In these days, when there is a lot of discussion in Krefeld about the future of KFC Uerdingen and especially the stadium issue, an anniversary threatens to be overlooked.
February 28th marks the fiftieth anniversary of the Uerdingen footballers’ first home game in Grotenburg. TuRa Büderich was the opponent of the then encounter of the association league.
The result of 1: 1 was rather disappointing for the then championship leader Uerdingen. The 2700 spectators were already better. So far, the Uerdingen team have played their home games in Uerdingen in the stadium on Lassenhofweg – ironically, on the exact place that Stefan Krämer is currently using as a training facility. 1000 to 1500 fans watched the games, and the anxious question arose whether the Krefeld soccer fans would also watch Uerdingen soccer, whether the move would pay off for FC Bayer 05 Uerdingen at all. He did it.
Incidentally, it was not the first time that Grotenburg, which opened in 1927, saw higher-class league football: when Union Krefeld met FC Schalke 04 in front of 16,000 spectators in 1949, it was already becoming apparent that the best years were to come. The Krefeld won 4-0. A good decade of contract football was ahead, in which Union competed against all sorts of clubs that had and still have a good reputation in German football. Borussia Mönchengladbach, 1. FC Cologne, Bayern Munich, Alemannia Aachen, Eintracht Braunschweig and many more should be mentioned. Krefeld footballer names were in the notebook of national coach Sepp Herberger. Some made professional careers at Fortuna Düsseldorf and Gladbach Borussia. Hansi Baum, Hermann Wefels, Edi Wichmann, Heini and Gerhard Jansen stand for the sporting heights of BV Union Krefeld, which had to finally end the chapter of contract football in the 1959/60 season. In addition to the cotton mill and stainless steel arena, the Grotenburg was often the site of the games.
In the 1963/64 season, TuS Duisburg 48/99, who had been promoted to the newly created Regionalliga West, played some home games not in its Fugmann arena as usual, but in Grotenburg.
At the end of the sixties the Grotenburg was the living room of the handball players of the TV Oppum – of course in the now extinct version of the field handball. The German champions from 1966 and 68 played there on Sundays at 11 a.m.
But the rise of the footballers could not be stopped, the successes of the Uerdingen manifested the name Grotenburgkampbahn. Two of the five Bundesliga promotions could be celebrated on this lawn. 13 years of first division football, legendary cup triumphs like the 6: 3 afterwards against Eintracht Frankfurt (1977) or the 6: 4 afterwards against VfB Stuttgart (1986) with Oliver Bierhoff as striker or the duels with the first division Energie Cottbus, SV Werder Bremen and 1. FC Köln, which the meanwhile third-class KFC hosted in the 2002/03 season, are associated with the name of Grotenburg. And not to forget seven European Cup games that even brought FC Barcelona to Krefeld in November 1986. The stadium, its name and that of the city achieved worldwide fame with the match of the century on March 19, 1986, when Uerdingen defeated Dynamo Dresden 7: 3 (1: 3) in the European Cup – after 2-0 in the first leg.
The move of the Uerdingen footballers brought the city not only increased awareness but also the advantage that the Bayer workshops carried out a large number of smaller and larger repairs on this urban property. And Bayer supported the construction of the new north stand and the parallel expansion of the south stand in the summer of 1986 with a lost grant of one million marks, and for a while also waived the proceeds from perimeter advertising for loan financing, which corresponded to a further 3.5 million marks.
Kampfbahn Grotenburg: opening in 1927
The Kampfbahn-Grotenburg – so its first name – was opened on September 17th, 1927. The opening program includes the lowering of 4,000 carrier pigeons, calisthenics for gymnasts or a style run for sports clubs.
Even if athletics with the legendary Hubert Houben (1898 – 1956) at the top determined the sporting scene, football was also represented at the opening with the encounter between the Krefeld city team and the DFC Prague.
The Grotenburg saw the first international football match after nine years of existence. On September 27, 1936, Germany won 7-2 over Luxembourg.
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