Bundesliga review part 2. the new one :)

[Tugay One Cup]

I had an amazing trip last week - ticked off some new grounds and met some new friends.

I started in Hamburg. St Pauli 1v3 FSV Frankfurt

Day 2 and my first trip to the East, for Hansa Rostock 0v2 Erzgebirge Aue

Day 3;
Game 1 - Arminia Bielefeld 1v1 Paderborn

Game 2 - Hannover 0v1 Augsburg

Day 4 - Fortuna Düsseldorf 1v1 Nürnberg

Day 5- No live game as I was traveling to Kiev from Dortmund

Day 6 - Dynamo Kyiv 1v3 Manchester City

Day 7 - Travelled back from Kiev to Dortmund, and couldn't get back early enough for Schalke unfortunately.

Day 8 Paderborn 0v1 RB Leipzig

Day 9 - Werder Bremen 2v2 Darmstadt

Day 10 - Liverpool 1v1(p) Manchester City

Obviously really enjoyed the two City results in there, but Kiev especially as I had managed to get into hospitality, so free beer, wine, & food.

In terms of the German games, I really enjoyed St Pauli, Bielefeld, Düsseldorf, and Bremen. Bremen is one of my favourite German cities so far I'd say.

I didn't see the home team win once on the trip and when you add that to the last couple of City home games - Leicester and Spurs, it means its been ages since I've seen a home win. So I'm a little nervous for City v Villa tomorrow!

I'm up to 30 German grounds in total now and 16/18 current Bundesliga grounds - just Wolfsburg and Darmstadt to go. Without being too presumptious, if we get through to the Quarter Finals (and we should), I'm desperately hoping for Wolfsburg. Not sure whether I'll be satisfied with completing the Bundesliga or whether I'll then feel I have to try to complete 'The 56'.

Fuck me, you're not exactly a lucky charm for home teams! Pretty jealous of your travels though. I should hopefully be at the Camp Nou a week today and then back just in time for the Kiev game, that's about as much travelling as I can muster.

 

[Alex - City Matters]

Tennis Borussia had some financial breakdowns. They have loyal group of supporters, around 800, kind of a St.Pauli type of fans with political left ideas. Except that they also live the jewish tradition and history of the club.

Union Berlin was the club of the outsiders of the GDR communist system. These days they play the part of the anti-western, anti-capitalist and anti-modern-Football-club. The fans once saved the club from bankruptcy and modernized parts of the stadium with their own work. They also own parts of the stadium. So that is why they have this reputation of being fans owned and doing more for their fans than other clubs.

Hertha was down in 3rd division, before the wall came down (which meant playing in West-Berlin with local non-professional clubs). Until 1997 they played mostly Bundesliga 2, often with less than 10,000 fans in the large Olympic stadium. East german football fans had mostly a favorite team in the west, but that was Bayern or Schalke or HSV. Not Hertha. After the wall came down, east germans drove to the west to see their teams, not to Berlin, even when the city was much nearer.

Also i once read that after reunification there was an exchange of nearly 1 million people in Berlin. Berliners leaving the city, new people came. Most of them staying loyal to their teams. You find nearly for all Bundesliga clubs a pub in Berlin with fans in exile.

Football also doesn´t play such a big role in the culture of the city. In Dortmund or Gelsenkirchen it is all about football. 1.FC Köln belongs to Cologne like Carnival and Kölsch beer. Bayern has a large support in the regions around Munich. Hertha never played that role. Not even in West-Berlin and certainly not for the whole city or the area around Berlin. The stadium is far out and not really a football ground. Also Berlin has the best ice-hockey team in the country, one of the best basketball teams, a good handball team. That is a class of non-Football sport like in no other city.

And finally Berlin is still a poor city, heavily subsidized. No wonder, Hertha was sponsored for a long time by the state-run German Railway as their is still no big industry in Berlin. And Hertha itself is so uncool, not hip. Not only the silly club name, the whole image is one of a province club.

Great little piece there Ruhr, although I object to the part about them having the best Ice hockey team, we all know that title belongs to Ingolstadt and ERC! ;)

I'd quite like to do a trip to the Alten Foerestai, looks quite a ground and what you said about them explains why they are quite popular in the UK.

I had an amazing trip last week - ticked off some new grounds and met some new friends.

I started in Hamburg. St Pauli 1v3 FSV Frankfurt

Day 2 and my first trip to the East, for Hansa Rostock 0v2 Erzgebirge Aue

Day 3;
Game 1 - Arminia Bielefeld 1v1 Paderborn

Game 2 - Hannover 0v1 Augsburg

Day 4 - Fortuna Düsseldorf 1v1 Nürnberg

Day 5- No live game as I was traveling to Kiev from Dortmund

Day 6 - Dynamo Kyiv 1v3 Manchester City

Day 7 - Travelled back from Kiev to Dortmund, and couldn't get back early enough for Schalke unfortunately.

Day 8 Paderborn 0v1 RB Leipzig

Day 9 - Werder Bremen 2v2 Darmstadt

Day 10 - Liverpool 1v1(p) Manchester City

Obviously really enjoyed the two City results in there, but Kiev especially as I had managed to get into hospitality, so free beer, wine, & food.

In terms of the German games, I really enjoyed St Pauli, Bielefeld, Düsseldorf, and Bremen. Bremen is one of my favourite German cities so far I'd say.

I didn't see the home team win once on the trip and when you add that to the last couple of City home games - Leicester and Spurs, it means its been ages since I've seen a home win. So I'm a little nervous for City v Villa tomorrow!

I'm up to 30 German grounds in total now and 16/18 current Bundesliga grounds - just Wolfsburg and Darmstadt to go. Without being too presumptious, if we get through to the Quarter Finals (and we should), I'm desperately hoping for Wolfsburg. Not sure whether I'll be satisfied with completing the Bundesliga or whether I'll then feel I have to try to complete 'The 56'.

When you mentioned that trip I thought it sounded great, looks like it turned out that case!

My total still stands at four (...) and I'm hoping to increase that number when I come back to Germany for the first match day of next season. Will fly to either Stuttgart or Bremen, then travel to wherever Ingolstadt are playing and take in a few Bundesliga/2. Liga grounds in the process. Who knows, that could be Eintracht the way this season is going @Bembeltown ;)

I don't know if I mentioned previously, but I now produce the weekly English preview for the Schanzer website. Can be found here http://www.fcingolstadt.de/en/home/news/5603-schanzer-want-to-keep-the-distance-against-frankfurt/

 

[Schalker]

Frankfurt going down, Schalke far away from CL and the Bundesliga topic is on page 3 :o)))

btw our next Away match is in Ingolstadt first Saturday in April

 

[davymcfc]

Great win for Schalke tonight. Hung on at the end there, great save from Fahrmann.

 

[Schalker]

Tonight we were the luckyones .Like Gladbach was in the last two matches before.

Good to have a break now then Ingolstadt Doofmund Bayern and Leverkusen in a row

 

[Scaring Europe to Death]

A must-win for Bembletown’s boys today. Meanwhile, I’m hoping that Bochum keep the pressure on Nurnberg, as we’ve got tickets for their game v FSV Frankfurt next Month.

Also, thanks to Rhineland for organising tickets for the Koln-Leverkusen derby, the same weekend. I still haven’t seen Koln lose, so nothing to worry about.


So that’s two German games sandwiched between the two legs v PSG. Looks like an expensive week.

 

[cptaidan88]

Big game for Frankfurt this evening. Fingers crossed!

Also hoping Hertha can get 3 points against Ingolstadt to give them a really good chance of getting a Champions League spot.

 

[Alex - City Matters]

Also hoping Hertha can get 3 points against Ingolstadt to give them a really good chance of getting a Champions League spot.

Oi! Less of that! ;)

 

[Bembeltown]

3 important points....that relegation battle is going to become intense. So many clubs stuck down there.

 

[cptaidan88]

Chat Scheiße knallte erhalten! ;-)

Shame I don't give even the smallest of fucks about international football