1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig

1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig is a football (soccer) club from Germany.

Talk 1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig

Are you a fan of 1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig or want to know more about the club? Then you can discuss 1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig with other fans on the messageboard here.

1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig News

Want to know more about 1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig? We gather news from various medias about 1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig and you find them in the news section

1. FC Lokomotive Leipzig is a Germany football (soccer) List of football clubs in Germany based in the city of Leipzig, Saxony and may be more familiar to many of the country's football fans as the historic side VfB Leipzig, the first national champions of Germany. They currently play in the 5th tier of the German football league system.

Early history

1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig was formed on May 26 1896 out of the football department of gymnastics club Allgemeine Turnverein 1845 Leipzig. However, they lay claim to an earlier date of origin by reaching back to a club that was incorporated into VfB in 1898 – Sport Club Sportbrüder Leipzig – which was one of four football clubs formed in Leipzig in 1893. The union lasted until May 2, 1900 when the two sides went their separate ways again.

VfB Leipzig was one of the Founding Clubs of the DFB that came together in the city in 1900 to form the DFB (Deutscher Fussball Bund or German Football Association). They were immediately successful at their chosen sport and made their way to the first German national championship final held in 1903. Their opponents were DFC Prague, an ethnically German side out of what is today Prague in Czech Republic, but which was then part of the Austria-Hungary. The DFB had invited "German" clubs of this sort from other countries in order to boost numbers in their new national association.

Prag had made their way to the final under circumstances that had allowed them to avoid playing a single playoff game, while Leipzig had come through some hard fought matches. Arriving in Hamburg for the match, the heavily favoured Pragers took themselves off on an ill-advised pub crawl the night before the contest and so arrived to the pitch in less than ideal game-shape. The contest against VfB Leipzig was delayed half an hour as officials scrambled to find a football that was in good enough condition to play the match. The host FC 93 Altona Hamburg club provided a new ball and eleven minutes in Prag scored the first goal. At the end of the first half the score stood at (1:1), but Leipzig then pulled away to emerge as the first winners of the Viktoria Meisterschaftstrophaee (Victoria Championship Trophy), representative of German football supremacy, on the strength of a decisive 7:2 victory.

Leipzig played themselves into another final appearance in 1904, but the match was never contested. A protest by Karlsruher FV over their disputed semi-final with Berliner SV was never resolved and the DFB called off the final only hours before its scheduled start. There would be no champion that year. The following season Leipzig found themselves unable to cover the expense of travelling to participate in their scheduled first round playoff match and so were eliminated from that year's competition. They did, however, go on to raise the Viktoria again in 1906 and 1913 and also played in the 1911 and 1914 finals.

In the period leading up to World War II, VfB was unable to repeat their early success. After the re-organization of German football leagues under the Third Reich in 1933, 1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig found itself in Gauliga Sachsen, one of sixteen upper tier divisions. While they earned good results within their own division, they were unable to advance in the playoff rounds. In 1937, they captured the Tschammerpokal, known today as the German Cup, in a match against FC Schalke 04, the dominant side of the era.

GDR era

In the aftermath of the war 1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig was dissolved by the occupying Allied authorities, like most other organizations in Germany, including sports and football clubs. Club members reconstituted 1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig in 1946 as SG Probstheida under the auspices of the occupying Soviets. After playing as BSG Erich Zeigner Probstheida and then BSG Einheit Ost, 1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig merged with SC Rotation Leipzig in 1954 and played in the DDR-Oberliga, East Germany's top flight league, but earned only mediocre results. In 1963 Leipzig's two most important clubs – SC Rotation and SC Lokomotive Leipzig – were put together resulting in two new sides being founded - SC Leipzig and BSG Chemie Leipzig. East German football went through a general re-organization in 1965, creating Football club (GDR) as centres of high-level football, during which SC Leipzig was transformed into 1. FC Lokomotive Leipzig, while rivals FC Sachsen Leipzig continued as a Betriebssportgemeinschaft (GDR), or a company team. Playing as Lokomotive, 1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig's fortunes improved somewhat as they almost always finished well up the league table, but they were unable to capture the top honour in the German Democratic Republic (German: Deutsche Demokratische Republik or German Democratic Republic) with losing final appearances in 1967, 1986, and 1988.

Lok earned a clutch of FDGB Pokal with victories in 1976, 1981, 1986 and 1987 against failed appearances in the Cup final in 1970, 1973 and 1977. They also won the UEFA Intertoto Cup in 1966 and made an appearance in the 1987 final of the UEFA Cup Winners' Cup falling 0:1 to Ajax Amsterdam.

German reunification

German re-unification in 1990 was followed by the merger of the football leagues of the two Germanys. A poor season led to a seventh place finish in the transitional league, but an unexpectedly strong playoff propelled 1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig into the 2nd Bundesliga (football).

1. FC Lokomotive made a grasp at their former glory by re-claiming the name VfB Leipzig. A third place finish in 1993 advanced 1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig to the top flight Bundesliga (football) where they finished dead-last in the 1994 season. The new VfB began a steady slide down through the 2. Bundesliga into the Regionalliga Nordost (III) by 1998 and then further still to the Oberliga Nordost/Süd (IV) by 2001. They were bankrupted in 2004, their results were annulled and 1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig was dissolved.

In 2004, 1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig was re-established by a group of fans as 1. FC Lokomotive Leipzig. The renewed side had to start in the lowest league eleventh-tier 3. Kreisklasse, Staffel 2 in 2004-5. Even so, they continued to receive soldidly enthusiastic fan support: their game against Eintracht Großdeubens second team in the Leipzig Zentralstadion on 9 October, 2004 broke the world record for lower-league attendance with an astounding 12,421 spectators in the stands. Thanks to a merger with SSV Torgau, 1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig could play in the seventh-tier Bezirksklasse Leipzig, Staffel 2 in 2005/2006. Finishing this league as champion, 1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig qualified for the sixth-tier Bezirksliga. In 2006 Lok Leipzig also played a friendly match vs. FC United of Manchester (4:4) and qualified for the Landespokal 06/07 by winning the Bezirkspokal. Lokomotive Leipzig finished as champions of their group and promoted to fifth-tier Landesliga Sachsen Group for 2007-2008 season. 1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig finished 2nd to FC Erzgebirge Aue II and missed out on direct promotion to NOFV-Oberliga Süd by 2 points in 2007-2008 season. It still had the chance to regain Oberliga status through a relegation play-off with FC Schönberg 95, winning game one 2-1 at Schönberg. In the return leg, in front of almost 10,000 spectators, 1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig lost 0-1 but still gained Oberliga promotion on the away-goal rule.

Lokomotive Leipzig in European competitions

Honours
- German champions: 1903, finalist in the uncontested 1904 championship match, 1906, 1913
- German Cup: 1936
- East German vice-champions: 1967, 1986, 1988
- East German Cup: 1957, 1976, 1981, 1986, 1987
- UEFA Intertoto Cup Champion: 1966
- UEFA Cup semi-finalist: 1974
- Cup Winner's Cup finalist: 1987
- Central German football championship: 1903, 1904, 1906, 1907, 1910, 1911, 1913, 1918, 1920, 1925, 1927
- Saxony Cup: 1996 (by the reserve team)

Managers
BSG Leipzig-Ost
- Rudolf Walseck (1951 - 1952)
- Otto Winter (1952 - 1954)
- Arthur Fischer (1953 - 1954)

SC Rotation Leipzig
- Heinz Krügel (1954 - 1956)
- Werner Welzel (1956 - 1959)
- Martin Brunnert (1959 - 1960)
- Martin Schwendler (1961 - 1963)

SC Leipzig
- Rudolf Krause (footballer) (1963 - 1965)
- Günter Konzack (1965 - 1966)

1. FC Lok Leipzig
- Hans Studener (1966 - 1969)
- Kurt Holke (1969 - 1971)
- Horst Scherbaum (1971 - 1976)
- Manfred Pfeifer (1976 - 1978)
- Heinz Joerk (1978 - 1979)
- Harro Miller (1979 - 1985)
- Hans-Ulrich Thomale (1985 - February 1990)
- Gunter Böhme (February 1990 - 27. May 1991)

VfB Leipzig
- Jürgen Sundermann (28. May 1991 - 30. June 1993)
- Bernd Stange (1. July 1993 - 21. February 1994)
- Jürgen Sundermann (22. February 1994 - 8. April 1994)
- Damian Halata (9. April 1994 - 30. June 1994)
- Tony Woodcock (1. July 1994 - 30. October 1994)
- August Starek (31. October 1994 - 30. May 1996)
- Damian Halata (1. June 1996 - 30. June 1996)
- Sigfried Held (1. July 1996 - 7. October 1997)
- Damian Halata (8. October 1997 - 30. June 1998)
- Hans-Ulrich Thomale (1. July 1998 - 28. March 1999)
- Dragoslav Stepanović (29. March 1999 - 29. August 1999)
- Joachim Steffens (30. August 1999 - 22. July 2001)
- Hans-Jürgen Dörner (23. July 2001 - 26. March 2003)
- Detlef Schößler (27. March 2003 - 3. June 2003)
- Hermann Andreev (24. June 2003 - 19. March 2004)
- Michael Breitkopf (footballer) and Jörg Engelmann (20. March 2004 - 22. April 2004)
- Mike Sadlo (23. April 2004 - 30. June 2004) - Player/manager

1. FC Lok Leipzig
- Rainer Lisiewicz (since 1. July 2004)

Team trivia
- In the immediate aftermath of World War II, East German authorities showed a penchant for tagging sports teams with the names of socialist heroes: Erich Zeigner was German lawyer and socialist politician who served as the mayor of Leipzig under Soviet occupation from July 1945 until his death in April 1949. The former village of Probstheida is today the south-eastern quarter of the city of Leipzig.

Records (since re-establishment on 10 December 2003)
- Record Victory: 20-0 v Paunsdorf Devils (19 September 2004), v SV Althen 90 II (23 April 2005)
- Record Defeat: 1-15 v Hertha BSC Berlin, friendly (23 May 2005)
- Most Goals scored in a Match: 8 Ronny Richter v Paunsdorf Devils (19 September 2004)
- Most Goals scored in a Season: 81 René Heusel (2004/05)
- Record Attendance: Bruno-Plache-Stadion 13,098 v Hertha BSC Berlin, friendly (23 May 2005)
- Record Attendance (League): Zentralstadion 12,421 v Eintracht Großdeuben II (9 October 2004 - World Record in a lowest league)
- Longest unbeaten Run (League+Cup): 67 (04/05: 26+7, 05/06: 29+5), 5 September 2004 - 26 May 2006

Related pages

1. Fussballclub Kleve 1863/1903 e.V., 1.FC Eschborn, 1.FC Lokomotive Leipzig, 1.FC Magdeburg, 1.FC Pforzheim, 1.FC Schweinfurt 05, 1.FC Saarbrücken, 1.Fussball Club Köln II, 1.Fussball-Club Eintracht Bamberg, 1.Fussball-Club Heidenheim 1846, 1.Fussball-Club Nürnberg, 1.SC Feucht, Admira Wien, Altonaer Fussball-Club von 1893, Ballspielverein Cloppenburg e.V. von 1919, Bayer Leverkusen II, BFC Vorwärts 1890, Blau-Weiß Berlin, Borussia Dortmund II, Borussia Mönchengladbach II, Borussia Neunkirchen, BTuFC Union 1892, BTuFC Viktoria 1889, Chemnitzer FC, Concordia Hamburg, DFC Prag, Dresdner SC 1898, Dresdner SC 1898, Duisburger SpV 1900, Dynamo Berlin, Eintracht Frankfurt II, Eintracht Trier, Energie Cottbus II, FC Holstein 1902, FC Homburg, FC Sachsen Leipzig, First Vienna Football Club, FK Pirmasens, Fortuna Köln, Freiburger FC 1897, FSV Mainz 05 II, Fussball Club Hansa Rostock II, Fussball-Club Gelsenkirchen-Schalke 04 , Fussball-Club Oberneuland von 1948, Fussball-Club Sachsen Leipzig 1990, Göttingen 05, Hallescher Fussballclub, Hamburger SV II, Hannoverscher Sportverein von 1896, Hertha BSC Berlin II, Holstein Kiel, Kaiserslautern II, Karlsruher FV 1891, KFC Uerdingen, Luftwaffen SV, Lüdenscheid, Lüneburger SK, Preußen Münster, SC Rot-Weiß Essen, SC Verl, Schwimm und Sportverein Ulm 1846, SG Wattenscheid 09, SK Rapid Wien, Spielvereinigung Greuther Fürth, Spielvereinigung Unterhaching, Sport Club Preussen Münster, Sport Verein Eintracht Trier 05, Sport Verein Waldhof Mannheim 1907 e.V., Sport-Club Freiburg, Sportverein Viktoria 1901 Aschaffenburg, Sportverein Wehen Wiesbaden II, SpVgg Ansbach 09, SSV Ulm 1846, SV Babelsberg 03, SV Darmstadt 98, SV Meppen, SV Waldhof Mannheim, SV Wilhelmshaven, Tasmania 1900 Berlin, Tennis Borussia Berlin, Turn-und Sportverein Grossbardorf 1923, Türkiyemspor Berlin e.V. 1978, Verein für Leibesübungen Sportfreunde Lotte, Verein für Rasensport Wormatia 08 Worms e.V., VfB Leipzig, VfB Lübeck, VfB Oldenburg, VfL Bochum Fussballgemeinschaft e.V., VfL Wolfsburg II, VfR Mannheim, VfR Neumünster, VfV Hildesheim, Vogtländischer Fussball-Club Plauen e.V.