Bundesliga (football)

In German football, the Bundesliga is the highest level league club competition where play determines the national champions. The term also applies to football in Austria and is used to refer to the highest level league competitions in several other sports in those two countries.

Germany was unusual in that, unlike in other countries, a unified national league structure was quite late in developing. The Bundesliga was not formed until 1963 and the structure and organization of the nation's football leagues have undergone frequent change right up to the present day.

Overview

The Bundesliga is comprised of two divisions, the First Bundesliga, and below that, the Second Bundesliga. The First Bundesliga is called simply the "Bundesliga" in common usage, while the tier II league is referred to as the Second Bundesliga, 2. Bundesliga, or Zweite Liga (Second League) to distinguish it from the premier league. The Second Bundesliga has been the division below the First Bundesliga since 1974. The Bundesligen are professional leagues, while the leagues below these top two tiers are amateur. A measure of professionalism has begun to creep into the Regionaliga (III) from above as teams sign and then farm out prospects to have them gain playing experience.

German Football League Structure / 1903 to Present

	Germany	West Germany	West Germany	West Germany	Germany	Germany	East Germany
Class	1994 - present	1974-1994	1963-1974	1946-1963	1933-1945	1903-1932	DDR 1949-1991
I	Bundesliga	Bundesliga	Bundesliga	Oberliga	Gauliga	Verbandsliga	DDR Oberliga
II	2.Bundesliga	2.Bundesliga	Regionalliga	2.Oberliga	Bezirksliga	Bezirksliga	DDR Liga
III	Regionalliga	Am. Oberliga	1.Amateurliga	▼ ???	▼ ???	▼ ???	DDR 2.Liga
IV	Oberliga	Verbandsliga	2.Amateurliga				Bezirksliga
V	Landesliga/Verbandsligaˡ	Landesliga	▼ ???				▼ ???
VI	Bezirksoberliga	▼ ???
VII	Bezirksliga
VIII	Kreisliga
IX	Kreisklasse A
X	Kreisklasse B
XI	Kreisklasse C

ˡ in some areas called Landesliga, in others Verbandsliga.

Below the level of the 2.Bundesliga, leagues are most often subdivided on a regional basis. For example, the Regionaliga is currently made up of a Nord (North) and Süd (South) division, and the Oberliga is comprised of 9 divisions representing states, or large urban and geographical areas. League structure has shifted frequently and typically reflects the degree of participation in the sport in various parts of the country. In the early 90's, changes were driven by the reunification of Germany and the subsequent intregration of the national leagues of East and West Germany.

Every team in the Bundesliga must have a license to play in the league, or else they get relegated into the regional leagues. To obtain a license teams must be financially healthy and meet certain standards of conduct as organizations.

As in other national leagues, there are significant benefits to being in the top division:

A greater share of television broadcast license revenues goes to Bundesliga sides.
Bundesliga teams draw significantly greater levels of fan support. Average attendance in the upper class league is 30,000 per game – twice the average of the 2.Bundesliga.
Greater exposure through television and higher attendance levels helps Bundesliga teams attract the most lucrative sponsorships.
Bundesliga teams develop substantial financial muscle through the combination of television and gate revenues, sponsorships and marketing of their team brands. This allows them to attract and hold skilled players from domestic and international sources and to construct first class stadium facilities.

The Bundesliga is a financial powerhouse and the 2.Bundesliga has begun to evolve in a similar direction, becoming more stable organizationally and fiscally, and reflecting an increasingly higher standard of professional level play.

Internationally the most well-known German clubs include Bayern Munich, Borussia Dortmund, Bayer Leverkusen, FC Schalke 04, and Werder Bremen, all currently in the First Bundesliga.

However, Hamburger SV can lay claim to being the only club that has played continuously in the Bundesliga since its founding in 1963.

Presently, at the end of the season, the bottom three teams of the First Bundesliga are relegated to the Second Bundesliga, and the top three finishers of the Second Bundesliga are promoted into the First, where they will compete in the next season.

The season starts in early August and lasts until late May, with a winter break of six weeks (mid-December through to the end of January). In recent years, games have been played on Saturdays (seven games) and Sundays (two games). A new television deal in 2006 will re-introduce a Friday game in place of one of the Saturday matches.

History

Early history

Local sports associations or clubs are a longtime feature of the culture of German athletics. Each club would participate in, and field teams from, one or more sports depending on local interest and resources. Football was a popular game from early on and the German sports landscape was dotted with hundreds of local sides.

Prior to the formation of the Bundesliga, German football was played at an amateur level in a large number of regional leagues. Oberliga (Upper League) champions played a series of playoff matches for the right to compete in a final game for the national championship. On January 28, 1900, a national association, the Deutscher Fussball Bund (DFB or German Football Association), was founded in Leipzig with 86 member clubs. The first recognized national championship team was VfB Leipzig who beat DFC Prague (7:2) in a game played in Hamburg on May 31, 1903.

The nascent German association permitted teams from outside the country in their new league as long as they were ethnically German sides. This is how Prague, a Czechoslovakian team, managed an appearance in the German national final. Once the DFB joined FIFA (Fédération Internationale de Football Association) in 1904, clubs from outside the country were necessarily no longer permitted to play in Germany.

From 1903 to 1944, teams played for the Viktoria Meisterschaftstrophaee (Victoria Championship Trophy) donated by Crown Prince Wilhelm of Prussia. The trophy was originally intended to be awarded on an annual alternating basis to the championship teams of the German Football Association and the nation's rugby teams. Football became the more dominant sport and the trophy stayed with the DFB. Championship play skipped a year in 1904, was interrupted by World War I in 1914-18, and again at the end of World War II between 1944-46.

The last team to win the Viktoria was Dresdner SC who beat the air force club Luftwaffen SV Hamburg in Berlin's Olympiastadion 4:0 to end the 1943-44 competition. In the confusion at the end of World War II, the trophy disappeared. It was re-discovered decades later in an East German bank safe-deposit box where it had been placed by a Dresden supporter for safekeeping. It has since been returned to the DFB. In the meantime, a new championship trophy, the Meisterschale ("Championship Plate"), was created in 1949.

In 1919, there were 150,000 registered football players in Germany; by 1932 there were more than a million. In spite of the formation of a national association German football held to an ideal of amateurism built around local sports associations which felt that professionalism would diminish sportmanship and local participation in the game. In the early 1930's, the DFB's president, Felix Linnemann, pushed for the creation of a professional league, or Reichsliga, in which the country's best teams would compete for the national championship. The idea was rebuffed by the regional federations dominating the sport.

German Football Under the Third Reich

The reach of Germany's totalitarian Nazi regime stretched into social institutions at all levels, including their football leagues. Most sports and football associations were disbanded or replaced by Nazi-sponsored organizations. To join a DFB club a player required recommendations from two non-Marxists to be permitted to play. The DFB gradually lost its independence as it was assimilated into the Deutscher Reichsausschuss für Leibesübungen (DRA) or Reich Committee for Physical Education.

Under Hans von Tschammer und Osten as Reichssportsführer appointed by the Nazis, formerly independent sports organizations became departments of a new organization which replaced the DRA — Deutscher Reichsbund für Leibesübungen (DRL, later NSRL or National Socialist Reichsbund für Leibesübungen). As in most of German society at the time, sports associations and football teams took part in the purge of Jews from their organizations as ordered by the regime. A few clubs, such as Alemannia Aachen and Bayern Munich, moved to support or protect their members in the face of these actions.

Football was re-organized into sixteen Gaue, or regions, in the Gauliga, which was in place from 1933 to 1945. The overall effect of this was positive for German football. Prior to 1933, nearly 600 clubs competed at the "top flight". League re-organization reduced this to about 170 sides and significantly raised the level of competition. This was the beginning of a process of consolidation of the myriad of small regional leagues that would culminate in a stronger, unified national league structure. The German Cup was introduced in 1935. Known initially as the Tschammerpokal, for Reichssportführer Hans von Tschammer, the first cup winner was 1. FC Nürnberg. Play for the Tschammerpokal went on until 1943 and was not resumed again until 1953 under its new name.

The pre-war period saw the return of a number of German sides that played in a rump league set up in the Saarland, a German state occupied by the French since the end of World War I. Some of these teams played in the French 2nd Division, including FV Saarbruecken (later renamed to 1. FC Saarbrücken), which won that division handily but was denied play in the French premier division.

FC Schalke 04 dominated German football during the Nazi era and was often held up for propaganda purposes as an example of the new Germany. As the Reich expanded through conquest, teams from Austria, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Alsace-Lorraine and Luxembourg were incorporated into the Gauliga. After the Anschluss, the forced union of Austria with Germany, Vienna's Rapid Wien captured the Tschammerpokal/German Cup in 1938 and the German national championship in 1941, the latter with a 4:3 win over Schalke who had been ahead 0:3 with just fifteen minutes to play in the game.

During the war, football was used as a morale booster for the population and was supported by the regime. Many teams were sponsored by the Luftwaffe, the SS or other branches of the military. As the tide turned against Germany, the Gauliga began to crumble as players were called away to military service or were killed in the conflict, stadiums were bombed and travel became difficult. The original sixteen Gauligen broke up into over thirty smaller, more local, circuits. The level of play deteriorated and lopsided scores became common, the record being a 32:0 win by Germania Mudersbach over FV Engen. The 1943-44 championship was initially cancelled, but eventually went ahead after widespread protest. The 1944-45 season began less than two weeks later, rather than after the usual three month summer break. The last recorded match in the Third Reich was on April 23, 1945 as FC Bayern defeated TSV 1860 3:2. Less than three weeks later, Germany surrendered unconditionally.

Postwar Football

Under Allied occupation all organizations, including sports clubs and associations, were initially banned. However, within a year, sports-only organizations without political affiliation were permitted, and most pre-war clubs were reconstituted. Oberliga play resumed in 1946-47 on a regional basis and, in 1948, 1. FC Nürnberg defeated FC Kaiserlauten 2:1 to become the first post-war national champions.

Interestingly, at the time, there was no "prize" to play for. The Viktoria trophy traditionally awarded to the nation's best side had gone missing in the chaos of post-war Germany. In 1949, Nürnberg and each winning side since Vfb Leipzig in 1903, would have their names engraved on the newly created Meisterschale, nicknamed "the salad bowl" for its shape. The German Cup competition introduced prior to the war also returned, with Rot-Weiss Essen's 2:1 victory over Alemannia Aachen in 1953.

Through the 1950s, there were continued calls for the formation of a central professional league, especially as professional leagues in other countries began to draw Germany's best players away from the amateur domestic leagues. At the international level the German game began to falter as German teams often fared poorly against professional teams from other countries. A key supporter of the central league concept was national team head coach Sepp Herberger who said, "If we want to remain competitive internationally, we have to raise our expectations at the national level."

In spite of this, Germany (as West Germany) managed to win its first World Cup in 1954 defeating heavily favoured Hungary 3:2, the only "amateur" side ever to do so. The unexpected victory was called "The Miracle of Bern" by a delighted nation. An oddity of the 1954 World Cup preliminary rounds was the fielding of a separate side by the German state of Saarland, which was occupied by the French and did not become a part of West Germany again until after a plebiscite and treaty negotiation. The Saarlanders acquitted themselves well, finishing second in their group ahead of Norway and behind group winner West Germany.

Meanwhile, in East Germany, a separate league was established with the formation of the DS-Oberliga (Deutscher Sportausschuss Oberliga or German Sports Association) in 1950. The league was re-named the Football Oberliga DFV in 1958 and was generally referred to simply as the DDR-Liga or DDR-Oberliga. The league fielded 14 teams with 2 relegation spots.

The Formation of the Bundesliga

The defeat of the national team by Yugoslavia (0:1) in a 1962 World Cup quarter final game in Chile was the impetus to the formation of a national league. Under DFB president Hermann Neuberger the Bundesliga was created in Dortmund on July 28, 1962 to begin play starting with the 1963-64 season. The new German professional league was modelled on the long-established English league, which had been set up in 1888.

At the time, there were five Oberligen , or upper leagues, in place representing West Germany's North, South, West, Southwest, and Berlin. East Germany, under Russian occupation, maintained its separate league structure. Forty-six clubs applied for admission to the new league. Sixteen teams were selected based on their success on the field, economic criteria and representation of the various Oberligen.

From Oberliga Nord: Eintracht Braunschweig, Werder Bremen, Hamburger SV
From Oberliga West: Borussia Dortmund, 1. FC Köln, Meidericher SV (now MSV Duisburg), Preußen Münster, FC Schalke 04
From Oberliga Südwest: 1. FC Kaiserslautern, 1. FC Saarbrücken
From Oberliga Süd: Eintracht Frankfurt, Karlsruher SC, 1. FC Nürnberg, TSV 1860 München, VfB Stuttgart
From Oberliga Berlin: Hertha BSC Berlin

The first Bundesliga games were played on August 24, 1963. Early favorite 1. FC Köln (45:19) was the first Bundesliga champion over second place clubs Meidericher SV and Eintracht Frankfurt (both 39:25).

The 60s

The new league was met with enthusiasm early on and large crowds came out to watch the nation's top teams. No single team was able to dominate through the 60's — in seven seasons from 1963-64 through to 1969-70, seven different teams won the championship. The 1965-66 season saw the promotion of Bayern München to the top league and in 1968-69 they won their first championship on their way to becoming the most dominant side in Bundesliga history.

The 60's also saw one of the strangest incidents in the history of the Bundesliga. The license of Hertha BSC Berlin was revoked for the 1964-65 season and the team relegated to the Regionalliga Berlin (Regional leagues being the leagues below the Bundesliga at the time) for breaking the league's player salary rules, partially in an attempt to entice players to Berlin at the time of the construction of the Berlin Wall and high Cold War tensions. The last place clubs, Karlsruher SC and FC Schalke 04, tried to avoid being demoted by laying claim to Hertha's place. It was decided to suspend relegation for one season and increase the number of teams in the league from 16 to 18 to accommodate the two teams which would normally be promoted from the Regionalligen. The politics of the Cold War era led to a space being held open for a Berlin side to replace Hertha in a show of solidarity with the former capital city. What followed was the debacle of the promotion of Tasmania 1900 Berlin, which went on to the worst season in league history.

West Germany made another appearance in the final of the World Cup in 1966, losing (4:2) to England in extra time that included a famously controversial goal.

The 70s

The young league got off to a difficult start in the decade as a scandal broke with Kickers Offenbach president Horst Gregorio Canellas putting forward evidence of players being bribed to affect the outcome of games. Allegations were that a number of clubs, including Bielefeld, Hertha, Schalke, and Köln, were involved. The scandal caused a disastrous loss of confidence in the Bundesliga and game attendance plummeted. Investigations by the DFB led to the banning of many players, although most of these sentences were commuted. Arminia Bielefeld, identified as the club central to the scandal, was stripped of all points they had earned during the 1971-72 season and then relegated to the league below.

Enthusiasm for the sport was restored by host West Germany's win in the 1974 World Cup and the first wins by Bundesliga sides in the European Champions Cup (a triple by Bayern Munchen in 1974, 1975 and 1976) and the UEFA Cup (Borussia Mönchengladbach in 1975). Attendance rose steadily after the end of the bribery scandal, putting some teams on solid enough financial footings to be able to attract the first foreign stars to the league in the 1977-78 season.

The Bundesliga was dominated by two sides through the 70's. Borussia Mönchengladbach became the first team to successfully defend its title with its win in 1970-71. Bayern Munchen became the first three-time champion with wins in 1971-72, 1972-73 and 1973-74. Borussia Mönchengladbach then turned a triple of its own over the following three seasons. After wins by Köln and Hamburg, Bayern closed out the decade by matching Mönchengladbach's four titles.

The 80s

The 80s were a rather bleak decade for the Bundesliga. There was a general decline in attendance throughout the league: in the 1977-78 season average attendance for a Bundesliga match was over 26,000 – the best since 1964-65. By 1985-86 that figure bottomed out at just 17,600 spectators per game. The country's football was also afficted by the general European problem of hooliganism and the appearance of neo-Nazi fan groups. The German domestic game became a graceless, rough-edged, brute physical contest devoid of the kinds of star players fans had enjoyed watching in earlier decades. The best German players were regularly lured south to play in Serie A by cash-rich Italian clubs. Bayern Munich's domination of the Bundesliga became numbingly repetitive as they took six of ten titles in the 80s.

But by the end of the decade the stage was set for some fundamental changes to the Bundesliga. The league signed its first rich television contract and German re-unification and the subsequent merger of the football leagues of East and West Germany was on the horizon.

The 90s

In 1991, a year after German reunification, East Germany's Deutscher Fußball-Verband der DDR, or Football Federation of the German Democratic Republic, was merged into West Germany's DFB. East German sides were seeded and assigned to various levels within the West German league structure, which was itself modified to accommodate the influx of new clubs. To facilitate the union with the eastern league the Bundesliga temporarily expanded to 20 clubs in the 1991-92 season and added the DDR-Oberliga's top two sides, Dynamo Dresden and Hansa Rostock. The Bundesliga returned to an 18 team slate in the following season with Dresden managing to stick in the top league, while Rostock was relegated. These two teams continued to make appearances in the Bundesliga through the 90's. The only other former East German sides to earn promotion to the Bundesliga to date are FC Energie Cottbus and VfB Leipzig, while a half dozen others of these clubs have played in 2.Bundesliga.

Beginning with the 1995-96 season, the league adopted a new scoring system. Teams were now awarded three points for a win rather than two as had been traditional, with a view toward encouraging more effort through a greater reward in the standings.

Since the beginning of the 90s, the Bundesliga again enjoyed increasing popularity in Germany. This was on one hand due to the success of the German national football team (third World Cup title in 1990 and third European Championships title in 1996). The Bundesliga also began to take a more deliberate approach to marketing and promoting itself and its member clubs, following the example of other more widely recognized European leagues.

Into the new millennium

Until 2001, the Bundesliga was directly under the control German football's governing body the Deutscher Fußball-Bund (DFB or German Football Association). This changed with the formation of the Deutsche Fußball-Liga (DFL or German Football League) when the Bundesligen came under the auspices of this new body. The DFL, while remaining subordinate to the DFB, manages Germany's professional leagues and is responsible for the issuing of licences to clubs, general fiscal oversight of the Bundesligen, and marketing rights for the two upper leagues.

Since the launch of the Bundesliga on August 24, 1963 forty-nine clubs have played in the league ranks. To help celebrate the 40th anniversary of the league, two clubs with distinguished Bundesliga histories met in a game on August 24, 2003: Hamburger SV, known as the "dinosaur" for being the only club which has played in every season of the leagues' existence, and Bayern Munich, the most successful side in German football, which had just won their seventeenth Bundesliga title.

In 2005, German soccer was once again overshadowed by the discovery of a match-fixing scandal involving second division referee Robert Hoyzer, who confessed to fixing and betting on matches in the 2.Bundesliga, the DFB-Pokals (DFB or German Cup), and the Regionalliga (III). The games included a DFB Cup first-round match between regional side Paderborn and Bundesliga heavyweights Hamburg on August 21, 2004. Hamburg lost (2:4) through penalties and a red-card charged to the side and was eliminated from the lucrative competition.

Hoyzer was banned for life and received a 29-month prison sentence. He soon implicated other officials, players, and a group of Croatian-based gamblers, leading to an on-going investigation. To this point, at the end of 2005, it appears that the scandal did not directly involve the Bundesliga and was confined to lower divisions:

referee Dominik Marks was banned for life and received an 18-month sentence for his involvement
one-time Bundesliga player Jürgen Jansen received a fine and 9-month suspended sentence for accepting bribes to influence games he played in
three Croatian brothers orchestrating the scheme received varying sentences (35 months to 12 months - suspended)
referee Torsten Koop received a three-month ban for not promptly reporting an approach from Hoyzer
Hamburg SV will receive compensation worth a minimum of 2 million Euros for its forced early exit from the DFB Cup, compensation arrangements are planned for certain other teams affected
after review, replays have been ordered for a number of lower division games, while other results will stand
a number of changes have been put in place to ensure closer oversight of referees and other game officials

Despite the scandal, the Bundesliga continues to set new attendance records. In the Bundesliga's 43nd season, total attendance was about 12.48 million in 306 games for an average of 40,775 per game, a 7.9% increase over the preceding year, making the 2005-06 season the 5th consecutive record attendance year. This figure makes the Bundesliga the best-attended national football league in the world by per-game attendance. It is also second in per-game attendance among major professional sports leagues in the world, trailing only the runaway leader, the NFL (American football) in the United States. Top drawing clubs based on average attendance included: Borussia Dortmund 72,850; FC Bayern München 67,214; FC Schalke 04 61,177; and Hamburger SV 53,298. Interest in the league was piqued by the 2006 FIFA World Cup hosted in Germany. An ambitious program of stadium upgrades was undertaken in preparation for the tournament.

One of the problems currently facing the league is in the performance and fate of clubs from the former East Germany, which are finding it difficult to compete with the wealthy, established western sides. One time DDR clubs are unable to attract lucrative sponsorships, cannot afford the salaries needed to hold on to their "homegrown" talent, and find themselves playing in crumbling or primitive stadium facilities. Only four of the 36 clubs in the top two levels of the league system are from the former East Germany; three will play 2006-07 in the Second Bundesliga, while the fourth, Energie Cottbus, won promotion to the First Bundesliga for 2006-07. In preparations for the 2006 World Cup, an attempt to fairly balance the number of venues between the eastern and western halves of the country had to face up to the reality of there not being enough suitable facilities (not limited to stadiums, but including hotels, restaurants and other visitor needs, and transportation infrastructure) in the old DDR, with the result that the east finds itself underrepresented. Only one of the 2006 venues is in the former East Germany (in Leipzig). The situation fits into the broader context of the effects of German reunification on East Germany and the resentment that many Ossis feel for their western cousins.

The 2005-2006 season saw FC Bayern München become the first club ever to repeat both as Bundesliga and DFB Pokal champions.

Verdiente Meistervereine

In 2004, the honor of "Verdiente Meistervereine" (roughly "championships earned") was introduced, following a custom first practised by the Italian club Juventus, to recognize sides that have won multiple championships or other honours by the display of gold stars on their team crests and jerseys. Each country's usage is unique and in Germany the practise is to award one star for three titles, two stars for five titles, and three stars for ten titles.

Recently, the former East German side BFC Dynamo Berlin laid claim to the three stars of a ten-time champion. They petitioned the league to have their DDR Oberliga titles recognized, but received no reply. Dynamo eventually took matters into their own hands and emblazoned their jerseys with three stars. This has caused some debate given what may be the tainted nature of their championships under the patronage of East Germany's secret police, the Stasi. More generally, the DFB does not recognize East German or other championships – only those titles earned since the 1963 formation of the Bundesliga are counted. The issue also affects other former East German and pre-Bundesliga teams.

League Rules

The German football champion is decided strictly by play in the Bundesliga. Each club plays every other club once at home and once away. Originally, a victory was worth 2 points, with a draw worth 1 point and a loss no points. Since the 1995/96 season, a victory has been worth 3 points, with no change in the value of a draw or loss. The club with the most points at the end of the season becomes the German champion. Currently, the top two clubs in the table qualify automatically for the group phase of the UEFA Champions League, while the third-place team enters the Champions League at the third qualifying round (see overview). The three teams at the bottom of the table are relegated into the 2nd Bundesliga, while the top three teams in the 2nd Bundesliga are promoted (see overview).

If teams are level on points, tiebreakers are applied in the following order:

Goal difference for the entire season.
Total goals scored for the entire season.
Head-to-head results (total points).
Head-to-head goal difference.

If two clubs are still tied after all of these tiebreakers have been applied, a single match is held at a neutral site to determine the placement. However, this has never been necessary in the history of the Bundesliga.

Changes In League Structure

Number of teams:
- 1963-1965: 16
- 1991/92: 20, while East and West German leagues were being combined after German reunification
- All other seasons: 18
Number of teams relegated (automatic relegation except as noted):
- 1963-1974: 2, determined by a relegation round
- 1981-1991: 2 automatic; the 16th-place team in the First Bundesliga played a test match against the third-place team of the Second Bundesliga for the final spot in the First Bundesliga
- 1991/92: 4
- Since 1992: 3

Overview: European Qualification (as of 2005/06)

1st place: German football champion
1st and 2nd place: Group phase of UEFA Champions League
3rd place: Third qualifying round of Champions League. Winners at this stage enter the group phase; losers enter the UEFA Cup.
DFB-Pokal (German Cup) winner: Qualifies for UEFA Cup, regardless of league position.
- If the Cup winner has qualified for the Champions League, the losing finalist will enter the UEFA Cup. For example, although the Second Bundesliga side Alemannia Aachen lost to Werder Bremen in the 2004 DFB-Pokal final, Alemannia secured an entry in the 2004/05 UEFA Cup, because Werder qualified for the Champions League as First Bundesliga champions.
- If both Cup finalists have qualified for the Champions League, an extra UEFA Cup place is granted on the basis of First Bundesliga position. Since the 2005 DFB-Pokal final pitted champions Bayern München against runners-up Schalke 04 (with Bayern winning), sixth-place Bayer Leverkusen received a berth in the 2005/06 UEFA Cup.
4th - 5th place: Qualify for UEFA Cup
16th - 18th place: Relegated to 2nd Bundesliga.

Up to three other First Bundesliga clubs can participate in the UEFA Intertoto Cup, with priority for entry dependent on league position. The number of German clubs which may participate in UEFA competitions is determined by a formula that takes into account the results of a particular nation's clubs in UEFA competitions over the preceding five years (known as the UEFA coefficients ranking list).

European qualification: History

European Cup/Champions League:
- Up to and including 1996/97: German champion only
- 1997-99: Top two teams
- 1999-present: Top two teams automatically into first group phase (only one group phase starting in 2003/04). Depending on the DFB's standing in the UEFA coefficients ranking list, either one or two other clubs enter at the third qualifying round; winners at this level enter the group phase.
UEFA Cup:
- Starting with the 1999/2000 season, the DFB-Pokal winner automatically qualifies. Depending on the DFB's standing in the UEFA coefficients ranking list, anywhere from 0 to 3 extra participants can enter. Since the Cup Winners' Cup was folded into the UEFA Cup after 1999, the DFB has always been entitled to enter a minimum of three clubs in the UEFA Cup, and has been able to enter as many as four (the maximum for any European federation). Teams that enter via the Intertoto Cup or UEFA's Fair Play mechanism do not count against the national quota. The DFB's current UEFA coefficients ranking allows as many as three First Bundesliga sides to enter the Intertoto Cup, with as many as three UEFA Cup berths available. For the 2005/06 season, the DFB earned an extra UEFA Cup place via the Fair Play draw; this place went to Mainz 05 as the highest-ranked club in the Fair Play table of the First Bundesliga not already qualified for Europe.
Cup Winners' Cup (abolished after 1999):
- DFB-Pokal winner entered the Cup Winners' Cup. Today, that club will enter the UEFA Cup.

Champions

In total, 43 clubs have won the German championship. FC Bayern München have 20 titles, more than any other club. The clubs with the next most titles are BFC Dynamo Berlin (10) and 1. FC Nürnberg (9).

FC Bayern München are also the current title-holders.

Records

Top Ten Highest Goalscorers

Gerd Müller (1965 - 1979) 365 Goals
Klaus Fischer (1968 - 1988) 268 Goals
Jupp Heynckes (1965 - 1978) 220 Goals
Manfred Burgsmüller (1969 - 1990) 213 Goals
Ulf Kirsten (1990 - 2003) 182 Goals
Stefan Kuntz (1983 - 1999) 179 Goals
Klaus Allofs (1975 - 1993) 177 Goals
Dieter Müller (1973 - 1986) 177 Goals
Hannes Löhr (1964 - 1977) 166 Goals
Karl-Heinz Rummenigge (1974 - 1984) 162 Goals

Top Ten Players With Most Appearances

Karl-Heinz Körbel (1972 - 1991) 602 Games
Manfred Kaltz (1971 - 1991) 581 Games
Klaus Fichtel (1965 - 1988) 552 Games
Mirko Votava (1976 - 1996) 546 Games
Klaus Fischer (1968 - 1988) 535 Games
Eike Immel (1978 - 1995) 534 Games
Willi Neuberger (1966 - 1983) 520 Games
Michael Lameck (1972 - 1988) 518 Games
Uli Stein (1978 - 1997) 512 Games
Stefan Reuter (1985 - 2004) 500 Games

Oliver Kahn currently has 499 appearance, and will presumably enter this list in the 2006/07 season.

Other Records

Most own goals scored: 6 by Manfred Kaltz of Hamburger SV.
The oldest player was Klaus Fichtel of Werder Bremen (43 years old).
The youngest player to score was Nuri Sahin of Borussia Dortmund (16 years and 335 days).
Most red cards received: Jens Nowotny (8), Stefan Effenberg, Sergej Barbarez and Torsten Kracht (7 each).
Most goals scored by penalties: Manfred Kaltz (53 with 7 missed penalties).
Most goals conceded by a goalkeeper: 829 by Eike Immel (in 534 games).
Most clean sheets by a goalkeeper: 173 by Oliver Reck (in 471 games).
Most championships won as player: 8 by Mehmet Scholl.
Most championships won as coach: 8 by Udo Lattek.
Most games as coach: 820 by Otto Rehhagel, followed by Erich Ribbeck with 569.
Worst team: Tasmania 1900 Berlin (1965-66) holders of an extraordinary list of "worst-of" records

Members of the current Bundesliga (2006/2007 season)

Alemannia Aachen DSC Arminia Bielefeld TSV Bayer 04 Leverkusen FC Bayern München VfL Bochum Borussia Dortmund Borussia Mönchengladbach Eintracht Frankfurt Energie Cottbus Hamburger SV Hertha BSC Berlin Hannoverscher SV 96 1. FSV Mainz 05 1. FC Nürnberg FC Schalke 04 VfB Stuttgart SV Werder Bremen VfL Wolfsburg

In the above list, Alemannia Aachen, VfL Bochum and Energie Cottbus have just moved into the First Bundesliga, replacing MSV Duisburg, 1. FC Köln and 1. FC Kaiserslautern who finished at the bottom 3 spots of the table at the end of the 2005/06 season and thus were relegated to the Second Bundesliga.

Teams promoted to the Second Bundesliga since 1995

1995: SpVgg Unterhaching, VfB Lübeck, Carl Zeiss Jena, Arminia Bielefeld
1996: VfB Oldenburg, Rot-Weiss Essen, FC Gütersloh, Stuttgarter Kickers
1997: SpVgg Greuther Fürth, Energie Cottbus, SG Wattenscheid 09, 1. FC Nürnberg
1998: SSV Ulm 1846, Rot-Weiß Oberhausen, Hannover 96, Tennis Borussia Berlin
1999: Waldhof Mannheim, Kickers Offenbach, Chemnitzer FC, Alemannia Aachen
2000: LR Ahlen, SSV Reutlingen, 1. FC Saarbrücken, VfL Osnabrück
2001: SV Babelsberg 03, 1. FC Union Berlin, Karlsruher SC, 1. FC Schweinfurt 05
2002: Wacker Burghausen, Eintracht Trier, VfB Lübeck, Eintracht Braunschweig
2003: Jahn Regensburg, SpVgg Unterhaching, Erzgebirge Aue, VfL Osnabrück
2004: Rot-Weiß Erfurt, Rot-Weiss Essen, 1. FC Saarbrücken, Dynamo Dresden
2005: Eintracht Braunschweig, SC Paderborn 07, Kickers Offenbach, Sportfreunde Siegen
2006: FC Augsburg, TuS Koblenz, Rot-Weiss Essen, Carl Zeiss Jena

External links

Official Site
DFB - Deutsche Fussball Bund (German Football Association)
Federal league archives
News and features from the Bundesliga presented by the Deutsche Welle (in seven languages, including English and German)
Forum about Bundesliga

History

Bundesliga — All results since 1963, statistics, compare teams ...

Fußball-Bundesliga | National football (soccer) premier leagues

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