Edi Finger

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Eduard "Edi" Finger Sr. (also known as Ing.Edi Finger ; born January 29, 1924 in Klagenfurt ; † April 12, 1989 in Maria Enzersdorf ) was an Austrian sports journalist , football and general sports commentator .

Life

Origin and education

Eduard "Edi" Finger was born in 1924 as the son of Gottfried and Josefine Finger in simple circumstances, full of deprivation and hunger for the family. The father was a "controlled" casual worker, sometimes employed as a bricklayer, sometimes as a site manager. In the interwar period of Austro-Fascism , Gottfried Finger was considered politically unreliable and therefore did not even get a job building the Grossglockner High Alpine Road , where thousands of workers were needed. As the main breadwinner, the mother Josefine Finger had to support the family. For lugging heavy mortar containers on her head, she received a weekly wage of 15 shillings (the equivalent of 1.09 euros without taking inflation into account). Despite the meager family income parents sent her son Edi after the end of compulsory education at the Higher Federal Trade School in Klagenfurt , specializing in electrical engineering, where he in 1943, in the Second World War , graduated . His father Gottfried, an avowed opponent of the National Socialist dictatorship , came to a hospital in Graz in the winter of 1942 with an inflammation of the kidneys, where he died the following day, just 39 years old.

Edi Finger moved to Vienna and enrolled at the Technical University (TH Vienna). Sources differ about when and for how long he studied at the Technical University of Vienna: According to the personal dictionary published by Ackerl / Weissensteiner in 1992, Finger studied for four semesters at the Technical University in Klagenfurt immediately after graduating from the Technical College in Klagenfurt and then went back to Klagenfurt to then write as a sports journalist for Carinthian newspapers; on the other hand, Gernot W. K. Aglas, in his Edi Finger biography, locates this time with only two semesters and only after 1946 in occupied post-war Austria .

Goalkeeper, Military Service, and Post War

Finger spent his free time playing football passionately. He was a goalkeeper in the SK Austria Klagenfurt youth team . As a result of an enemy attack in 1942, he suffered a cruciate ligament and a meniscus tear as well as an overstretched collateral ligament . That meant the end of the goalkeeping career he had just begun.

The entry into the “writing” guild of sports journalists opened up for Finger through Ferdinand Lube, the sports club youth leader at the time, who wrote sports reports for the Kleine Zeitung . Before Lube was drafted into the Wehrmacht , he proposed Edi Finger, who was working for the Mining Union at the time, as his successor. Finger was denounced: "If the father was a communist , the son cannot be far off either!" (Quoted from Aglas, 2018) and was drafted into military service despite his football injury. According to his own account, he “ acted so stupidly and clumsily on the 'good soldier Schwejk '” (Aglas, 2018) that he returned from the last months of the war fairly safe and unharmed.

After his first print journalistic attempts at the Kleine Zeitung , Finger, back in his native Klagenfurt, was transferred to the sports department by Roman Ritter, a former footballer who founded the Kärntner Illustrierte with the permission of the British occupation forces in 1945 . During this time he was also involved with the Red Falcons .

The sports journalist who was awarded the “Ing. Edi Finger “became

At some point in the years after graduating from high school, he was given the title of engineer , which he was entitled to after three years of relevant professional activity . (On the ceremony itself as well as the award year are discoverable no sources; thinkable a ceremony honorary or a social practice, Edi Finger would be to address its technical training with an engineer and his name to Ing. Precede.)

In 1946 the British Forces of Occupation in Austria (British Troops Austria) installed the Alpenland broadcasting group (see British Zone and the diverse radio landscape 1945 to 1955 ) and sought talented young reporters in a selection process in the old Klagenfurt stadium. Finger, who had gone there to apply, found himself surrounded as a competitor by unemployed actors, senior fellow journalists and war veterans . Encouraged by Gerdi Springer , former ice hockey player in the Austrian national team and later well-known soccer coach, encouraged fingers to stay on. For five minutes he was the commentator of the game Waidmannsdorf against Annabichl (Annabichler Sportverein, ASV) and was appointed to step in when he is needed at some point. Two months later, Finger was ordered by the British officer in charge to the Mallnitz Ski Championships to comment on the first broadcast of the Alpenland station. This started his 42-year sports reporting career with the microphone as his working tool in hand.

In 1951, Finger moved to the federal capital Vienna as a full-time reporter . First he became head of the radio sports department at RAVAG , the indirect forerunner of Austrian broadcasting, between 1954 and 1964 he was the first TV reporter and TV sports director and built up the sports department and moderated the first TV sports direct broadcasts April 1956, Finger, who soon became the Edi Finger or Ing.Edi Finger brand, commented on the first live television broadcast of a football match when Brazil defeated the hosts 3-2 in Vienna. He reported on this event that he “crouched low on the green lawn” so as not to “get in the way of the camera.” From 1967, Finger was head of the ORF radio sports department.

In February 1975, the live broadcast Sport on Monday started in the main evening program of FS1 of the Austrian Broadcasting Corporation (ORF) , in which background information was provided beyond current events. The program was presented by Edi Finger from the start. In 1976 he emotionalized with his live report of Franz Klammer's Olympic victory in downhill skiing in Innsbruck . In the same year he was allowed to comment on an international football match in Florence for the first time . His love remained, however, despite the increasing television, the radio. Until 1987 he was head of sport at ORF radio and became a radio legend. He commented “what came before the microphone” (Nikolaus Scholz in Ö1 , 2003). Including boxing matches , ice hockey championships, bike races and reports from Formula 1 races; but above all it was the soccer games. Wherever a radio broadcast sports event took place in Austria, Ing.Edi Finger was at the microphone, the sports greats he accompanied as a commentator read like the contemporary who's who of Austrian sports:

“And he was really there everywhere. The great athletic careers of Anderl Molterer , Toni Sailer , Karl Schranz , Annemarie Moser-Pröll , Christl Haas , Franz Klammer , Toni Innauer (all winter sports), Jochen Rindt (with him, by the way, he conducted the last interview before his tragic accidental death in 1970 ) , Niki Lauda and Gerhard Berger (Formula 1), to footballers such as Ernst Happel , Gerhard Hanappi , the brothers Robert and Alfred Körner , Walter Zeman , Ernst Ocffekt , Ernst Stojaspal , Herbert Prohaska , Hans Krankl and so on accompanied Finger his incomparable reports. "

- Gernot WK Aglas : oepb / editorial office of the Austrian press office

Whenever a football game was broadcast on the radio and on television at the same time, many Austrians switched on the television, switched off the television sound and switched on the radio - Edi Finger commented on the radio speakers, as he did on June 21, 1978 in Cordoba . In southern Germany , too, Finger had already achieved a certain level of awareness: Many viewers there also preferred television reporting, in this case that of German television, to be accompanied by the radio report of the Austrian ORF - if only because of the often viewed as stale to avoid German commentators. This ultimately led to the feature section of the Munich tabloid newspaper tz Finger awarding it a “tz rose” for its report.

With Heribert Meisel , Edi Finger sen. one of the two most popular Austrian football reporters in the 1950s and 1960s. (Nikolaus Scholz in Ö1, 2003.)

Cordoba 1978 and the aftermath

Finger achieved fame with his radio report of the World Cup game between Germany and Austria (2: 3) in the “Chateau Carreras” stadium in Córdoba, Argentina , which went down in Austrian football history as “ Córdoba 1978 ”. At first, according to Kai Schächtele in the Financial Times Deutschland (2008), he had no desire to comment on this game. At best, Germany could have reached the final with a 5-0 win ("Five goals against Austria, why shouldn't we succeed?", Said Hermann Neuberger , the then President of the German Football Association , before the game). For the Austrian team, it was all about honor. That's why Finger initially decided to stay in Buenos Aires that day . The day before the game, he decided, following his gut feeling, to travel to Cordoba: “'Baba often had a seventh sense,' says his son today. 'Sometimes he foresaw things in the subconscious that really happened.' ”( Edi Finger jun. , 2008).

The well-known reporter became a star the next day, with Fingers commenting on the game with his emotions, with his reportage, especially with his booming voice: “Tooor, Tooor, Tooor, […] I wear narrisch!” At the winning goal of the Austrians by Hans Krankl cult status in its key passages . His biography became a sold-out bestseller, the long-playing record Edi Finger live: Football WM 78 was sold more than 50,000 times. “I wear narrisch” sounds as a ringtone from cell phones, the sentence can be found on T-shirts, key rings and mugs, advertisers also use the exclamation. After a civil lawsuit by Edi Finger's widow and sole heiress Anni Finger, who, together with her daughter Sissy, commenced in 2012 to refrain from the “unlawful acoustic use” of the cheering scream, as well as to invoice and pay the resulting amount, this issue became Judged up to the Austrian Supreme Court (OGH). Anni Finger lost in all court instances.

The name Edi Finger has become a brand in Austria with the rank of Sachertorte and Mozartkugel , hardly a child who does not know “I wear narrisch”. Starting a few weeks before the European Championship in 2008 , a CD of the same name was sold, on which Edi Finger jun. played a decisive role.

An excerpt from the report:

"There comes Krankl [...] into the penalty area - shot ... Tooor, Tooor, Tooor, Tooor, Tooor, Tooor! I am foolish! Krankl shoots - 3-2 for Austria! Ladies and gentlemen, we fall around our necks; the colleague Riepl, the graduate engineer Posch - we piss off. 3: 2 for Austria with a great goal from our Krankl. He covered it all over, ladies and gentlemen. And wait a little, wait no a little; then maybe we can have a fourth. [...] Now hammas gschlagn! […] Germany on the ball again. A possibility for Abramczik . And!? Besides! So the Abraaaamczik - I want to obbusseln the Abramczik for it. Now he's hoofed us. Standing alone in front of the gate. The braaave Abramczik hot shot next to it. The Orme will annoy you. [...] And now it's auuus! The End! Enough! Past! Out! Germany defeated! "

A few meters away from Finger, the German reporter Armin Hauffe commented on the game. He ended his broadcast "dryly":

“Germany is defeated by Austria two to three. It was a poor international match here from Cordoba. Well. "

In the following year, 1979, Ror Wolf produced a radio play as a writer and director for Hessischer Rundfunk . He created his radio collage Cordoba June 1:45 p.m. from the original sounds of the Austrian (Edi Finger) and German (Armin Haufe) radio broadcasts. Daniel Meuren sums up Wolf's collage in the Frankfurter Allgemeine in 2008:

“Wolf dissects the reports from German and Austrian radio so finely that he illustrates the basis for the origin of the Austrian Cordoba myth. A game in which there was almost nothing sporting any more has become a glorified legend for a whole nation, because in truth it was not eleven Austrians who defeated eleven Germans 3-2, but because Edi Finger won the duel of the radio reporters [Edi Finger and Armin Haufe] decided for themselves in a unique way. "

- Daniel Meuren : In: Frankfurter Allgemeine

The last decade

A few months after "Córdoba" he suffered a heart attack in 1979. He then withdrew and gave no more live reports. Eight years later, after commenting on a finish at the Vienna Marathon, the second heart attack followed. The third heart attack on April 12, 1989 had fatal consequences, Edi Finger died in his home in Maria Enzersdorf.

family

Edi Finger Sr. was married to Anna Finger (born around 1930). They met in the summer of 1946 at the Lorettobad in Klagenfurt and got married on October 10, 1948. They had two children together: their son Edi Finger junior (born March 9, 1949) became a sports journalist, sports reporter and commentator at ORF, just like his father. The seven years younger daughter Elisabeth "Sissy", née Finger (* 1956; marriage to the Uruguayan soccer player Carlos Alberto Sintas ), is a journalist (formerly with Börsenkurier in Vienna) and works as a director. “Baba”, as they called their father, took both children to the Wiener Rundfunkhaus at an early age . Edi jun. was already known as a two-year-old in the studio sitting on his father's lap on ORF. Sissy also always sat next to his father when he was reporting, and later she would help him if he hadn't seen something, such as which cyclist crossed the finish line first. Edi Finger Sr. made sure that the entire family attended the broadcasts. The daughter Sissy was also regularly present to report on the Formula 1 races, as she remembered on the occasion of the opening of an exhibition on Jochen Rindt in September 2010.

Honor

In October 2006 the Vienna City Council Committee for Culture decided to name a street in an urban development area in Vienna- Stammersdorf (in the 21st district ) after Edi Finger. With the opening of the housing estate on Orasteig , Edi-Finger-Straße became a reality. The turning square at the southern end of the dead-end street was named Cordobaplatz .

plant

  • Soccer World Cup: 82 Spain. With Peter Stützer and Siegmar Heintz, Football World Championship (eds.). Lauf, Cos 1982, ISBN 3-923406-03-7 .
  • ... I wear foolish! My life behind the scenes of international sport. With the collaboration of Heinz Sichrovsky . Jugend und Volk, Vienna / Munich, 1988, ISBN 3-224-16043-8 .

Discography

Literature and radio play

  • Cordoba June 1:45 p.m. Radio collage as a radio play with Edi Finger and Armin Hauffe . Author and director: Ror Wolf , production: HR 1979, 42:20 min.
  • Finger, Eduard. In: Isabella Ackerl, Friedrich Weissensteiner: Austrian Personal Lexicon of the First and Second Republic. Verlag Carl Ueberreuter, Vienna 1992.
  • Ror Wolf : The next game is always the hardest. Collected football prose in one volume. Fischer-Taschenbuch-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1996, ISBN 3-596-11768-2 . It quotes the original sounds of Edi Finger and Armin Hauffe from Ror Wolf's radio collage Cordoba June 1:45 p.m., HR 1979.
  • Christian Eichler: 25 years after Cordoba: When Hans Krankl made Edi Finger very “foolish”. In: Frankfurter Allgemeine , No. 141, June 21, 2003.
  • Daniel Meuren : Ror Wolf's radio collage: Cordoba as a work of art. In: Frankfurter Allgemeine, June 16, 2008.
  • Ricardo Peyerl: "I who 'foolish" is not an achievement. In: kurier.at , December 7, 2013.
  • Gernot WK Aglas (Ed.): Ing. Edi Finger / Weltberühmt on June 21, 1978. In: oepb / Redaktion Österreichisches Pressebüro, June 20, 2018.

Web links

As sources, unless otherwise stated as individual references:

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e Isabella Ackerl, Friedrich Weissensteiner: Finger, Eduard. Entry in: Austria-Forum , the knowledge network, March 1, 2017.
  2. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Gernot WK Aglas (Ed.): Ing. Edi Finger / Weltberühmt on June 21, 1978. In: oepb / Redaktion Österreichisches Pressebüro, June 20, 2018, accessed on June 24 , 1978 June 2018.
  3. ^ History of the Austrian federal states since 1945. Volume 6/2. Helmut Rumpler (ed.), Ulfried Burz: Carinthia: From the German border mark to the Austrian federal state. Böhlau, Wien 1998, ISBN 978-3-205-98792-5 , p. 320 ( limited preview in the Google book search).
  4. ↑ a b Gertrud Piesch-Köchl: Little stories from the little house. Klagenfurt, Hagenstrasse 4. Vienna 1993, p. 25.
  5. ↑ Note: This was not the later Wörthersee Stadium , built in 1960 and located in the Waidmannsdorf district.
  6. ↑ See Ice Hockey World Championship 1947 .
  7. ^ Gerhard Urbanek: Austria's Germany Complex. LIT Verlag, Münster, 2012, p. 219.
  8. ↑ Michael Huemer, Radio Upper Austria : Legends of the football report. In: ooe.ORF.at, June 1, 2018, accessed on June 24, 2018.
  9. ↑ a b Nikolaus Scholz: Edi Finger Senior: Expressive reporter. In: oe1.ORF.at, August 1, 2003. ( Accessed September 2, 2010, no longer online.)
  10. ↑ a b c d e f g Kai Schächtele: A country becomes foolish. The 88th minute of Córdoba marked Austria's winning goal over Germany in 1978 - and made a radio commentator immortal. His descendants still draw from Edi Finger's fame today. In: Financial Times Deutschland , June 6, 2008.
  11. ↑ a b Edi Finger live: Football World Cup 78 at Discogs . (Note: Since the entire title is printed in capital letters on the record and cover, FUSSBALL is written with two S instead of ß .) Polydor 2440 205. Record (LP), Austria 1978.
  12. ↑ Decision of the Supreme Court, 23 September 2013, 4 Ob 61 / 13v ( full text in RIS . References: RdW 2014/101 p. 74 - RdW 2014.74 = ÖBl ‑ LS 2014/11 (Musger) = CaS 2014.70 = SpuRt 2014,156 / 1 Issue 4 - SpuRt 2014/1 Issue 4 - I who 'foolish!) As well as: Supreme Court decision of 23.9.2013, 4 Ob 61 / 13v - gate scream. (PDF) In: eurolawyer.at, Annotated Decisions, Lawyer Dr. Clemens Thiele, LL.M. (Ed.), September 23, 2013, accessed June 24, 2018.
  13. ↑ a b Ricardo Peyerl: "I who 'narrisch" is not an achievement. In: kurier.at , December 7, 2013, accessed on June 24, 2018.
  14. ↑ a b c Radio-Collage Cordoba June 1:45 pm by Ror Wolf, HR 1979, in the Ö1- Hörspieldatenbank, accessed on June 24, 2018.
  15. ^ A b Daniel Meuren: Ror Wolf's radio collage: Cordoba as a work of art. In: FAZ.net, June 16, 2008, June 24, 2018.
  16. ^ ORF 2, broadcast Vienna today on September 2, 2010: Exhibition in honor of Jochen Rindt. “40 years ago Jochen Rindt died while training for the Formula 1 Grand Prix in Monza. The Westlicht Gallery in Vienna's Neubau is showing the first major photo exhibition in honor of the Austrian sports hero . ”In: wien.orf.at, accessed on September 3, 2010.
  17. ^ Wien.gv.at: A street for Edi Finger. Street named after the legend of the sports reporter. In: Archive report of the town hall correspondence from October 23, 2006. Retrieved on September 2, 2010.
  18. ^ Wien.gv.at: Aviso-10.6 .: (...) Neighborly self-administration in the Orasteig residential courtyard. In: Archive report of the town hall correspondence from June 8, 2009. Retrieved on September 3, 2010.
  19. ^ Roman David-Freihsl: Córdoba in Vienna , In: Der Standard , print edition, 19./20. September 2009, accessed September 3, 2010.
  20. ^ Edi Finger: FK Austria Memphis. European Cup 78/79. Live reports at Discogs . Polydor 2486 659, Austria Gold series. Record (LP), Austria 1979.
  21. ↑ Edi Finger. Highlights from the Vienna stadium at Discogs . Polydor 831 342-1, Austria Gold series. Record (LP), Austria 1986.
  22. ↑ Christian Eichler: 25 years after Cordoba: When Hans Krankl made Edi Finger very "foolish". In: Frankfurter Allgemeine , June 21, 2003, accessed June 24, 2018.
personal data
SURNAME Finger, Edi
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Finger, Edi Sr. Finger, Ing. Edi; Finger, Eduard (real name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian sports journalist, football and sports commentator
DATE OF BIRTH January 29, 1924
PLACE OF BIRTH Klagenfurt
DATE OF DEATH April 12, 1989
Place of death Maria Enzersdorf