First Division. Nothing new here either – the expected outsiders went down, the winner was known in advance, the league was sharply cut into two halves…
First Division was clearly too much for BSG Motor (Suhl) – the newcomers won but a single match and received 92 goals in 26 championship games. 5 points in a year was new low even for such divided league.
BSG Chemie (Leipzig) had much bite than Motor, but they were not cup for top league football either – 13th with 17 points. So familiar… once again relegated, but very likely to come back for a short spell. The vicious circle.
BSG Stahl (Riesa) survived – 12th with 20 points – but it was not because they improved in some way. It was just that there were weaker teams, but it was still temporary escape – soon they will be back in Second Division, for sure.
Same thing for BSG Stahl (Brandenburg) – 11th with 20 points and good for one more season here, but no more than that. Top row from left: Eckart Märzke, Silvio Demuth, Rainer Fliegel, Karsten Heine, Christian Knoop, Holger Döbbel, Andreas Lindner.
Middle row: Trainer Heinz Werner, Frank Jeske, Siegfried Malyska, Jens Pahlke, Michael Schulz, Winfried Kräuter, Fred Krohn, Peter Schoknecht, Christoph Ringk, Co-Trainer Eckhard Düwiger.
Front row : Mannschaftsleiter Günter Boede, Roland Gumtz, Eberhard Janotta, Hubert Gebhardt, Holger Bahra, Gerhard Kraschina, Thomas Arendt, Physiotherapeut Gerd Meißner.
FC Hansa (Rostock) – 10th with 21 points. Avoiding relegation was their whole ambition and they succeeded.
FC Karl-Marx-Stadt – the usual. 9th with 21 points.
FC Vorwaerts (Frankfurt/Oder) – 8th with 22 points. Their brief revival proved only that it was not a real one. No leaders, not a threat to the established order – they sunk to the lower half of the league and were to stay there.
The crisis of FC Carl Zeiss (Jena) continued – 7th with 25 points. Top row from left: Volker Probst – Jürgen Raab – Thomas Ludwig – Stefan Meixner – Jörg Burow – Uwe Pohl
Middle row: Jürgen Werner(Trainer) – Thomas Schmiecher – Matthias Pittelkow – Heiko Peschke – Hans-Ulrich Grapenthin – Andreas Bielau – Andreas Krause – Gert Brauer – Lothar Kurbjuweit(Trainer)
Sitting: Wolfgang Schilling – Konrad Weise – Karsten Härtel – Perry Bräutigam – Ronald Szepanzki – Robby Zimmermann.
Carl Zeiss was at the border – above them was entirely different group of teams. As always, the league was cut in two separate groups.
FC Rot-Weiss (Erfurt) – 6th with 30 points. Way above the lowly teams bellow, but make no mistake: Rot-Weiss enjoyed strong period, yet, it was nothing more than mid-table team. Even when they were much stronger than most, they were at the bottom of the leading pack. More likely to go down a notch, than climbing up.
1. FC Magdeburg – they lost their edge, but only that. Becoming outsiders was not possible at all – 5th with 31 points.
BSG Wismut (Aue) – the pleasant surprise of the championship. 4th with 32 points. They had to enjoy their good fortune, for it was not going to be repeated – one time wonder they were.
1.FC Lokomotive (Leipzig) – 3rd with 38 points. No disappointment here, but nothing new either – Lokomotive stayed solid and among the best, but not able to come even close to winning a championship. Battle for 2nd place was the most they could do – they had to settle for bronze medals because of worse goal-difference.
SG Dynamo (Dresden) clinched 2nd place, beating Lokomotive on goal-difference. Well, realistically, this was the most they can do no matter what kind of squad they had.
One more title for BFC Dynamo (Berlin). 20 wins, 4 ties. Only 2 lost games. 90-28 goal-difference, 44 points. Dominant, having no rival, just going from one title to the next. It was well known they will win – it was known they will the next year too, everything was well known.