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As Kaiserslautern and Eintracht Frankfurt begin their first season out of the Bundesliga, their fans are naturally wondering whether they'll bounce straight back up like Duisburg usually do, or whether they'll continue in a downwards spiral like Wattenscheid have done.
It certainly was a bad year for football fans in Frankfurt, with Eintracht's amateur team relegated from the Regionalliga Sued along with FSV Frankfurt, who were in the Zweite Liga only two years ago (although their glory days were back in the 20s and 30s). Contuinuing to plummet like a sperm whale from a jumbo jet are Rot-Weiss Frankfurt, relegated from the fourth-division Oberliga Hessen along with Progres Frankfurt. Progres may well have set some sort of record by conceding 142 goals last season and gain ing only five points in total. Is that what they call Progres?
So what exactly is going on in Frankfurt? Are they making a real effort to rival Berlin's complete lack of footballing success? Even nearby Traditionsklub Kickers Offenbach, West German Cup winners in 1970 and members of the Bundesliga as recently as 1984, are struggling to come to terms with life in Division Four (though admittedly they finished third last season).
The summer has also seen some big clubs falling out of the bottom of the Second Division and into an uncertain future in the Regionalligen. 1.FC Nuernberg, Hannover 96, and FC Chemnitz all plunge into third-level football for the first time. Nuernberg. who for several years have been looking forward to renewing their local derbies with Bayern and Karlsruhe, have finally managed to achieve their aim: this season, they will indeed be facing Bayern's amateurs and Karlsruhe's amateurs in the Regionalliga Sued. How many of Nuernberg's fans (over 15,000 were on hand for their final Zweite Liga game last season) will turn up to see these sorts of matches?
Certainly Der Club will not have an easy ride back to the Bundesliga, faced with the likes of SSV Ulm and VfR Mannheim. Yes, that's the same VfR Mannheim who were champions of Germany in 1949 and founder members of Bundesliga 2 in 1973. Fallen giants in fact abound in this Regionalliga, with Darmstadt 98, regular members of Division Two until 1993 and even managing a couple of seasons in the Bundesliga itself. Darmstadt can count themselves very lucky not to have dropped down another division over the summe r, saved only by the merger of SpVgg Fuerth and TSV Vestenbergsgreuth who henceforth will be known as Greuther Fuerth (or is it Fuerther Greuth?).
It signifies the end of Traditionsklub Fuerth, three-times national champions of Germany in pre-war days and playing in the second division as recently as 1983. Curiously enough, one of the teams coming into the Regionalliga from the Oberliga Bayern are their local rivals SG Quelle/60 Fuerth.
Famous clubs going through a very hard time in the southern part of Germany include an FC Bayern. Sadly, it's not that FC Bayern, but FC Bayern Hof, who spent four seasons in the Zweite Liga in the seventies but are now in the Oberliga Bayern, and Kickers Wuerzburg, who were in the Second Division until 1978 but were last heard of in the Landesliga Bayern-Nord, keeping company with local rivals FV 1904 Wuerzburg and SV 1919 Heidingsfeld Wuerzburg.
FC Freiburg, the German champions of 1907, are now down in the Verbandsliga Suedbaden, where they finished one place below SC Freiburg's amateur team, and the German champions of 1910, Karlsruhe FV, even managed to disappear down from the Verbandsliga Nordbaden a year ago.
Up in the Regionalliga Nord, Hannover 96, with its glorious past and a 60,000-seat stadium in a city of nearly half a million people, find themselves apprehensively awaiting clashes with SV Lurup and VfL Herzlake as well as the amateur sides from Hamburg SV, St. Pauli and Werder Bremen. One of their main rivals in this division could well be Eintracht Braunschweig, Bundesliga champions in 1967, who finished seven points behind VfB Oldenburg in the Regionalliga.
Altona 93 make a welcome appearance in this league. They ended up champions of the Oberliga Hamburg/Schleswig-Holstein after a nail-biting finale to the season. The club's main claim to fame has been reaching two DFB-Pokal semifinals (in 1955 and 1964). Sadly, Holstein Kiel, German champions in 1912 and runners-up in 1930, have made the reverse journey from Regionalliga to Oberliga.
Upwardly mobile after at last having a half-decent season are SV Goettingen 05, who were Zweite Liga members from 1974 to 1977 and again in 1980. They leave behind the likes of Armninia Hannover (second division participants from 1976 to 1980) in the Oberliga Niedersachsen/Bremen.
In the East, the glory days of FC Chemnitz fade rapidly into the past. One-time champions of East Germany and three-times DDR-Pokal finalists, their four-year stinit in the Zweite Liga is over, and their rebuilt team faces life amongst the amateurs of the Regionalliga Nordost. Here of course they will renew rivalries with Dynamo Dresden, who are hoping to solve their chronic goalscoring problems in order to improve on last season's fourth-place finish. Also in fourth place but one division lower, in the Obe rliga Nordost (Sued) were Dresden SC, winners of the national German Cup in 1940 and 1941.
A little further northwards, in the Oberliga Nordost (Nord) are 1.FC Magdeburg, members of the DDR-Oberliga from 1960 to 1991, East German Cup winners on no fewer than seven occasions, and winners of European Cup-Winners' Cup in 1974. With their leaky defence conceding 59 goals in 32 games, Magdeburg could only finish ninth last season, which at least was a couple of places above SV Schwarz-Rot Neustadt / Dosse.
Suffering even greater torment are the followers of Halle FC, one-time stalwarts of the DDR-Oberliga, UEFA Cup entrants in 1971 and 1991, members of the Zweite Liga as late as 1992, but now immersed in the fifth-level Landesliga Sachsen-Anhalt. Last season they managed to finish eighth. One place below Saxonia Tangermuende, in fact.
The southwestern corner of Germany is probably still recovering from losing Kaiserslautern from the Bundesliga, but fans are also mourning the demotion of Borussia Neunkirchen from the Regionalliga West-Suedwest to the Oberliga Suedwest. Borussia were German Cup finalists in 1959, members of the Bundesliga up until 1968, and in the Zweite Liga as recently as 1981. The village team of FK Pirmasens spent four years in the Zweite up to 1978, but were mid-table in the Verbandsliga Suedwest, as indeed are the in imitable Wormatia Worms who spent six seasons in the Zwiete Liga up until 1982.
The densely-populated, football-crazy western part of Germany didn't shed many tears for the demise of humble Wattenscheid 09 as they left the professional leagues for the more realistic confines of the Regionalliga West/Suedwest. Rot-Weiss Essen have duly made their return to the Second Bundesliga, but rivals Schwarz-Weiss Essen are still down in the Oberliga Nordrhein, but only narrowly missed out on promotion this time around. Those glory days of winning the 1959 Pokal must grow dimmer with each passing season.
Rot-Weiss Oberhausen have now completed one season back at Regionalliga level, having almost gone out of existence a few years ago, but they hardly look likely to regain the Bundesliga status they enjoyed from 1969 to 1973. Other famous clubs languishing in this league currently include Alemannia Aachen, Cup Finalists in 1965, and members of the professional elite from 1967 to 1990, and Preussen Muenster, national runners-up in 1951 and founder members of the Bundesliga in 1963.
Which league Eintracht Frankfurt will be in by the year 2000, no one seems bold enough to predict.
