Hubbry Logo
search
logo
2190548

1. FC Köln

logo
Community Hub0 Subscribers
Write something...
Be the first to start a discussion here.
Be the first to start a discussion here.
See all
1. FC Köln

1. Fußball-Club Köln 01/07 e. V., better known as simply 1. FC Köln (German pronunciation: [ɛf ˈt͡seː ˈkœln] ) or FC Cologne in English, is a German professional football club based in Cologne, North Rhine-Westphalia. It was formed in 1948 as a merger of the clubs Kölner Ballspiel-Club 1901 and SpVgg Sülz 07. Köln will compete in the first-tier Bundesliga after winning the 2024–25 2. Bundesliga season and plays its home matches at RheinEnergieStadion.

1. FC Köln was formed in 1948 through the merger of Kölner BC 01 and SpVgg Sülz 07, two successful local sides. It was a founding member of the Bundesliga in 1963 and was crowned its inaugural champions the following year. The club enjoyed golden eras in the 1960s and 1980s, winning three national championships and four DFB-Pokal titles; this includes the inaugural Bundesliga and a domestic double in 1978. After a decline beginning in the 1990s, Köln became known as yo-yo club due to frequent promotions and relegations between the top two tiers. A resurgence in the 2010s brought European qualification and financial stability, but recent seasons have been marked by relegation struggles.

The club is nicknamed Die Geißböcke (The Billy Goats) in reference to its mascot, a male goat named Hennes after veteran Köln player and manager Hennes Weisweiler. The first Hennes was donated by a circus entrepreneur as a Cologne carnival joke. The current mascot is Hennes IX as of 1 August 2019 after Hennes VIII was retired by the club due to old age. Another nickname for the club, more common locally due to its ambiguity, is FC (often written as Effzeh), a common German abbreviation for football clubs. Characteristic for the dialect spoken around Cologne, this is pronounced "EF-tsay", in contrast to the Standard German pronunciation of the abbreviation where the second syllable is emphasized ([ʔɛf ˈtseː]).

Köln play at home in white and red, both colours having been used as the main shirt colour throughout its history. The club's longest-standing and fiercest rivalry is with Borussia Mönchengladbach, against whom they contest the Rhine derby. Although Mönchengladbach is not located along the Rhine, both clubs are based in the Rhineland cultural region. Köln also shares rivalries with two other Rhineland-based clubs: Fortuna Düsseldorf and Bayer Leverkusen.

Like many of Germany's other professional football clubs, 1. FC Köln is part of a larger sports club with teams in other sports like handball, table tennis and gymnastics. 1. FC Köln has over 150,000 members, making it the fourth largest club in Germany.

Kölner BC was formed on 6 June 1901 by a group of young men who were unhappy as part of the gymnastics club FC Borussia Köln and were more interested in football. BC participated in the Zehnerliga West in the years before World War I and took the Westdeutsche championship in 1912 and advanced to the preliminary rounds of the national finals. Their next best result was in the 1920 league final, where they lost 1–3 to Borussia Mönchengladbach.

Spielvereinigung 1907 Köln-Sülz was established in 1907 as Sülzer Sportverein and on 1 January 1919 merged with Fußball Club 1908 Hertha Sülz to form SpVgg. They won the Westdeutscher title in 1928, but lost in the early rounds of the national finals. They went on to play as a top flight club in the Gauliga Mittelrhein, one of sixteen premier level divisions established in 1933 in the reorganization of German football under the Third Reich. After winning a divisional championship in 1939, – they then entered a period of decline in the early 1940s. After the 1941 season, the Gauliga Mittlerhein was split into two new divisions: the Gauliga Köln-Aachen and the Gauliga Moselland, which included clubs from occupied Luxembourg. Sülz struggled until they were united with VfL Köln 1899 for the 1943–44 season, to form the combined wartime side Kriegspielgemeinschaft VfL 99/Sülz 07, which would end up winning the Gauliga Köln-Aachen title by a single point over SG Düren 99 in a close race. The club did not play the next campaign as war overtook the region.

After the union of these two predecessor sides (1948), 1. FC Köln began play in the Oberliga West in the 1949–50 season, and, by 1953–54, had won their first divisional championship. In 1954, they lost the DFB-Pokal final 1–0 to VfB Stuttgart. Die Geißböcke won their second Oberliga West title in 1959–60, and appeared in the national final against Hamburger SV, where they lost 3–2. Köln also finished first in the Oberliga West from 1960–61 to 1962–63. They won the 1962 German championship final 4–0 against 1. FC Nürnberg, becoming German champions for the first time, and qualified for the 1962–63 European Cup, where they were one of the favourites to win the trophy. In the first round, Köln visited Dundee of Scotland and lost 8–1, and despite winning the second leg back in Germany by 4–0, they were eliminated from the tournament. In the following year's German championship final, they lost 3–1 to Borussia Dortmund.

See all
User Avatar
No comments yet.