Hi there Fire fans, Does anyone remember the starting lineup and formation the Sting used back in their championship season? Here are the team members I dug up from a picture on the internet: #20 Coffee, Paul (GK) #09 Fajkus, Charlie #-- Ferner, Dieter (GK) #08 Glenn, Rudy #12 Granitza, Karl-Heinz (ST) #05 Hahn, Paul #23 Hall, Bret #16 Huson, Dave #13 Koutsoukos, Tasso #17 Long, Steve #10 Margetic, Pato (CM) #07 Mathieu, Frantz #02 Miukovic, Ivan #-- Parkes, Phil #04 Peter, Ingo #03 Ryan, Greg #11 Simanton, Mark #-- Spalding, Derek #06 Steffenhagen, Arno (LM?) #18 Tyma, John
It's great to still see Dave Huson and Bret Hall still coaching in the Chicago area. I have had both of them as my coaches during my club soccer days, and they have both been very influential in my development of the game as well. Kudos to them.
The Sting - San Diego Soccers semi-final in Old Comiskey is one of the great moments in Chicago sports, not just soccer history. Theere were 39,000 zealots. It was a charged mood all night. The end came, in OT I believe, when jitterbug defender Franz Mathieu, went on a 50 yard sprint up the middle and scored the golden goal. Chicagoans flooded the diamond. The police didnt really try to prevent it. No chicago team had won anything in a generation, since the Bears in 1963. When the Fire won soccer bowl there was actualy a bus parade of the team down LaSalle. Willy Roy played a up the middle #10 style, heavy on offense. They liked to post up Granitza with his back to the goal. The guys shot was heavy. He was spectacular, better than Hristo, on dead balls. In the midfield Ingo Peter was just as strong a shot. The Dutchman, Steffanhagen, was strong and beat everyone on the field off the dribble. Clearly Ferner started in goal. In the Semifinals he matched off vs the other great NASL German keeper, Volkmar Gross. Mathieu was on D most seasons. When they had him they won. Unfortunatly I heard back then that the Teutons didnt like his Haitian pigment. Glenn played defense as I remember, Hall as well. Spaulding I think. they were the grinders. I think Tasso was a local kid. John Tyma was the hail Mary sub, who scored a few last second goals during the season. Fajkus may have been local as well. This is still my favorite Chicago team ever. We need to find that trophy for the museum.
I thought one of the names on this list looked familar and looked it up. # 03 Greg Ryan, is the new women's national team coach. Below is a link to his bio where it mentions him playing for the Sting. http://www.ussoccer.com/news/fullstory.sps?inewsid=165744
I was at that game. First row of the upper deck along the 3rd base line (far side from the field). In my memory Pato Margetic scored the goal, but I'm most likely wrong.
Formation: 3-4-3 Man, I loved that team. Funny this thread should pop up today. While I was getting a haircut this afternoon who was in the chair across from me, but Lee Stern. I let him know I spent quite a bit of time at Comiskey/Wrigley/Soldier Field watching his team as a teenager and it fueled a fan of the game for life. I thanked him for what he's done for the game. He was exceptionally gracious.
I was there first row centerline in what was the right field bleachers at old comiskey. Mathieu scored the winning goal but it was a shootout goal he dribbled around Volkmar gross and san diego always claimed after that frantz took longer than the 5 seconds.I went to soccer bowl 1981 in toronto and saw them win there to in a shootout.The parade down lasalle st had the sting players in mini cars not a bus.
My best memory of that season was Ingo Peter's shot from mid-field. I think it bounced two or three times, and went over the keeper. Unfortunately, he didn't ever score again for the Sting. That season was a blur for the most part, tho. The post games at Arnie's on Rush Street, sitting in the sun along third base at Wrigley ... Later, like 1983 or 1984, I was the dj at the post-game parties at the Executive House on Wacker. Usually, it was the lesser known players who showed up there, but I did meet a lot of chickies at those parties.
Whirlwind posted the link to the first picture. Here's a link to another team picture: http://home.att.net/~naslpics/teampics/81_sting_alt_bw.jpg Thanks for the info. Was Granitza successful in Europe? Did he return after the NASL folded? Were there any players who received their first playing experience in the NASL, American or internationals, that went on to be regulars in Europe?
Granitza did not play in europe after his Sting days. He opened a french restaurant in chicago on clybourn (go figure) that eventually went bust then returned to Germany where he owned a bar.
Granitza came from Hertha Berlin. One Sting player was DIck Aadvocat. He managed Rangers and I think he is now manager of the Dutch national team.
Karl Heinz - "I gotta go!!!" Yeah, Karl Heinz had to leave in a hurry. Either the law or his investors were after him hot & heavy!!!! That was soccer. Thunderfoot Granitza, long golden haired Pato, Arno & Rudy Glenn. Wily Roy as HC. These were stars. And they stayed with the team. They weren't sold to European leagues. You could follow that team and league. Not like this minor league garbage you have now. ___________________________________________________________ THE WHOLE WORLD IS WATCHING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Thunder and Lightening Yes, Karl-Heinz fled to Germany to avoid prosecution by his partners because of some financial malfeasance. He finally resolved the issues and was permitted back. Arno was banned from the German national team because of a match fixing scandal (IIRC), so Wily recruited him to play here. Oh. And Jurgen is god.
I played on an indoor team (over-30) this winter with Willy Roy at his facility. One night after a game we sat around and he started telling stories from the "good old days". Althougth I wasn't living anywhere near Chicago at the time and in 1981 I was nine years old; it was great to hear from/about the history of the game in this country and how it has developed.
The Sting got some coverage back in the day. The late Tim Weigel in particular played them up. One Weigel-Granitza moment lives in hilarity. Karls wife, Rosewitha, opened a boutique called '12' after Karls uniform number and Weigel let Karl do a live remote from the grand opening. Karl and Rosewitha stood side by side next to a rack of clothes while Karl held the mike and talked about the shop and the Sting. At the end, when Karl was going to be all professional and throw it back to the studio, he let out one of the immortal lines in local sport reporting history "So, if you want to see super soccer excitement come and see the Sting. And if you want to buy a piece from a woman, come see my wife" Yoou could hear the anchors and off screen techs laughing, Weigel almost fell over. I loved the Sting.
CUS and I sat in the first row of the upper deck of that game screaming derogatory comments the whole time at the San Diego bench and, in particularly, their coach Alan Wiley. At the end of the game, he looked up, smiled and gave us a wave. Those were great days for young, teenaged soccer fans.
Actually, Krol, Ron Newman was the coach of the Sockers. Give him credit for appreciating the creative abuse that we hurled at those bastards from San Diego. 1981 was a special season. I attended every home game that year and made the road trip to Toronto. Useless trivia: Did you know, that in every playoff game that year, when the Sting wore yellow socks, they won, and when they wore black socks, they lost? When I got to the stadium for the final, I was praying that they would wear yellow socks.
I love hearing all of these stories. My Bigsoccer name is a tribute to that team since 1981 was the year I was born. I did some searching on Google and found a guy with all of these old NASL game tapes and even a Sting 1981 Highlights tape. Anybody here have any Sting games on tape? Also, I read in Game Informer magazine recently that "NASL Soccer" was voted Best Sports Game of 1981. Anyone have it or remember playing it? I partly credit my love of soccer to my Dad's two soccer phases, one around the 1984-85 Sting years and the other during the '94 World Cup. So the Sting are indirectly responsible for my affliction.
See, all that cheap beer we drank did have some effect on the brain cells. Was Alan Wiley coaching a team that season?
The other great game many of us recall was the 6-5 goalfest at a jam-packed, sun-drenched Wrigley Field. I want to say that was 83 or 84... Back then, WGN broadcast a few games, and this one was so good Roy Leonard talked them into letting him do a half-hour highlight show replay a couple nights later.
Alan Willey was a striker for Manic de Montreal. We roasted him big-time from the center field bleachers in Wrigley Field.