All regional league carriers have approved a nationwide working group, zt with significant voting results. The DFB Presidium meets on August 18. For the first time since 2017, the procedure has been returned to zero. Sport in the east explains the starting point.
The club initiative started in the northeast for the “promotion reform” in the 3rd division has achieved an important stage destination. The regional associations or sponsors of the five regional leagues have agreed to participate in a Germany -wide working group.
Clear results in the northeast, north and west
While the north-east relay was 17: 1 (only Meuselwitz was against it) for the establishment, it was 9: 1 votes for eight abstentions in the north. From Bavaria it was said that a “vast majority” would have positioned itself in a digital round. There was also no precise information from Regionalliga Südwest GmbH, which, however, signaled its willingness in a press release, to enter a national dialogue. The Südwest regional league emphasized that it could not find a reform requirement and is more of a matter of discussions due to the efforts of the other regions.
A clear statement came from the West. With 18: 0, the regional league-west clubs were closed for a reform process.
Uhlig raises accusations against West Association
Marcus Uhlig, CEO of Rot-Weiß Oberhausen, explains Sport in the east of the session in the western team: “It was previously agreed in the DFB Presidium that the promotion initiative will be presented at all season conferences and that a coordination of a working group moderated by the DFB is to be stopped. The agenda item was not made.
The head of the West German Football Association, Peter Frymuth, and his deputy Manfred Schnieders were not present at the meeting. The West regional leagues shared the resentment of the East Team about the current regional league structure. Uhlig denotes the promotion regulation, which only enables the west and southwest of direct rose and alternately sends two out of three masters from north, Bavaria and northeast to the relegation, clearly as “greatest injustice in German football that has to be repaired”.
Why the west follows the northeast
The West relay has direct access to the 3rd division, but its clubs lack further developments and perspectives in the area of admission procedures, infrastructure requirements, league marketing and TV presence in the regional league. In addition, seven second representations of federal and second division teams compete there. They also speak out for a reform process.
The Oberhausen boss criticized the handling of the reform initiative launched in the east: “In almost all appointments, association peaks stay away at the last second. This has tastes. You cannot deny the impression that the strategy of the regional associations is to sit it out and play for time. It looks like a preventive tact.” The fact that club bosses from other regions go into a shoulder with the north -east clubs and publicly attack the procedures of their regional associations ensures a new starting point for the nationwide working group. This could now also be formally decided.
NOFV President Hermann Winkler says: “I will work on August 18 at the conference of regional and state presidents in the DFB to ensure that the nationwide working group can get started for a regional league reform immediately.” Winkler and the NOFV still be open to whether he will catch up with an official order for this on the DFB Bundestag on November 7th.
Tommy Haeder, branch manager of the Chemnitzer FC and spokesman for the promotion reform group, is: “A mandate may be important that the working group is placed on safe feet and thus underpinned the reprint with which this question is to be solved.” It should be crucial how the DFB and its President Bernd Neuendorf position themselves.
Uhlig and Haeder accept DFB
Uhlig says: “I see the DFB there in the responsibility to accompany and moderate the process.” This is emphasized by Haeder: “We have refuted that the majority of the current regional leagues are satisfied with the current solution. Our homework is done. Now it is the turn of the DFB.”
A clear target formulation for the working group could also be important for the further course-be it through the DFB Bundestag or the DFB Presidium. Haeder sees the following three aspects as inevitable: “Masters have to rise, there must be no regional unequal treatment between the same leagues and the problem must not shift down to the top division.”
Most recently, a Task Force of the DFB and the regional league carrier had worked on the goal of a four-relevant regional league between 2017 and 2019, was then the other way round and in the end, but in the end, the often criticized ascent regulation with five seasons recommended the DFB Bundestag 2019 to say goodbye. Even then, Peter Frymuth was there, while for the northeast as club representative Hubert Wolf from ZFC Meuselwitz and Mario Kallnik from 1. FC Magdeburg and finally not intervening. Today’s club bosses want to undo this error from the east and have created the base for this.
42 clubs support the procedure across league and nationwide, also because they believe that further improvement potential for the regional league and the German league structure can be generated in the reform process.
