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The Sportklub Rapid Wien or SK Rapid Wien is one of the two big football teams in Vienna. The second team, Rapid's eternal rival, is FK Austria Wien. The Rapid squad is often known as the "Green-Whites" (those being the team's colors) or as Hütteldorfer for the location of the Gerhard Hanappi Stadium, which is located in Hütteldorf, part of Vienna's Penzing or 14th District.

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History

SK Rapid Wien was founded in 1898 as Erster Wiener Arbeiter-Fußball-Club (First Workers' Football Club of Vienna). The team's original colors were red and blue and sometimes they are still used in away matches today. On January 8 1899 the club was re-named, taking on its present name of Sportklub Rapid Wien (Sport Club Rapid Vienna), following the example of Rapide Berlin. In 1904, the team colors were changed to green and white.

One of the best teams in early European football, Rapid became a dominant side during the years between the world wars, when Austria was one of the leading football nations on the continent. After the Anschluss of Austria to Germany in 1938, Rapid played in that country's Gauliga Ostmark along with clubs such as First Vienna and Admira Vienna (playing then as Wacker Wien and Admira Wien). Rapid would be the most successful of these clubs. They won the Tschammerpokal, predecessor of today's German Cup, in 1938 with a 3:1 victory over FSV Frankfurt, and topped that with a German Championship in 1941 by defeating Schalke 04, the most dominant German club of the era. The team was able to overcome a 3:0 Schalke lead to win the match by a final score of 4:3 through strength and endurance – the traditional virtues of Rapid players known as the Rapidgeist or "Rapid Spirit".

Almost since the club's beginnings, Rapid fans have announced the last fifteen minutes of the game by way of the legendary "Rapidviertelstunde" – rhythmic clapping at home or away no matter what the score. The first mention of the practise goes back to 1913, and in 1919 a newspaper wrote about the fans clapping at the beginning of the "Rapidviertelstunde". Over the decades, there were many instances where Rapid managed to turn around a seemingly hopeless situation by not giving up and, with their fan's support, fighting their way to a win just before the final whistle.

Stadium

SK Rapid Wien's stadium is Gerhard Hanappi Stadium, which is located in Hütteldorf, part of the Penzing district of Vienna. In its earliest days Rapid played on a military exercise field, until the opening of a new stadium in Rudolfsheim in 1903. But the field there was unsuitable because it was sloped, and with the club's rising popularity, a new stadium was needed: in 1912, the legendary "Pfarrwiese" was built, just in time for the first Austrian Championship. In 1977, Rapid moved to the new "West-Stadion", which was later renamed Gerhard Hanappi-Stadion after its architect and popular and successful former Rapid player Gerhard Hanappi.

Honours

Rapid Vienna is also Austria's record titleholder, winning the Austrian Championship title 31 times to date. Supporters of other teams sometimes argue that the 16 championship wins before the establishment of a nation wide all-Austrian league should not be counted. However, those titles are credited by most observers, since Viennese league play was virtually synomymous with Austrian football at that time.

  • Austrian Championship (31): 1912, 1913, 1916, 1917, 1919, 1920, 1921, 1923, 1929, 1930, 1935, 1938, 1940, 1941, 1946, 1948, 1951, 1952, 1954, 1956, 1957, 1960, 1964, 1967, 1968, 1982, 1983, 1987, 1988, 1996, 2005

  • Austrian Cup (14): 1919, 1920, 1927, 1946, 1961, 1968, 1969, 1972, 1976, 1983, 1984, 1985, 1987, 1995

  • Austrian Supercup: 1986, 1987, 1988

  • German Championship: 1941

  • German Cup: 1938

Current squad

Notable players

Managers since 1910

Team trivia

  • SK Rapid Wien won the German Championship in 1941 and the German Cup in 1938.

Competitions

See also

External links

  • Official Homepage
  • http://www.rapidarchiv.at/
  • http://mitglied.lycos.de/rapidwien/titel.htm (Rapid's achievements)
  • http://mitglied.lycos.de/rapidwien/geschich.htm (Rapid's history)
  • http://www.scr-forum.net (Rapid forum)

SK Rapid Wien | 1899 establishments | Austrian football clubs | Sport in Vienna | German football clubs

SK Rapid Wien | SK Rapid Wien | Rapid Viena | Rapid de Vienne | ראפיד וינה | Rapid Wien | ラピド・ウィーン | Rapid Wien | Rapid Wiedeń | SK Rapid Wien

 

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the "SK Rapid Wien".

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