Month: January 2015

The South was stable and more competitive. No clear favourite here and no license problems. Five clubs competed for promotion – at least judging by the final table. At the bottom there were no hopeless outsiders. There was dividing line, however – 5 points separated 9th from 10th placed teams: half of the league was clearly stronger than the lower half. Some ‘exotic’ members, like in the North – they were relegated. FC Hannau 93 (17th), KSV Baunatal (19th). The other two were the former first division member Borussia (Neunkirchen) – last, and FC Augsburg – better known today, but not at all in the 1970s – which finished 18th. Some clubs played a bit of top league football – Kickers (Offenbach), now in decline, was better known, but the only ‘big’ name was TSV 1860 (Munich). There was a league derby – Freiburger FC and SC Freiburg. Neither team was strong.

SC Freiburg – little known in the 1970s, not even dreaming of playing in first division. 15th place, 3 points ahead of relegation zone, and bellow their local rivals Freiburger FC, which ended 13th with 1 point more.

There were also second teams from cities having big clubs in the Bundesliga – FSV Frankfurt and Stuttgarter Kickers.

Stuttgarter Kickers ended the stronger half of the league – 9th with 41 points. Like FSV Frankfurt, they were regular members of 2nd Bundesliga, unable to look higher. Yet, they managed to outdo FSV Frankfurt and play a little among the best – but that was in the future. The 2nd Bundesliga was seemingly designed for clubs like that – too big for semi-professional and amateur regional leagues, but too small for top division. They were just comfortable in the second tier of German football – the two mentioned above, SpVgg Greuther Furth, Wormatia Worms…

Standing from left: Trainer Baldauf, Pankotsch Klump, Bergmann, Kastner, Löwer, Kirschner, Geyer, Heinlein, Vizepräs. Liebold,

Sitting: Schäfer, Rütten, Hinterberger, Grabmeier, Lausen, Bulut, Lambie, Grimm, Heubeck.

SpVgg Greuther Furth finished 4th – good season for them.

Wormatia came even closer to promotion – 3rd place. Three points short from direct promotion, and only 2 points behind the silver medalists. They also had a star player – the former Yugoslavian national team central defender Dragoslav Stepanovic. ‘Stepi’, now 30-years old, came from Eintracht (Frankfurt), where he played well for two years. May be getting too old and going down? May be not – he was key player this season and Manchester City paid 140 000 pounds for him. Still a star – not everyday old players go from second division to the toughest championship in the world. Wormatia, however, would stay in second division.

TSV 1860 Munich won the league – it was not easy, but they did it. A single point more than the closest pursuer. It was nice – after all, they won the Bundesliga back in the 1960s. They were bigger than Bayern once upon a time.

Third row, from left: Alfred Kohlhäufl, Franz Gerber, Klaus Vöhringer, Herbert Scheller, Alfred Herberth, Wunder, Masseur Springer.

Middle row: Trainer Heinz Lucas, Wolfgang Metzler, Hans Fischl, Ahmet Glavovic, Hans Haunstein, Neumann, Beppo Hofeditz, Schneider, Manager Ettlinger.

Sitting: Anton Nachreiner, Dieter Agatha, Willy Bierofka, Manfred Eiben, Bernhard Hartmann, Jan-Hoiland Nielsen, Rudolf Sturz, Georg Metzger.

No stars here, but champions anyhow. Two foreigners, well respected, but not big names – the Yugoslav Ahmet ‘Glavo’ Glavovic, who was part of the strong team of Velez (Mostar) before joining TSV 1860, and the occasional Danish national team midfielder Jan-Hoiland Nielsen. But foreigners were not unusual in any level of West German football and it was not because of them TSV 1860 won. Going up was nice, especially after years of second division football. May be the decline of TSV 1860 was coming to end. Well, they needed stronger new players for that, but at least were returning to top flight.

SpVgg Bayreuth finished second – unusually strong season for practically unknown club. Bayreuth is known for music, not football. May be the spirit of Wagner helped.

The boys missed direct promotion, but had one more chance – the play-off against the second placed team in the Northern league. Their opponents looked like favourites – at least, they had Bundesliga experience. A single season, but still experience. The contest between the runner-ups was tough: the first leg in Bayreuth was 1-1 tie. At home, Bayer 05 prevailed 2-1.

The Aspirins won the last promotion. Experience or money? Does not matter – Bayreuth was not going to taste first division football and Bayer 05 was going to have a second try.

West Germany at the top of European football – exciting championship, almost at the entertaining level of the English league, high scores, money, organization, stadiums, stars, everything. Bundesliga had it all, not so at the second level, but it was going strong on its own right. 40 teams, divided into two leagues in the Second Bundesliga.

2 Bundesliga Nord. Few former members of Bundesliga, none a big name.

Perhaps Rot Weiss (Essen) was the best known club here, already fading into obscurity. 8th this season.

A few entirely unknown clubs, hardly noticed outside Germany and just happy to play professional football for awhile: DSC Wanne-Eickel (13th), Rot Weiss (Ludenscheid) (19th). Most of the league was made of smaller clubs with somewhat recognizable names, but clearly unable of anything bigger than second-tier football. Some eventually disappeared from sight – like Viktoria (Koln).

So far, Koln was a big football centre – 3 teams in the two professional leagues was more than almost any other German city. A local derby was – and is – a German rarity, but Koln had it at the time – Fortuna vs Viktoria. Did not last very long – Viktoria was already sinking down – 16th this season.

Most members of the league were similar in one thing – it was hard to imagine them in the top league.

Alemannia (Aachen) – a typical Second Bundesliga member. 7th this season. Many, many years later they climbed up, but in the 1970s looked like the Second Bundesliga was made for clubs like that – modest professional clubs. Which was even a trouble for Bundesliga Nord: some clubs had difficulties even playing there. Wacker 04 (West Berlin) finished last – nothing surprising, but the three teams just ahead of them were lucky – Westfalia (Herne) had a good season and finished 5th, but money was short… the club voluntarily returned their license for the following season and was relegated. A place bellow Westfalia finished St. Pauli (Hambourg). They tasted Bundesliga football short time ago and seemingly played well… but they also lacked money. The Federation did not grant them license for the next season. Thus, the 5th, the 6th, and the 20th in the final table were relegated to the regional leagues.

The Northern league was problematic since formation – poorer and consequently even the winners were not looked upon with any hope. Few clubs competed for the second place, but there was only one favourite. It was the year of the ‘Aspirins’ – a matter of stable money. Bayer (Uerdingen) finished 2nd with 53 points, 2 more than Preussen (Munster). But they did not challenge the other Bayer , which won the championship with 59 points.

A great success – Leverkusen won 24 matches, tied 11, and lost only 3. Supreme goal-difference too – 87:34. Going up to join the top division for the first time. Their ‘brothers’ from Uerdingen already played a bit of first division football and judging from this experience, perhaps nothing was expected from Leverkusen. But it was only the beginning of great success story – this ‘Aspirins’ did not taste second division football after their victory in 1978-79.

 

 

Traditional English football was alive – thanks to the cup tournaments. Both cup finals were attended by 100 000 fans each and were entertaining. Liverpool did not reach either final. Lowly Woolverhampton Wanderers and 3rd Division Watford played at the semi-finals. Neither was easily eliminated. Southampton and Nottingham Forest apposed each other at the Football League Cup final. Peach and Holmes scored for Southampton. Woodcock and Birtles scored for Nottingham. But Birtles scored 2 goals – and Forest prevailed 3-2.

Southampton was not much – they finished 14th in the championship and were typical English formation: one great veteran – Alan Ball, one or two current or rising stars – Chris Nicholl and Phil Boyer. A ‘continental’ addition,which apparently settled well – Ivan Golac. The Yugoslavian was the first of the new imports to reach a final. Southampton played heartily, but were unable to win the cup.

Nottingham Forest prevailed – it was not an easy victory, but it was theirs. Second League Cup in two years. One more trophy – a club without any just two years ago was quickly building a collection. So far, Brian Clough was more successful with Nottingham than with Derby County early in the decade. His finest years, apparently.

The FA Cup final opposed traditional foes – Arsenal and Manchester United. Both teams looked inferior in the championship, but excelled in the cup, thus actually showing that English traditions were alive. Competitive final too – McQueen and McIllroy scored for ManUnited; Talbot, Stapleton,and Sunderland for Arsenal. 3-2 Arsenal and the Cup was theirs.

Dave Sexton’s United was good team, yet… somewhat unfinished, somewhat transitional. Impressive names, but some were getting too old to lead the team (Buchan, Macari) or failed to become the stars they promised to be few years back (Houston, Brian and Jimmy Greenhoff, Albiston, Pearson). And yet few others were just good, but clearly did not have really big potential (Roche, Thomas). There was a skeleton for the future – McIllroy, McQueen, Jordan, Nicholl, Bailey, Moran, lead by wonderful Steve Coppell – but this skeleton needed shaping and additional players. It was a team in between, rough, uncertain. Reaching a final was more or less the best these squad could do.

Arsenal, compared to Manchester United, was a tad better: Brady, Stapleton, and O’Leary were reaching their peak and were the obvious leaders of the team. Pat Jennings was fine between the posts. Rice, Price and Nelson were the old fading guard, but the team did not depend on them so much. Sunderland, Macdonald, Talbot were strong players – not superstars, but stars on their own right. Graham Rix was rapidly becoming one too. It was already made team, lead by players in their primes. It was not a team depending on aging veterans and searching for young talent to replace famous, but shaky by now feet. Well deserved victory.

Happy – and tired – winners. 5th FA Cup for the Gunners. They waited 8 years for that one. Had to wait 14 years for the next…