The Bundesliga Thread

[bear_1982]

Dortmund is the choice for you!

I've become a bit of a closet fan myself since moving to the area a couple of years back! the fan base is by far the best in Germany (I think there average attendance is something like 2-3rd in Europe) and the stadium is incredible. Dortmund is good. I won't claim its the best city in the world, but it's also not bad. Location-wise in Germany its very good. If you want to know anything else, let me know, i'd be happy to help out.

You said about the financial trouble, but this is much better these days. They have a very young team which is doing very well, and they have got themselves to the point where they can start spending again. In my opinion they are Germany's equivalent of the Villa! What more can you want!

Viel spaß...

[Nath182]

I'd have to say either Borussia Monchengladbach or Stuttgart, 'Gladbach mainly because I used to live around 30 mins drive away from the ground. Never actually went to a game but it looks like a nice stadium. And Stuttgart obviously because of Hitz's transfer there. I don't generally follow Bundesliga much because the quality of football imo is pretty dire but would love to go back over for a Gladbach game one day with the old man.

[MrWeedMcGrass]

I don't generally follow Bundesliga much because the quality of football imo is pretty dire

[NurembergVillan]

I still follow 1.FC Nürnberg. They're up and down like a yo-yo but have an amazing fanbase and are a "proper" football club. Going to the matches is a fantastic experience. They won the cup a few years ago and the whole city erupted.

My second team there is VfB Stuttgart who I've also seen a few times. The first kit I ever designed as a professional was for them and when one of my mates played for them it cemented them a place in my heart.

Based on which city to visit, and if you want a really authentic football rollercoaster, it's got to be FCN!

[The_Rev]

Borussia Mönchengladbach.

You can go to a game and start a chant.

"Give us a B"

[BOF]

Some wierdo on here is a Kaiserslautern fan I believe :-)

SCREW YOU HIPPY!

We're back in the Bundesliga

Trog, you basically want to support Germany's Villa. I think anyone other than Bayern will do. I'd say Kaiserslautern except I believe the city is a bit, well, crap. Other than that I think the candidates are Dortmund, Schalke & Werder Bremen.

Bremen play in green though so they fail the 'nice strip' test. Schalke play in blue, are over on the west in a 61k stadium in Gelsenkirchen and Dortmund have a cracking day-glo yellow & black strip, always sell-out their 80k stadium and are also in the West (500k).

If I was you it'd be one of those 3 and I'd lean towards Dortmund.

[S-Platt]

If you are gonna be posting on a message board think logically about how far it could go. Obviously the ladies on the message board are gonna be attracted to the english guy that supports their team and invite you over so think about which is the easiest to get to from Brum!!! Or ignore that rubbish and support Dortmund as mentioned previously the team that resembles us the most i think!

[slovenian]

St. Pauli was very proud of having what was probably the last non-electronic scoreboard in the upper leagues (until 2007). After every goal, a worker manually updated the scoreboard by taking down and then replacing a number placard. wiki

[maqroll]

I always liked Dortmund, and the atmosphere at their ground is insane.

[Troglodyte]

Cheers guys, I am very much leaning towards Dortmund now. Seeing as they have Europe's best average attendance though, is it difficult to get tickets?

Did look at St. Pauli, read about their fanbase etc but also there seems to be worries about it becoming too commercialised. Other than that they just seem like a yo-yo team really. And what's with all the brown?

And Rev, I actually have a Hertha shirt too; quite an old one with die Continentale on the front. Not too sure they're the team for me though.

[GarethRDR]

To everyone who's said the mighty Foals, you're on my Xmas card list chaps.

Reasons to support Borussia Monchengladbach:

-Strong Brit following, especially during the '90s due to proximity to British Military bases Rheindahlen and Laarbruch.

-Only German club to be referenced in a Fast Show skit ("Borussia Monchenmonchenmonchenmonchenglad To Be Back... match abandanos; fisty, bad boys").

-Proud history, absolutely dominated German football in the '70s.

-The club Lothar Matthäus, Stefan Effenberg, Berti Vogts and Günter Netzer all made names for themselves at.

-Gorgeous new stadium. I've had the pleasure of attending matches at Borussia Park (and at the old Bokelsberg stadium) and the atmosphere is always electric, even at friendlies.

-Uwe Kamps penalty heroics in the '92 German Cup semi-final (saving all four in the shoot-out against Bayer Leverkusen) mirroring Bosnich's penalty heroics against Tranmere.

-Penchant for nurturing exciting young talent: Marko Marin, Marcell Jansen, Marvin Commper to name a few that have done well for themselves. Currently, Marco Reus (brought in from 2. Liga Rot Weiss Ahlen as Marin's replacement) and Michael Bradley (who had a fantastic Confederations Cup) are two players causing quite a stir.

For those who've suggested FC St. Pauli, well, if you want to follow a team who thought having a camo-kit was a good idea then more power to you...

.

Bleurgh!

And lastly, shit on Bayern Munich, shit on Borussia Dortmund, and shit on FC Koln. Much love! 8)

[AVFC_Hitz]

Just come across this thread. I did a lot of work on German football for my diss and imparticular the old communist East German football. There are some very interesting stories out there. FC St Pauli are the cult team to support if your a bit of a lefty. As are Union Berlin who are also a very interesting team. They were in the old East and was a popular breeding ground for anti-state propaganda which led to STASI officials to be planted in the crowd to pick out dissidents. Now, in Germany the former old East teams such LOK Leipzig and Dynamo Berlin/Dresden are now a breeding ground for far-right hooliganism and are pretty much to be avoided (unless thats your thing...) There was a huge betting/bung scandal in the West in the 70's in which many of the big teams lost credibility. Schalke were one the main teams with their reputation tarnished.

Anyway, there is a lot of interesting and often banal history in German football...from breaking up a team overnight because they won too much to the recent upsurge in the quality and stadia in Germany.

I follow German football almost religiously (well as much as English football...) I always look out for the results of: 1860 Munich, Hertha/Union Berlin, Hoffenheim and Stuttgart because of Der Hammer....

Read this...

[Wainy316]

Glad to see lots of St Pauli suggestions, they are my team also. Got promoted this weekend too.

Paid a visit to their ground last summer and got a pin badge. Really must get to a game sometime and hope to bag a shirt too.

'St Pauli whoaaah-oh

St Pauli whoaaah-oh

sie spielen in Braunem und im Weiß

un Hamburger ist Scheiße'

I started singing this when I was out in Hamburg and these crazy Bremen fans we met loved it. (They hate Hamburg too).

[bear_1982]

tickets aren't too hard to come by for Dortmund, although obviously the bigger games are harder! If you can get in the 'South Stand' (Sud Tribune) the atmosphere is immense. Almost 30k all standing. I think the tickets there also start from around €10-15, not bad...

[chappy]

i am going to be living in germany for 10 months from september so i will have to choose a team too. all i know is that i will be in nord-rhein westphalia, don't find out my actual town until july.

[PauloBarnesi]

St Pauli ready to hoist the Jolly Roger over the Bundesliga

Post categories: Football

Phil Minshull | 21:21 UK time, Monday, 3 May 2010

It's been a week of mixed emotions in Hamburg.

On one side of the city the fans of Hamburger SV are still bemoaning their lost opportunities last Thursday.

Rather than the Rothosen - red shorts - it will be Fulham who will contest the Europa League final against Atletico Madrid in their own Nordbank Arena on May 12 after Hamburg's 2-1 defeat at Craven Cottage.

However, in the areas down by the docks and the famous Reeperbahn, or should I say infamous depending on your point of view, there has been unrestrained joy over the last day or so from the fans of cross-city rivals FC St. Pauli.

St Pauli have been immortalised in a Blur song - photo: Getty

The smiles are not just because of the Craven Cottage comeuppance of Hamburg, the club that famously beat Juventus 1-0 to win the European Cup in 1983, but after a 4-1 away win at Furth on Sunday, arguably Europe's most atypical professional club are heading back to the Bundesliga after an absence of eight years.

More than 9,000 St Pauli fans followed their team to Furth and, as happily pointed out by German newspapers on Monday, peacefully invaded the pitch after the final whistle, while more than 10,000 people congregated on the Reeperbahn.

What a better way to celebrate your centenary than with a promotion back to the top tier of German football?

St Pauli, resplendent in their rather unusual brown kit - now how many teams can you name that have regularly played in that colour - and their supporters in their Jolly Roger totenkopf - skull and crossbones - attire are now set to reek their own particular brand of fun and mayhem when they visit the comparatively staid surroundings of Bayern Munich and Bayer Leverkusen next season.

Words like eccentric or odd are often used in the context of St Pauli but results have still to be achieved on the pitch so The Buccaneers of the League, as they are often known, are not really football's answer to the Harlem Globetrotters.

However, there is a certain attitude and atmosphere that surrounds St Pauli.

The best way to describe them might be just to say that they are different.

Even though the club has been around in its current form since 1910, a unique identity has emerged over the last quarter of their existence.

"St Pauli opens its home matches with AC/DC's Hells' Bells, and after every home goal Song 2 by Blur is played, turning the stadium into a giant mosh pit," says Wikipedia. "St. Pauli is also a worldwide symbol for punk and related subcultures."

"It was in the mid-'80s that St. Pauli's transition from a traditional club into a 'Kult' club began... An alternative fan scene emerged built around left-leaning politics and the 'event' and party atmosphere of the club's matches.

"Importantly, St. Pauli became the first team in Germany to officially ban right wing, nationalist activities and displays in its stadium in an era when Fascist inspired football hooliganism threatened the game across Europe."

The promotion comes at an appropriate time as St Pauli are expanding their Millerntor-Stadion to 27,000 in order to accommodate their ever increasing fan base.

St Pauli's Deniz Naki celebrates promotion to the Bundesliga with the club's supporters - photo: Getty

St Pauli have been in the Bundesliga before, managing to stay in the top flight for three years between 1988-1991, while the club had a brief stint in the Bundesliga in the 2001-02 season.

Sadly, it wasn't a glorious swashbuckling ride on the pitch as they finished bottom and by a very long way, having only won four games that season.

They slid through the 2. Bundesliga the following season in similar fashion and then spent four years in the regional third tier - the Regionalliga Nord - before starting their climb back up.

There are a few signs that St Pauli is finally having to join the 21st century; perhaps in the same way that punk icon Iggy Pop is now doing adverts for insurance companies.

Do I hear the words 'Sold Out' being uttered by some radical elements?

Club legend Holger Stanislawski, who has been a player, sports director vice-president and is now their coach, told German newspapers after Sunday's game, "St Pauli can't afford to be a social utopia anymore."

They are moving to new training facilities in 2012, and the current clubhouse where fans and players still mingle together for a coffee or beer - imagine that at any other first division club across Western Europe - may just become a distance memory.

Sponsors have increased the club budget to around €40m (£34.6m) so regular and frantically solicited injections of emergency cash from friends in the theatre world of club president Corny Littmann who, coincidently, is openly gay, are no longer necessary.

Stanislawski has also warned that if he's still the coach in July, and several other clubs are believed to have already made bids for his services, then sentiment could be in short supply.

Familiar faces who have been with the club since its days languishing in Regionalliga Nord look set to be shown the door and while Stanislawski has promised loyalty to many of the players who have got them back in the Bundesliga, he has said that three or four signings are inevitable.

Nevertheless, if St Pauli do lose a modicum of their charm as commercial reality bites, they should still bring a lot of fun to the Bundesliga next season.

sounds like the team to follow

[Rodders]

St. Pauli it is then!

though a girlfriend from near Berlin might have something to say about that

[GarethRDR]

i am going to be living in germany for 10 months from september so i will have to choose a team too. all i know is that i will be in nord-rhein westphalia, don't find out my actual town until july.

Monchengladbach's in Nordrheinwestfalen. :winkold:

[CarewsEyebrowDesigner]

FC St Pauli, for the reasons people said.

Proper wee cult team!

[BOF]

St. Pauli, great for a weekend and a match and all that Hamburg offers ( :shock: ) but you probably wont be involved in anything other than relegation battles for the foreseeable future. Might take some of the shine off supporting a 2nd team.