walls, graffitis of FC Sion Ultras. I see another school, and others’ fields, this time there’s grass and nets. But the school playground is empty, and no one is playing.
The football field is a football field. There is also a fence around it. A few standing bleachers and the gardener is taking care of the grass. There is also a sign, reminding parents of juniors that this is only a sport, and that they’re here to have fun. Also: this is not the World Cup. On a lamppost next to the stadium, there are the remains of ripped stickers, traces of things gone. This is also a story of territory. Teams opposing each other on the field, fans on the space of the city. There is no apparent link between those two sleepy towns and the world of international football, but there are also signs everywhere for those with eyes to see them.
I keep going along the local tributary, the Vispa, until it joins the Rhône. There’s a sign giving distances: 59km to the Rhône glacier where it takes spring, 109 km to Lake Geneva. After the Lake, the Rhône keeps going for more than 500km in France, until it reaches its endpoint in the Mediterranean Sea. For now, the river is small and not very strong. In a few weeks, the snow will melt on all the surrounding mountains, and it will grow. A bit further up the river, on the banks, I see the Lonza factory: it’s the region’s biggest employer, Blatter’s father worked there, it’s one of the sponsors of the FC Visp. It’s a biochemical and pharmaceutical company. There were cases of water pollution: mercury, aniline and benzene were found around. There’s definitely something in the water: whether it’s pure alpine minerals or chemical pollution.
Then, I can only go back. There was a desire to keep following the river to the glacier, but the mountain pass is still closed because of the snow. My thoughts go one more time to those two sleepy towns. They look alike, both wedged between the Rhone and a smaller tributary river. Each with its sixth division football team and its FIFA President.
It shows something that is not always clear for outside eyes. Switzerland is a place with often two contradictory things happening at the same time. It’s two picturesque old towns in the middle of a postcard landscape. And then, behind the varnish, behind the facade, something darker. Like chemical pollution on an alpine river. Bad governance and corruption stories.
Gianni Infantino once said, in a speech where he tried to answer all the controversies of the last World Cup in Qatar, that he felt Qatari, Arab, African, gay, disabled, migrant worker. He didn’t say that he felt from Oberwallis. Maybe he doesn’t. It’s hard to picture going from here to the biggest stages in the world, giving the World Cup to Messi, and a Peace Prize to Trump. There’s maybe another story to be told here: about drive and motivation, about believing in your dreams, from rags to riches, all these kinds of things. Maybe it’s a prejudice, but I think of this story as a typical American Story: you can start in a place where the sound you hear the most is the river flowing and arrive at the top of the world. But I’m a Swiss writer, and I’m forced to write Swiss stories. Between the bucolic valleys and the alpine rivers, I can only see the corruption and the scandals. There’s maybe another story to be told here: I’m not the one to do it.
On my way back to the train station, I pass once again to the school, where the goals have nets and the playing field is grass. There are a dozen kids, half of them trying to run in a direction, the other half going the opposite way, and in between a ball: kids playing football.