Rudolf Seliger

Rudolf Seliger (2012)

Rudolf "Rudi" Seliger (born September 20, 1951 in Mülheim an der Ruhr ) is a former German national soccer player for MSV Duisburg .

Club career

The young striker Seliger began his football career in 1963 at TuS Union Mülheim, where he played until 1970. He came to the Bundesliga club MSV Duisburg via the Eintracht Duisburg intermediate station (Amateur League Niederrhein) in the summer of 1971. “Zebra” coach Rudolf Faßnacht also relied on the two other newcomers Klaus Wunder (Arminia Hannover) and Helmut Roth (FC Lugano).

Already on the first day of the 1971/72 season, on August 14, 1971 at the home game against Borussia Dortmund, the winger made his debut in the MSV dress. In his first year in the Bundesliga he made 21 appearances, scored one goal and landed with the team on 14th place in the table. In the following four seasons, the fast man with the hard shot on the wing established himself as a regular player. Duisburg did not get away from a double-digit place in the table in these years. Switching from Faßnacht to Willibert Kremer and Rolf Schafstall did not help . In the 1974/75 DFB Cup , however, Rudi Seliger made it to the finals with his teammates and coach Kremer. On February 8, 1975, the “Zebras” defeated FC Bayern with 3-2 goals in the Munich Olympic Stadium . "Rudi" struggled with injuries, however, in the league round he made 25 appearances and in the three cup rounds before the final he was therefore unable to actively intervene. The Cup final on June 21, 1975 he denied though, the 0: 1 defeat to Eintracht Frankfurt but he could not prevent.

Hope for improvement came up for clubs like attacker Rudi Seliger in the 1976/77 round: With coach Otto Knefler they came in 9th and Seliger contributed six goals in 32 Bundesliga games. In the seventh season, the athletic knot in the meanwhile crowd favorite, he was cheered on by the fans on the Wedau with a long drawn out "Ruuudiii", seemed to have burst, with what for him 16 goals he shot the MSV to sixth place in the table and thus into the UEFA Cup . The 1978/79 round brought highlights in the European Cup by reaching the semi-finals, but his injury problems (adductor tear, strains, operations on the spine and intervertebral disc, kneecap) in 1978 to 1980 often prevented him from showing his skills on the pitch can. In the two rounds 1978/79 and 1979/80 he came only to 30 Bundesliga appearances with nine goals. When Duisburg's Bundesliga relegation was determined after the 1981/82 round , Rudolf Seliger played 13 times in the 2nd division with 65 goals after 288 Bundesliga games and scored one goal before he finally ended his professional career. In the 1983/84 season he played for VfB Speldorf in the Oberliga Nordrhein . He then played in the amateur field from 1984 to 1985 for Olympia Bocholt , from 1984 to 1987 for SSVg Velbert and from 1987 to 1989 for Lobbericher SC .

Selection games for the DFB, 1971 to 1978

After almost two months of playing in the Bundesliga, on October 6, 1971, the storm talent came from Wedau for his first appearance in the DFB jersey. DFB coach Jupp Derwall called him in the course of preparation for the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich in the German national soccer team of amateurs , for the international match against the Soviet Union in Nuremberg. In the year of the Olympic Games, Seliger completed thirteen games with the Olympic team alone. At the tournament during the Olympic days he was used in six games, including the encounters against Hungary and the GDR. On March 27, 1973 he came in the junior national team in the 5-1 success against the USA as a substitute for the course. The next step in the ladder of the DFB followed on September 3, 1974, "Rudi" was used in the B national team . Two days before Christmas 1974, on December 22nd in La Valletta, Seliger also became a senior international . A second time, on October 6, 1976 in Cardiff against Wales, he put on the dress as a senior international. With the DFB amateurs he ended his amateur appearances after his 25th mission and a total of ten goals on April 7, 1976 in Bremerhaven against Denmark (juniors). With the game against Sweden on April 18, 1978 in Norrköping, the chapter in the B national team was over after five missions.

After the career

The trained businessman and programmer ran two sports shops in Duisburg, a restaurant in the city center and a tennis hall in the Meiderich district.

literature

• Jürgen Bitter : Germany's football. The lexicon . Sportverlag, Berlin 2000, ISBN 3-328-00857-8 .
• Jürgen Bitter : Germany's national soccer player: the lexicon . SVB Sportverlag, Berlin 1997, ISBN 3-328-00749-0 .
• Matthias Weinrich, Hardy Greens : Encyclopedia of German League Football. Volume 6: German Cup history since 1935. Pictures, statistics, stories, constellations. AGON Sportverlag, Kassel 2000, ISBN 3-89784-146-0 .
• Matthias Weinrich: Encyclopedia of German League Football. Volume 3: 35 years of the Bundesliga. Part 1. The founding years 1963–1975. Stories, pictures, constellations, tables. AGON Sportverlag, Kassel 1998, ISBN 3-89784-132-0 .
• Matthias Kropp: Triumphs in the European Cup. All games of the German clubs since 1955 (= "AGON Sportverlag statistics." Volume 20). AGON Sportverlag, Kassel 1996, ISBN 3-928562-75-4 .
• Kicker . Football Almanac '93 . Copress-Verlag, Nuremberg 1992, ISBN 3-7679-0398-9 .

Web links

Commons : Rudolf Seliger  - Collection of images, videos and audio files