Adolph Bachmeier

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Adolph "Adi" Bachmeier , also Adolf Bachmeier (born October 13, 1937 in Ferdinand I. , Romania ; † July 21, 2016 in Des Plaines , Illinois , United States ) was a German-American football player in the position of a defender and midfielder . In 2002, he was inducted into the National Soccer Hall of Fame in the Veteran Player category .

Club career

Adolph Bachmeier was born on October 13, 1937 into a Bessarabian German family in the municipality of Ferdinand I in Romania, which is in close proximity to the Black Sea . In 1940 he came to Germany with his family on the orders of the German government , where he grew up before he emigrated to the United States in 1957, where he subsequently settled in and around Chicago in the US state of Illinois. He had already played football at the junior level in Germany. Between the 1950s and 1960s he played for various soccer teams in the Chicago area , where he mainly appeared for the Chicago Kickers in the National Soccer League of Chicago . With the team he was able to celebrate the championship title in the National Soccer League in the playing years 1964, 1966 and 1968, as well as winning the National Amateur Cup in 1966 and 1968 . At that time, Bachmeier was already a US citizen .

In the last year he also appeared as a player in the Chicago Mustangs . These were founded a year earlier and took part in the short-lived United Soccer Association (USA), which subsequently merged with the National Professional Soccer League (NPSL) and became the North American Soccer League (NASL). With the Mustangs, he completed 29 championship games in their only year in the NASL and contributed five hits and three assists. When the franchise, which had only existed for two years, was dissolved at the end of the 1968 game year, Bachmeier returned to the Kickers in 1969. With them he won the National Amateur Cup in 1970, for the third time in his career and for the third time in the history of the club.

His individual successes, which he achieved in the course of his active career, include, among other things, the election of Sepp-Herberger -German-American-Illinois-Soccer-Player-of-the-Year in 1965. In 1984 he was transferred to Illinois Soccer Hall of Fame inducted . In 2002 he was inducted into the National Soccer Hall of Fame in the "Player Veterans" category. Five years later he was also inducted into their Hall of Fame by the United States Adult Soccer Association (USASA).

National team career

In the years 1959 to 1969 Adolph Bachmeier appeared for the US national soccer team . His stake numbers for these are different with regard to the sources. While Dave Blevins in his volumes The Sports Hall of Fame Encyclopedia. Baseball, basketball, football, hockey, soccer assumes 15 international matches, the American Football Association mentions Bachmeier's 22 international matches. Both agree, however, that Bachmeier, who is mainly used as a defensive midfielder, remained goalless in all of his appearances. He played his first international game on May 28, 1959 in the clear 8-1 defeat by England in Los Angeles . In 1963 he was with the team participant in the football tournament of the Pan American Games 1963 in São Paulo , Brazil . The United States finished fifth in the group behind Brazil (first), Argentina (second), Chile (third) and Uruguay (fourth). With four defeats from four games and a goal difference of 3:30, the Americans were clearly the underdogs of the competition.

A year later he took part with the team in the qualifying rounds for the soccer tournament of the 1964 Summer Olympics , but could not qualify with the team for the finals. With the Americans he took part in the qualifications for the World Championships in 1966 and 1970 and was used in a total of nine World Cup qualifying games. In the six qualifying games for the last-mentioned World Cup, he led the team in 1968 and 1969 as team captain . The last two international matches of his career ended on April 20 and May 11, 1969, also in two defeats against Haiti .

successes

Private / professional career

In addition to or after his career as an active person, Bachmeier worked as a toolmaker . On July 21, 2016, Bachmeier, who last lived in Niles , died at the age of 78 in Des Plaines, Illinois. Bachmeier described the soccer club Chicago Swabia as his family club, for which not only he, but also his four brothers were active. Otto, the oldest of the six brothers, appeared as a trainer. The remaining players were mostly cousins ​​of the brothers at that time. After the end of his active career, he also worked briefly as a trainer in the children's and youth sector, but soon stopped doing it.

Web links

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f Din România, lângă Pele (Romanian), accessed on September 4, 2018
  2. ↑ a b c Adolph Bachmeier - Obituary (English), accessed on September 4, 2018
  3. ↑ Scan of the naturalization notice (English), accessed on December 29, 2018
personal data
SURNAME Bachmeier, Adolph
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Bachmeier, Adolf; Bachmeier, Adi (first name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German-American soccer player
DATE OF BIRTH October 13, 1937
PLACE OF BIRTH Ferdinand I. , Romania
DATE OF DEATH July 21, 2016
Place of death Des Plaines , Illinois , United States