60 years ago today: First match day of the German Bundesliga

With 16 founding members

The Bundesliga is 60 years old: On August 24, 1963, the then newly founded highest football division in Germany completed its first day of play – for the first time and as the last country in Europe at that time as a cross-regional league.

16 clubs started, 46 had applied. The DFB awarded the starting places to the reigning champions Borussia Dortmund, HSV, Werder Bremen, Eintracht Braunschweig, 1. FC Köln, Schalke 04, Meidericher SV, Preußen Münster, 1. FC Kaiserslautern , 1st FC Saarbrücken, Eintracht Frankfurt, Karlsruher SC, VfB Stuttgart, 1st FC Nuremberg, 1860 Munich Hertha BSC as a representative of Berlin.

The rule book looked significantly different than it does today. For example, injured players were just unlucky because there weren’t any substitutions yet. Yellow and red cards had not yet been introduced either, warnings were issued verbally by the referee. At that time, goalkeepers were still allowed to handle back passes that were not yet covered by gloves. And there were two points for a win, in the case of a tie the goal quotient counted instead of the goal difference – so a 1-0 was better than a 5-1. The zero had to be in place back then.

The first Bundesliga goal was scored by Timo Konietzka, who only needed 58 seconds to give BVB the lead against Werder. There is no photo of it. Dortmund still lost the game, in the end it was 2:3, although Konietzka even managed a brace in the 90th minute. At the end of the season he finished second in the top scorer rankings (20 goals) behind the legendary Uwe Seeler (30) from HSV. The first table lead was shared by 1. FC Köln and Schalke 04, both of whom won 2-0. It wasn’t as high as Duisburg’s 4-1 win in Karlsruhe, but it was mathematically more valuable.

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