GERMAN LIONS’ FAMOUS HISTORY

WHO are Eintracht Braunschweig? Formed 118 years ago, the club’s official title is Braunschweiger Turn-und-Sportverein Eintracht von 1895.Their nickname is The Lions. Their games are held at the 23,325 capacity Eintracht-Stadion in Braunschweig (Brunswick), a city of 1.1m people in northern Germany. Founder members of the German FA, they were one of the country’s most famous names before World War I I .

Eintracht were also one of 16 teams – chosen from 46 applicants – to be selected for the inaugural Bundesliga in 1963 and won their first and only title in 1966-67.

In 1971, ten players were fined and two suspended for taking bribes – not to fix matches but to put in extra effort. They have regularly been touched by tragedy. In 1949, goalkeeper Gustav Fahland died from internal bleeding two days after a collision with an opponent.

In 1968, long-serving forward Jurgen Moll was killed, along with his wife, in a car crash whilst returning from holiday. And Lutz Eigendorf, who fled communist East Germany to play for Kaiserslautern in 1979, also died in a car accident shortly after joining Braunschweig in 1983.The Stasi later admitted it had been a planned assassination. Their main rivals are Hannover 96. Eintracht have provided 13 players to the West German national team. Famous alumni include Paul Breitner, aWorld Cup winner in 1974, Wolfgang Dremmler, who won 27 caps for Germany, and Max Lorenz, a member of theWest Germany squad beaten by England in 1966.