In the history of Danish football 1978 is very important: professionalism was introduced. The effect was not immediate – it was really long-term project. The Danish Federation reluctantly realized the changes in the game: it was not longer possible to sustain even relatively high quality amateur football. The direction was clear and inevitable. The Danes already took small steps – professional players were permitted to play for the national team since 1971. But it was half-measure at best – foreign-based players were rarely and reluctantly called and they were not very eager to don the Danish jersey for they were not paid for the trouble. The national team operated still on amateur basis – even coaches had no paying contracts. But reality was biting: amateur clubs had difficulties surviving. They were not getting money for the players joining foreign clubs, or they got very small compensation. It was increasingly difficult to develop good player in amateur structure – football was full-time job for very long time already and whoever wanted results needed to organize the whole structure professionally. The Federation resisted changes to the end, perhaps with some justified motifs: Danish clubs were old and not exclusively football clubs. The fan base was small, but loyal to their clubs, meaning it was not possible to forcefully amalgamate three or more clubs in otherwise small town into bigger and financially stable one. Denmark is a small and not particularly crazy about football country, so ambitious plans of creating a few mega-clubs was entirely unrealistic. The idea was never to make Danish clubs equal to British, Italian, Spanish, and West German clubs – the point was rather stabilizing the clubs, so they would be able to continue developing young talent and eventually getting income from transfers. It was mostly a matter of survival, not success. The most immediate impact was felt by 1982 and it involved the national team: the change in 1978 helped the national team with a big sponsor – the famous brewery Carlsberg – and thanks to the cash coming from the beer makers the Federation hired in 1979 fully professional coach – the West German Sepp Pionteck. And foreign-based players became the core of the new national team: now it was easy to call them to play for the country – travel expenses and bonuses were paid. But the change was not fully based on the Federation’s good will – they were also forced on it. Voices in favour of professionalism were not new and one of the most vocal belonged to Harald Nielsen, one of the all-time greatest Danish players. A big star in the 1960s, he played in Italy for Bologna, Napoli, and Sampdoria. Injury ended his career at 29 and he returned to Denmark. Nielsen was more than advocate of professionalism – he was involved in the pirate professional league as well. It was a classic problem, although coming very late to Denmark – in most countries the split happened before 1930, inevitably forcing federations to accept professionalism. It was a battle between legal body insisting on ‘purity’ vs clubs contracting players and organizing their own ‘rogue’ championship. As a rule of thumb, the best clubs were more than willing to go to the rogues and the Federation was almost left with no choice: the rebels were more attractive to the top players and fans were quickly following. The quality was higher among professionals, it was that simple – and nobody cared that they were ‘illegal’ and banished for life from the ‘official’ body. Not every club was in favour of that, but the results were clear – the best talent was abandoning the amateur clubs. The stand off always ended with quick legalization of professionalism – Denmark was no exception. On the surface, nothing changed at first: the league remained exactly as it was. Former ‘pirate’ clubs rather disappeared. If anything, Danes were level-headed and cool – they were not looking for some immediate results, but for long-term stability and gradual improvement. No club went on shopping spree or declared sudden ambitions of becoming a mega-club. Most likely the change helped the youth systems of the clubs. Finding money was perhaps the biggest concern – sponsorship was nothing new in Denmark, but it was not very lucrative. More or less, the real concern was finding the best way of using limited resources. Nothing fancy, just a careful long-term project – Europe hardly noticed the big change and the first noticeable thing was the national team. Four years later! Stronger Danish clubs were noticed and recognized probably around 1985-86, but it was mostly healthy recognition that Danish clubs were no longer an automatically easy opponent. As for the first professional season, it was hardly different from the old amateur ones.
Before anything else, a bit of trivia, illustrating the fundamental problem Danish football was facing, professional or not: money. Shirt adds were introduced years before, but nothing changed just because the clubs were now professional. Some were unable to get sponsors. Others had to improvise. Perhaps the following picture is unique: shirt adds are uniform, right?
IK Skovbakken (Aarhus) was not able to get enough money from a single sponsor. There were at least two other clubs in the city… which is not big… so the club had to be creative.
The players are not important here: 10 firms advertise on 11 players. Looking like sponsoring individual players, not the club – and it may have been that. Air Marine is apparently the biggest sponsor, having their name on the chests of two players. ‘Ford’ equal to ‘Royal Stake House’, most likely just a local restaurant. Most likely no other club ever displayed such strange photo, but it is an acute illustration of the deep problem of Danish football: money. Hard to get… Skovbakken finished 9th… not a place making sponsors willing to invest.
But Skovbakken was at least out of relegation zone. Three clubs were going down – to be replaced by the second division winners.
AaB Aalborg – also referred to as AaB Fodbold and Aalborg BK – was an up and down club. So far, the club won the Cup twice – in 1966 and 1970 – but slipped again to second division. Professionalism sounded fine, but Danish football was really semi-professional: it was up to the individual clubs to decide when, if at all, to become fully professional. In the case of AaB – 1987.
Traditionally shaky newcomers or returnees – at least they had seemingly better sponsor, judging by the uniform adds on their shirt.
The next promoted club was Ikast fS.
Another club with meaningless name outside Denmark – no trophies, no regular first division record, nothing.
Good for them going up and good luck in the new environment.
The last promotion went to club with more or less familiar name.
Hvidovre IF – a relatively young club by Danish standards, founded in 1925. Champions twice, the last time in 1973 – thanks to their brief participation in the European Champions Cup, the name was known, but like almost every Danish club a success one year did not mean stable performance later. Hvidovre were relegated and now were coming back.
There was no telling what impact Hvidovre would have on the first division – but this was true for the other promoted clubs and for the whole Danish football as well.