Harsh History
June 10, 2011
Being a Bielefeld supporter these days isn't easy. A fixture in the first division for much of the new millennium, the cash-strapped Westphalian club came in a distant last in division two this season and only just secured a license to compete in division three from the German Football Association, the DFB.
Fans are resorting to gallows' humor.
“My girlfriend left me and I'm a Bielefeld supporter so you could say I had a pretty bad year,” Dirk Schäberle, a long-time member of the faithful, told Deutsche Welle. “Nonetheless, I'm not going to commit suicide.”
So how did a team that played in the top flight from 2004 to 2009 plummet so far, so fast? The answer has much to do with an expensive stadium renovation in 2006, carried out under the assumption that Arminia would remain in the first division.
“We were pretty comfortable bouncing between the top two tiers, and we had a nice home grounds with a view of the city,” Schäberle said. “Then we got above our station and racked up a huge amount of debt.”
Around 27 million euros ($39.5 million) of debt, to be more precise, much of it accrued after the Schüco Arena renovations turned out to be twice as expensive as originally planned.
Bielefeld are not alone in their misery. Former first division clubs 1860 Munich and Unterhachingen also faced a nail-biting race to put their finances in order and secure professional licenses this summer.
Those clubs were saved, but a look at German footballing history shows that Bielefeld fans still have good reason to worry their team might disappear into the abyss of obscurity.
Remnants of the past
Time for a trivia test.What do Wattenscheid 09, Waldhof Mannheim, KFC Uerdingen and Rot-Weiss Essen have in common?
Answer: They are all former first-division clubs who played for major titles and beat the likes of Bayern Munich only to go bankrupt and be punished with demotion by the DFB. These teams currently play in divisions 6, 5, 5 and 4 respectively.
The specifics of their stories vary. Uerdingen, for instance, were doomed when the club severed its relationship with its main sponsor, Bayer, in 1995, while Mannheim were sunk by an overly adventurous attempt to debt-finance its way back to division one around the turn of the millennium.
The tales of woe are even more depressing at traditional clubs in the formerly Communist eastern part of Germany. In that region's second largest city, for instance, Lokomotive Leipzig are currently in division 5 and have been as low as division 11, while broke local rivals Sachsen Leipzig dissolved entirely last month.
The basic problem is that while it is relatively easy to find sponsors to fuel a club's rise, it's much harder to cut costs to match the drastically declining revenues that follow relegation. The result can often be an unstoppable downward spiral in which clubs sell their best talent to balance the books, ensuring further relegation and further budget cuts.
That's the scenario Arminia fans like Schäberle are fearing. But recent history also offers some examples of traditional clubs clawing their way back from the abyss.
Phoenixes from the ashes
In 1999, former German Cup winners Fortuna Düsseldorf had sunk to division 4 and were facing insolvency. But local rock band Die Toten Hosen, one of Germany's biggest, agreed to sponsor the club for two years, and Fortuna were able to halt their plummet.
Since then the club has put together squads with a sensible mix of young talent and seasoned veterans. The result has been slow but steady progress. Fortuna finished in the top half of the division two table in each of the past seasons.
Dyanamo Dresden have enjoyed a similar renaissance. Forcibly relegated for financial irregularities in 1995, the tradition-rich eastern German club have fought their way back up to division two next season - thanks in no small part to their fans who consistently broke amateur-league attendance records.
Bielefeld supporters are certainly doing their bit to help their team follow suit. Despite the club's uncertain future, 1800 season tickets have already been sold for 2011-12, and an anonymous, late donation of nearly a million euros allowed the club to secure its third-division license.
“I think if we get the sort of players who have experience in the third division instead of just relying on young prospects, we could survive,” Schäberle said. “That's if we get the chance.”
The DFB have given the black, white, and blue that chance. Now the hard work can start.
Author: Jefferson Chase
Editor: Matt Hermann