Fan Culture And Relations Between The Fans In Germany

Yes, Yes, Yes.

 

As an outsider who gained an appreciation for German football culture I found several aspects quite interesting. To paraphase; if people wanted to find out what German football culture was like I'd describe it loosely as a half-way point between the British and Italian games, both on and ff the pitch. However not only has the German game had its own supporter ideosyncracies, but various influences at various times. This is never more prevalent than now.

At the moment the German supporter culture is probably undergoing its most significant change ever. The tradition denim-clad Kuttenfan is becoming more outnumbered by a fad that has brought its culture with it from the south of the Alps-that of the Ultras.

The "Italianising" of the German supporter culture has totally revolutionised the notion of what supporters stand for. Huge flags, people leading the singing wth loudhailers, and intricate choreographies involving cards, long strips of paper etc etc wth al sorts of logos and things on them are now par for the course in German Kurven. Smething that has promoted debate about many of the older supporters, intent on more British style terrace singing. But the Ultras are here to stay, and similarly to in Italy have become not only supporters of their club but fierce opponents of the increasing commercialisation of today's football. However luckily unlike in Italy, the German Ultras of today remain more or less apolitical, which is a great thing in my view.

For pictures of what I'm talking about, go to <http://www.stadionwelt.de> and click on the word "fans". The choreographies are not only breathtaking but add so much to the colour of attending a Bundesliga match these days.

One thing I initialy found strange to understand when I first attended FCB matches was the concept of "fan friendships" between clubs, even to the point of fans brandish fan-friendship scarves at matches. Some clubs have highly cultivated fan friendships meaning that they will often go and support their "partner club" at match when their team isn't playing. For example Bayern's partner club is VfL Bochum, 1860's is Kaiserslautern, Schalke's is FCN, FC Koeln's is St Pauli etc etc. Games against "partner clubs" are generally relaxed affairs, with many fans even going to the extent of of standing in the opponents curve to cultivate this friendship.

There are still definitely several huge rivalries in the Bundesliga. The biggest are
-Schalke-Dortmund
-1860-Bayern
-Leverkusen-FC Koeln
-Hamburg-St Pauli (probably more with Bremen these days)
Greuter Fuerth-Nuernburg

Of course in the east some of the derbies are nasty encounters. VfB Leipzig vs Sachen Leipzig ist best avoided, as well as FC Union Berlin and Dynamo Berlin. All clubs are in the 2nd league down, but the intense hatreds are there.

I'm not saying there isn't hooliganism in Germany. But generaly you can go to a match feeling that you will be more or less safe from trouble. Of course on the other hand if you look for it, you will find it easily enough as well. And on that score, German police are people best avoided.

JF in Oz

 

It really depends on the grounds and the attitude of the security personal in them. For example in Dortmund and Kaiserslautern the Ultras are able to wave 4-5 metre high whoppers right in the middle of the curve.

In Munich however the security are total arseholes and insist on a strick 1.2m limit. Any flag stick bigger than that waved in the Suedkuerve is often snapped by our friends in green. At one match last season the Schickeria Muenchen <http://www.schickeria-muenchen.de> even had their small flags and "Doppelhalter" hold-up signs taken off them.

Luckily they allow giant flags to be waved by select people out on the running track in front of the curve. But it is not the same effect as what you have at the WestfalenstadEON or Fritz-Walter Stadion.

JF

 

I remember in the old stadium of Schalke, huge flags are forbidden in the stadium.

I've owned a flag with a 7,50 meter staff, and that was not allowed.

The flag was made in 1979, and in the 80's they forbid.

 

Yes and no Jonam,
The thing is that FC Bayern deliberately cap their season tickets to 20000. They are more worried about the overall profit they make from indivifual match tickets and supporter items. And I guess this motto does work to a degree.

I mean if you have 40000 season ticket holders, you will have the same 40000 people in the ground. That means they may buy one or two teams shirts per year, if you are lucky. By capping the season tickets at 20000 the majority of tickets are sold to individual purchasers. That means over 35000 people PER GAME who could buy a team shirt, scarf etc etc.

I cannot see this culture changing until we get the new stadium. Let's face it, if you are sitting in the Gegengerade freezing your nads off on a sub-zero night in a half-full bay of seats, the addictive adrenalin rush you get from going to the football each week is virtually reduced to nothing. As we have seen at Schalke and Hamburg (and even in Rostock) the crowds in the new grounds have remained very high even despite generally crap football BECAUSE OF THE NERVE-TINGLING ATMOSPHERE in the ground.

I'll be flying over for the opening of the "rubber dinghy" in 2005.

JF in OZ

 

One section in the stadium is reserved for the away fans, so when you have an away ticket you go there (you have such a specified section also on "regular" tickets, and at least here the stadium security won't let you stay anywhere else, even if the stadium is half-empty). And no one forces you to wear a team shirt. I don't even own one .
In heated (?) derbies (at least when Braunschweig plays Hannover, i lack knowledge about other games) the away fans are catched at the train station and guarded to the stadium by the police.

 

Especially for a club like FC Bayern where the "home" fans still come to matches in buses from all over, the concept of travelling away isn't must different. Basically, the away club gets an allocation of X sanding terrace tickets as well as Y seats in the bays next door. Sometimes the allocation is tiny (aka Freiburg). Sometimes there are as many as 15000-20000 away fans in attendance. And as long as you are not in the standing terracing, in Germany there is little problem with having supporters in both teams' colours mingling, the typical cat-caling etc etc aside.

Things in Germany are nowhere near as extreme as in England where two full rows of yellow-raincoat clad 'stewards' are needed to keep the fans apart. The main fans who need to be seperated are those in the two respective standing terraces. More often than not they are at opposite ends of the ground anyway, so there generally aren't too many problems, apart from the ever-shrinking groups of organised Category C 'casuals' who organise brawls with opposition groups whereever they go by swapping mobile phone numbers etc etc.

The best thing about standing terraces is the fact that fans can stand with their friends without having to pre-book tickets in Row X Aisle 24 etcf etc. If they get in early enough, and can locate their gang, they are right. And have the full freedom to stand anyway in the Stehsektor that they want.

UEFA is now anti-terracing. So all UEFA Cup, national team or Champions League matches must be played in all-seater stadia. The way the German grounds have gotten by this problem is to have flip-up seats that can be used in the big Euro games, even if people still never use them in the respective team's curves. Hamburg has even gone one better and installed seats that fold away under their terracing.

Even at big CL matches security never is strict on having people seated, unlike England where the authorities threatened Man Utd with closing Old Crapford if the fans didn't stop standing to sing when they played FC Bayern.I once heard reports of a CL Qualifier match in Leeds where about 30% of the Sechziger were thrown out for refusing to be seated durig the game. Luckily you'll never see this is Germany.

Once again, the game in Germany is still for the people, not some filthy media mogal intent on turning sport into some TV comodity.

JF

 

Nice, but one thing is wrong. The people supporting Bayern at their away-matches are not those who travelled there from Munich, but more people(glory-hunters) from the area the game is played at.

 

KUEHSCHEISSE!

Bayern has supporters from Munich and wherever in fanclubs all around the country that travel to matches. Sure in areas like the Ruhr & Berlin there will be extra hordes of local FCB fans, but at games such as Dortmund you'll be getting fans mostly from Bavaria who have nabbed tickets through their fanclubs.

Bayern has the largest pool of supporters in the country from which to draw attendences. Sure some of these fans will not make the trip to Munich for midweek cup games at home (which is embarrassing, I know). But most home league matches have been sell-outs this season.

Hopefully with more people tied to season tickets at the Allianz Arena, the numbers will boom dramatically. But as I said in another thread Bayern look at things from a business perspective. If you get 40000 with the same season tickets each match, you'll only get so many shirts scarves etc etc bought each year. If you cap the amount of season tickets to 20000 that allows about 37000 tickets to be sold on a match-to-match basic. Considering Bayern's supporter base and the cost of the team shirts etc etc, that means far more income derived through the sale of the supporter paraphanalia. Whilst means we don't have to reduce players salaries by 10-20% as BvB had to do this season.

How many people would even the allmighty BvB or S04 get if playing in our stadium every week, sitting in the snow and ice during the cooler months. I'd gather not much more than we do now.

And of course Borussia Luedenscheid doesn't have its bandwagon of fans! Of course they never got fans after winning Europe in 1996.If you believe that BvB hasn't got a bandwagon element either, you also must believe in the tooth fairy as well.

Borussia Dortmund fans are so loyal that when they start losing they NEVER whistle and jeer their side! And always stay supportive when their team is losing , even if their team's coach has to drive over them so as to leave an away game.

Purely and simply every club has its bandwagon element. Schalke got 30-40000 at normal matches at their massive old dinosaur Parkstadion. Where are all the new supporters from. Now they are getting 60000 every match. A couple of seasons ago Stuttgart were getting crowds as low as 18000. Now suddenly the Gottlieb-Daimler is near full at each match. "Stuttgart vor, noch ein Tor!"

Stop viewing your club with gold-tinted glasses (so to speak) SF. Each club will have its bandwagonners. You just ignore them and remember to recognise the true supporters.

JF

 

In Florida, I saw a guy wearing a 2003 Bayern Munich jersey yell something in German to a guy wearing a 2002 Leverkussen jersey.... I hope it was not pleasant

 

The heated rivalries are more in the lower leagues. Some lower league clubs that have always had a lot of violent fans are Dynamo Dresden, Eintracht Braunschweig, Waldhof Mannheim, Sachsen Leipzig, VfB Leipzig, BFC Dynamo Berlin, Chemnitz, RotWeiss Essen .. the list goes on. Bundesliga rivalries are there too of course, but they are less "critical" because of the tight security and the modern stadiums.

A lot of great rivalries are currently put on ice because the clubs are in different leagues. I'd sure as hell like to see St. Pauli meet HSV again or a Berlin derby, or see Mannheim play Kaiserslautern but that will maybe take a while.

Somtimes old derbies are revived for one game when clubs meet in the cup.. that's always a big spectacle. In this cup season we saw two historic derbies, Offenbacher Kickers - Eintracht Frankfurt and Eintracht Braunschweig - Hannover 96.

 

Yes, the fights in lower classes are more intensive.

 

Your club seems to have some excelent and highly passionate supporters match. I recall images from a match in Manchester where all the Baseler Ultras were doing a song where one row jumped one way and the rows above and below jumped in the other. Looked totally sick! The St Jakobpark looks a European-class stadium if I ever saw it. You should be very proud of your set-up at FC Basel. (Plus you have an Aussie Scott Chipperfield too!)

But sadly there looks to be a rather nasty elements amongst the FC Basel support. Check out this website, enough said.

<http://www.gepflegt-arrogant.com>

JF

 

Yes our Ultras are really great, you can check out some pics and videos in the pictures thread.

the website you posted is the one of "Bande Basel", a hooligan group regarded as one of the strongest in German speaking Europe at the moment.

Personally I don't have that much of a problem with hooligans as long as they keep it between themselves (and with some kind of fairplay). They don't bother you usually, but if they do that's a different thing of course.


btw. Scott Chipperfield is one of our crowd favourites He always gives everything and you see that he puts his heart into every game. He was voted best player of the first season half this year by Basel fans. We're currently leading the table with 17 wins, 1 draw and 0 losses !
There's been rumours that he wants to go play in England (div. 1 or prem.l.), which has always been his dream. But he should rethink going to a 1st division club (Cardiff was named) because next year we're probably going to be in CL again and our stadium will be upgraded to 40'000 for Euro2008 too (we average 30k in season matches, but some matches can easily fill the 40k.. all matches vs. Grasshoppers, CL etc.. for the deciding game against Liverpool, they could have sold 90'000 (!) tickets!)

 

And without any riots !

(i couldn't resist).