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VfB Stuttgart History
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VfB Stuttgart a German sports club based in Stuttgart, Baden-Württemberg. With 31,082 members (14 December 2006), VfB is the seventh largest sports club in Germany and the largest in Baden-Württemberg. The club is best known for its football team which has participated in all but two Bundesliga seasons, and has won the national championship five times in total.
The football team plays its home games at the Gottlieb-Daimler-Stadion, situated in the Cannstatter Wasen sports complex.
In addition to the successes of the professional, amateur and youth football teams, athletes from the club's athletics department have won numerous titles and medals. The club also has departments for fistball, hockey, table-tennis and football referees. These five departments only compete at amateur level. The club also maintains a social department, the VfB-Garde.
History
Foundation to WWII
The full name of VfB Stuttgart is Verein für Bewegungsspiele Stuttgart 1893 e. V.. The year 1893 refers to the formation of predecessor side Stuttgart FV 93, which was founded on 9 September 1893. On 2 April 1912 it merged with Kronen-Club Cannstatt, with the combined club taking on its current name. Both clubs were formed mainly by school pupils with middle class roots. The pupils were taught new sports such as rugby and football by English pioneers, and they subsequently played the sports in newly formed clubs.
FV Stuttgart
FV Stuttgart were founded as Stuttgarter FV 93 the Zum Becher hotel in Canstatt on 9 September 1893. FV were initially a rugby club, playing games at Stöckach-Eisbahn, moving to Cannstatter Wasen in 1894. The team drew players primarily from local schools, under the direction of teacher Carl Kaufmann, and quickly achieved its first success; in 1909 FV were runners-up to FC 1897 Hannover in the national rugby final, losing 6-3. However, rugby soon lost out to football, as spectators found the game too complicated.
In 1909 FV joined the Süddeutschen Fußballverband (Southern Germany Football Association).[4] The team entered the Süddeutschen B-Klasse, despite the existence of a lower C-Klasse In their second season FV played a district final against Kronen-Klub Cannstatt, the club they would later merge with. However, the club were not promoted due to a defeat to in FV Zuffenhausen in the county championship.
Kronen-Klub Cannstatt
In 1890 Cannstatter Fußballklub was formed by Cannstatt schoolpupils. At first the club played rugby, but only for a brief period before football was introduced. After a few years the club dissolved. and from it Kronen-Klub Cannstatt formed in 1897. The new club played football only. The Süddeutschen Fußballverband assigned Cannstatt to the lower of the two divisions which existed at that time. In 1904 the club ascended to the first division.
In 1912 the FV Stuttgart merged with Kronen-Club Cannstatt following a meeting in the Concordia hotel in Cannstatt.
1933 - 1945
In 1933 German football was re-organized under the Third Reich into sixteen top-flight divisions called Gauligen. Stuttgart played in the Gauliga Württemberg and enjoyed considerable success there, winning division titles in 1935, 1937, 1938, 1940, and 1943 before the Gauliga system collapsed part way through the 1944-45. The club had an intense rivalry with Stuttgarter Kickers through this period.
VfB's Gauliga titles earned the team entry to the national playoff rounds with their best result coming in 1935 when they advanced to the final where they lost 4:6 to defending champions Schalke 04. After a third place result at the national level in 1937, Stuttgart was not able in subsequent appearances to advance out of the preliminary rounds.
1950s championships
After the war VfB continued to play first division football in the Oberliga Süd, capturing titles there in 1946, 1952, and 1954. The team also made regular appearances in the German championship rounds emerging as national champion in 1950 and 1952, and finishing as runner-up in 1953. In the 1950s, the club also twice won the German Cup (1954 and 1958). The team which won four titles in eight years was led by Robert Schlienz who had lost his left arm in a car crash. No player from Stuttgart had been selected for the team that won the 1954 World Cup though.
1963 Bundesliga
Due to international competition that lead to disappointing results in the 1958 and 1962 World Cup, DFB introduced a single professional league in 1963. Stuttgart's consistently good play throughout the 1950s earned them a place among the sixteen clubs that would make up the original Bundesliga. The club, as an amateur organisation and due to proverbial swabian austerity, hesitated to spend money, and some players continued to work in an everyday job. Throughout the balance of the decade and into the mid-70s the club would generally earn mid-table results. One of the few stars of the time was Gilbert Gress from Strasbourg.
In 1973 the team qualified for the UEFA Cup for the first time and advanced to the semi-finals of the 1974 tournament where they were put out by eventual winners Feyenoord Rotterdam
1975 - 2000 era of president MV
The VfB Stuttgart was in crisis in the mid 1970s, having missed new trends like sponsorship. Attempts to catch up with new levels of professionalism by spending money failed. Towards the end of the 1974/75 season, with the team in imminent danger of been relegated to Second Bundesliga, local politician Gerhard Mayer-Vorfelder was elected as new president. Yet, a tie in the final game meant that VfB would be ranked 16th and lose its Bundesliga status. The first season in second league, considered the worst in its history, ended with the VfB being ranked 11th, having even lost a home game against local rival SSV Reutlingen 05 in front of only 1200 spectators.
With new coach Jürgen Sundermann and new talents like Karlheinz Förster and Hansi Müller, the team around Ottmar Hitzfeld scored hundred goals in 1976/77 and thus returned to top flight play after just two seasons.
The young team was popular for offensive and high-scoring play, but suffered from lack of experience. At the end of 1977/78, the VfB was ranked 4th, but the average attendance of over 53,000 set the league record until the 1990s. They made another UEFA Cup semi-final appearance in 1980 and delivered a number of top four finishes on their way to their first Bundesliga title – the club's third national title – in 1984, now under coach Helmut Benthaus.
In 1986, VfB lost the German Cup final 2:5 to Bayern Munich. In the final of the 1989 UEFA Cup, they fell to SSC Napoli (1:2, 3:3) where Diego Maradona was playing at the time.
In 1992, the club clinched its fourth title in one of the closest races in Bundesliga history finishing ahead of Borussia Dortmund on goal difference. Internationally, they had been eliminated from UEFA Cup play that season (1991-92) after losing their second round match to Spanish side CA Osasuna (2:3). As national champions, the club qualified to play in the UEFA Champions League in 1992-93, but was eliminated in the first round by Leeds United after a tie-braking third match in Barcelona which was required due to coach Christoph Daum having substituted a fourth non-German player in game two.
VfB did not qualify for any European competition again until 1997 by way of their third German Cup win, with coach Joachim Löw. They enjoyed a measure of success on their return, advancing to the 1998 European Cup Winners' Cup final in Stockholm where they lost to Chelsea F.C.. Only one player of the magic triangle, captain Krassimir Balakov, remained after Giovane Elber and Fredi Bobic left. Löw's contract was not renewed, he was replaced by Winfried Schäfer who in turn was sacked after one season.
However, Stuttgart's performance fell off after this as the club earned just mid-table results over the next two seasons despite spending money on the transfer market and for veterans like Balakov.
2000-2007 The post-MV-era return to success
Due to high debts and the lack of results, Gerhard Mayer-Vorfelder finally resigned from VfB in 2000 to take over offices at DFB, UEFA and FIFA. New president Manfred Haas had to renegotiate expensive contracts with players that seldom appeared on the field anyway. As in 1976, when MV had taken over, the team had to be rebuilt by relying on talents from the youth teams. The VfB has one of Germany's most successful programs in the de:Deutsche Jugendmeisterschaft (Fußball).
Coach Ralf Rangnick had started a restructuring of the team that won the UI Cup, but the resulting extra strain of the UEFA cup participation ended in barely escaping from relegation in 2001 by clinching 15th spot. Rangnick was replaced by Felix Magath.
With players like Andreas Hinkel, Kevin Kurányi, Timo Hildebrand or Alexander Hleb earning themselves the nickname the young and wild, the club soon re-bounded and finished as Bundesliga vice-champions in the 2002-03 season. This qualified VfB for their second Champions League appearance and, beating Manchester United and Rangers F.C. once and Panathinaikos Athens twice, they advanced out of group play to the first knock out round where they were eliminated by their old nemesis Chelsea F.C. (0:1 and 0:0) (see also UEFA Champions League 2003-04).
They continued to play as one of the top teams in the country, earning fourth and fifth place Bundesliga finishes, and again taking part in the UEFA Cup, but without great success. In addition, coach Magath and players like Kuranyi, Philipp Lahm and Hleb left.
Halfway through the disappointing 2005-06 season, Giovanni Trappatoni was sacked and replaced by Armin Veh. The new coach was designated as a stop-gap due to having resigned from FC Hansa Rostock in 2003 to focus on his family and having no football job since 2004 except coaching his home team FC Augsburg for a season. Supported by new manager Horst Heldt, Veh could establish himself and his concept of focussing on promising inexpensive players rather than established stars. Team captain Zvonimir Soldo retired, and other veterans left the team that slipped to ninth place and did not qualify for European competition for the first time in four years.
Despite early-season losses and ensuing criticism, Veh managed to turn the collection of new players like Mexican Pavel Pardo and Brazilian Antônio da Silva and fresh local talents, including Mario Gomez, Serdar Tasci and Sami Khedira, into a strong contender that lead the league on 12 November 2006 for the first time in two years. Stuttgart established themselves among the top five and delivered a strong challenge for the Bundesliga title by winning their final eight games. In the penultimate week on 12 May 2007, Stuttgart beat Bochum 3-2 away from home, took the Bundesliga lead from FC Schalke 04 and secured a spot in the 2007-08 UEFA Champions League. After trailing 0-1 in the final match of the season against Energie Cottbus, Stuttgart came back to win 2-1 and claim their first Bundesliga title in 15 years. The victory celebrations even topped those of Germany's third place win over Portugal in the 2006 World Cup a year ago.
In addition, VfB Stuttgart had their first ever chance to win the double as they also reached the final of the German Cup for the first time since their victory there ten years ago. Their opponents in the cup final in Berlin were 1.FC Nürnberg, a team that had beaten them twice in regular season, but last had won the cup in 1962. With the game level at 1-1 in the first half, Stuttgart's scorer Cacau was sent off. Nuremberg gained a 2-1 lead early in the second half, but the ten men of Vfb managed to fight back and equalise. In the second half of extra time, with both teams suffering from exhaustion and the humid conditions, Nuremberg scored the winning goal. Stuttgart will have a cup winner in its ranks anyway for the 2007-08 season as Nuremberg's captain Raphael Schäfer replaces goalkeeper Timo Hildebrand who had decided in winter to leave for a yet unknown destination.
source: wikipedia.org
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