1. FC Magdeburg
1. FC Magdeburg is a German association football club based in Magdeburg. The club was founded in 1965 from the football department of the sports club SC Magdeburg and has been one of the top teams in the East German Oberliga, winning three championships and seven cup titles. By winning the European Cup Winners' Cup in 1974, the club became the only East German club to win a European trophy and also achieved the greatest success in its history. After German reunification, the club fell on hard times but returned to professional football in 2015 with the promotion to the 3. Liga. Afterwards the team managed in 2018 to climb up to the second division, in which the team plays today.
History
Football has been played in Magdeburg since the end of the 19th century. On 15 June 1896 SV Victoria 96 Magdeburg was founded, a club that had its best days before World War II, when it participated in the German championship finals on several occasions. Later the club participated in the Gauliga Mitte. After World War II, all sports clubs in the Soviet Occupation Zone were dissolved and a number of smaller clubs were created, which at first competed at a local and regional level. In 1945 players from the disbanded clubs Magdeburger SC Prussia 1899 and Cricket Viktoria Magdeburg formed Sportgruppe Sudenburg. This club and SG Lemsdorf came together as the sports club BSG Eintracht Sudenburg, which in turn merged with SAG Krupp Gruson in 1950. The next year the club was renamed BSG Stahl Magdeburg, and then in 1952, became BSG Motor Mitte Magdeburg. In 1957 the football department of Motor Mitte was moved to SC Aufbau Magdeburg, a political decision with the goal of achieving higher standards of performance. In 1965, the football department was again broken out of SC Aufbau Magdeburg and a pure football club was created, 1. FC Magdeburg. This was part of a general – again politically motivated – movement in East Germany towards football-only clubs with the goal of achieving higher standards. Ten dedicated football clubs were created during the winter break 1965–1966 1. FC Magdeburg was the first football club to be founded.The 1960s
SC Aufbau Magdeburg were promoted to the first tier of East German football in 1959. At the beginning of the 1960s, the club usually played in the lower midtable of the DDR-Oberliga, but in 1964 the club had its first major success with a surprise win of the FDGB-Pokal. In the final at Dessau, SC Augbau Magdeburg came back from being 0–2 down to beat SC Leipzig 3–2. The cup win meant the first international appearance of a Magdeburg club, and SC Aufbau Magdeburg managed to hold Galatasaray to a draw – three times, but went out on a coin toss. Legend reports that the coin first stuck upright in the muddy ground, and only the second toss brought about a decision.SC Aufbau Magdeburg finished mid-table again in the 1964–65 season and managed to defend their cup title as the first team in East German football ever, beating FC Carl Zeiss Jena 2–1 in the final in Berlin. However, the 1965–66 season, when the football department of SC Aufbau Magdeburg was reorganized into football club 1. FC Magdeburg, ended in disaster: The club finished last in the table and was relegated to the second-tier DDR-Liga. However, in the UEFA Cup Winners' Cup, 1. FC Magdeburg managed to reach the quarter final, eventually going out against defending champions West Ham United featuring stars such as Bobby Moore and Geoff Hurst.
With their new manager Heinz Krügel, 1. FC Magdeburg were immediately repromoted and finished third in 1968 and 1969. With their third win of the FDGB-Pokal in 1969 the club had finally established itself among the top teams of East German football.
The 1970s
During the 1970s, the DDR-Oberliga was mostly dominated by two teams, 1. FC Magdeburg and SG Dynamo Dresden. One of the figures behind the success at Magdeburg was Heinz Krügel, manager of the first team. Under his reign, Magdeburg produced 9 East German internationals between 1969 and 1974 alone, four of which were part of the East German team competing at the 1974 FIFA World Cup. The golden age of Magdeburg football began in 1972, when the club won the East German championship with the youngest squad in history. 1. FC Magdeburg had a record attendance in this season, an average 22,231 spectators per game.The following season Magdeburg finished third again. The club's European campaign ended in the second round of the European Cup with a 0–2 aggregate loss against Juventus. The home leg saw an attendance of 50,000 spectators. However, Magdeburg did not finish the season without a title, as they won their fourth FDGB-Pokal title with a 3–2 against 1. FC Lokomotive Leipzig.
The 1973–74 season is generally considered as the most successful in the history of 1. FC Magdeburg. Aside from winning their second East German championship, the club could celebrate the biggest success in club history when they won the Cup Winners' Cup against title holders AC Milan, beating them 2–0 in De Kuip in Rotterdam. 1. FC Magdeburg would be the only East German football club to triumph in a European competition.
In the next season, 1. FC Magdeburg defended their Oberliga title successfully and topped their record attendance once more, averaging 22,923 spectators. The European Super Cup that usually pitted the Cup Winners' Cup and European Cup winners against each other was not played, supposedly because the two clubs involved could not fit it into their schedules, but a political motivation has since been suggested, as West German powerhouse FC Bayern Munich would have been the opposition. However, the two teams were drawn against each other in the first round of the European Cup, and Bayern won both matches.
In 1976, Heinz Krügel was relieved of his duties as manager of 1. FC Magdeburg, as he had fallen into disgrace with the SED cadres. They considered him politically unreliable. His successor was Klaus Urbanczyk. 1. FC Magdeburg would not win any more championships, but always finished in the top four for the rest of the 1970s. In the FGDB-Pokal, 1. FC Magdeburg was more successful, winning the competition in 1978 and 1979, against Dynamo Dresden and BFC Dynamo.
The late 1970s saw 1. FC Magdeburg play against a number of famous teams in the European competitions. In the 1976–77 UEFA Cup, 1. FC Magdeburg went out in the quarter-finals against eventual winners Juventus, in the 1977–78 UEFA Cup Magdeburg met FC Schalke 04 and beat them 4–2 and 3–1, making 1. FC Magdeburg the only team to beat Schalke 04 in a European competition at their home Parkstadion. But 1. FC Magdeburg went out in the quarter-finals again, eventual winners PSV Eindhoven scoring the deciding goal with just 90 seconds left on the clock.
The 1980s
From the end of the 1970s, 1. FC Magdeburg did not have much more success in the league, aside from a third-placed finish in 1981. This had a profound effect on attendances: While until the 1976–77 season the club had averaged 18,000 spectators or more – with attendances of up to 45,000 against Dynamo Dresden or FC Carl Zeiss Jena, the season average had now dropped to a mere 13,000 spectators. Only with their seventh FDGB-Pokal title in 1983 was the club able to get back into the limelight – and with the club came the fans. About 25,000 fans supported their team in Berlin's Stadion der Weltjugend against FC Karl-Marx-Stadt, a club record for travelling fans that still stands today. However, it soon became clear that 1. FC Magdeburg had lost its position among the best clubs in East Germany, those were now BFC Dynamo, Dynamo Dresden and Lok Leipzig. This made qualification for the UEFA Cup via league position the only realistic goal in this period. But even in the UEFA Cup, 1. FC Magdeburg usually went out in the early rounds, albeit against reputable opposition, such as AC Torino, Borussia Mönchengladbach, FC Barcelona and Athletic Bilbao. The 1–5 home defeat against Barcelona showed that the club from 1. FC Magdeburg was no longer able to keep up with Europe's footballing greats. From the mid-80s, attendances shrunk to around 10,000 spectators.Only in the 1989–90 season did 1. FC Magdeburg compete for the championship until the final day. However, the team lost the decisive match against their direct competitors from Karl-Marx-Stadt and only managed to finish third in the table.
The 1990s
Grave mistakes by the club's management led to 1. FC Magdeburg losing touch with top-flight football. After the third place in 1990, hopes were high that the team would be able to qualify for Fußball-Bundesliga or at least Second Bundesliga in the 1990–91 season. However, the club could not compensate for losing manager Joachim Streich and a number of players and only finished tenth. In the qualification playoffs for the Second Bundesliga the club did not win a single game and found themselves in the tier III Oberliga Nordost/Staffel Mitte. Eventually, Magdeburg are ranked eighth in All-Time DDR-Oberliga Table. During the 1991–92 season Magdeburg managed to keep up with 1. FC Union Berlin, but eventually finished second, trailing the winners by thirteen points.In the next season Magdeburg finished eighth, but winning the Saxony-Anhalt Cup meant qualification for the DFB-Pokal. Magdeburg met then Second Bundesliga club Wuppertaler SV and beat them 8–7 after penalties in a dramatic game. In the third round, holders Bayer 04 Leverkusen came to a sold out Ernst-Grube-Stadion and triumphed, Magdeburg was beaten 5–1. The 1993–94 season saw Magdeburg miss out in yet another qualification, finishing seventh because they had scored less goals than Hertha Zehlendorf. Magdeburg competed in tier IV now, finishing twelfth in Oberliga Nordost/Staffel Nord. This was the worst position the club ever finished in – and a mere 444 spectators came to see the matches on average.
In 1996–97 Magdeburg moved to Oberliga Nordost/Staffel Süd again. In this season, another Magdeburg team, Fortuna Magdeburg had been promoted to this league, leading to better attendance levels: Both derbies and the key match against FSV Hoyerswerda were watched by more than 10,000 people. FCM averaged 3,000 spectators in that season. Eventually, 1. FC Magdeburg could reaffirm their position as the number one club in the city, finishing first in the league and winning promotion to the Regionalliga Nordost.
In 1997–98 Magdeburg managed to stay in the third-tier Regionalliga and win the Saxony-Anhalt Cup for the second time and in the following year, the team competed for promotion to 2nd Bundesliga for a long time, but eventually finished third, raising hopes that the team would be able to qualify for the reduced Regionalligas in the following season. However, a tenth place meant relegation to tier IV once more. Consolation could only be found in the club's reserves winning the Saxony-Anhalt Cup for a third time.