Felix Zwolanowski

Felix Zwolanowski (born July 12, 1912 in Düsseldorf , † November 26, 1998 ) was a German football player.

Player career

societies

In the youth department of Rheinfranken Düsseldorf , Felix Zwolanowski got to know the game of a club and the competitive games of the association round. He went through all youth teams in the Rhine Franconia. The Düsseldorf native also completed his first probation with the seniors in his home club. At the age of 20, the little whirlwind, he was 1.68 m tall, switched to the big local rival Fortuna Düsseldorf.

Already in his first year at Fortuna, the lively technician, who can be used on the left side of the field as a runner, half-forward or winger, won the title in the final round of the 1933 German soccer championship . Fortuna Düsseldorf won its first championship in the 1932/33 season in the Berg-Mark district. In the following games for the West German championship against the champions of the districts of Rhine, Hesse / Hanover and Ruhr, the team with the formative runner series Paul Janes , Jakob Bender , Theo Breuer and the storm conductor Georg Hochgesang reached the final against FC Schalke 04 . Sülz 07 and Borussia Fulda - the West German runner-up in the previous season - were the opponents on their way to the final. The "Knappen" -Elf from Schalke brought on April 30, 1933 in Duisburg with a 0-1 defeat Fortuna Düsseldorf the first defeat of the season. Even the outstanding left wing of the Elf vom Flingerbroich with Felix Zwolanowski and Stanislaus Kobierski did not score a goal against Ernst Kuzorra and Fritz Szepan's team that day . As West German runner-up, Fortuna took part in the final round of the German soccer championship in 1933. In the 9-0 success in the round of 16 against Vorwärts-Rasensport Gleiwitz , Zwolanowski, who played on the half-left, scored four goals. In the quarter-finals, the sporting hurdle against the SV Arminia Hannover team, which was coached by the successful English coach William Townley , was significantly higher. The team of the Viennese trainer Heinz Körner prevailed in Hanover with 3-0 goals. In the semifinals Fortuna continued their series of victories without conceding with a 4-0 against Eintracht Frankfurt in Berlin. It was clear that for the first time a team from West Germany would win the German championship, the Viktoria, because with Schalke the second finalist for the final on June 11, 1933 in the Müngersdorfer Stadium in Cologne was certain. Fortuna made it into the final without conceding a goal, after the 3-0 victory in the final, the Düsseldorf team also won the German championship in 1933 without conceding a goal. In the 10th minute, Zwolanowski had brought the new champions 1-0 up. The Düsseldorf lightweight fought most of the duels in the final with the right runner from Schalke 04, Otto Tibulski . At the time of this sporting climax, the 21-year-old Zwolanowski also experienced a profound change in society and thus also in football. On April 28, 1933, the SA man Hans von Tschammer und Osten was given the post of "Reich Sports Commissioner" (on June 19 that of the "Reich Sports Leader"). Germany was to become “a people in physical exercise”, and so that this also happened in the National Socialist sense, the transformation of the bourgeois sports organization began. For the first time in Germany's history, sport was steered by politics and had lost its independence. For the footballer Zwolanowski, the games in the Gauliga Niederrhein began with the 1933/34 round . VfL Benrath prevailed two laps ahead of Fortuna. From 1936 to 1940 Felix Zwolanowski celebrated the championship in the Lower Rhine Gauliga five times in a row. In 1936 he again entered the final of the German championship with his comrades. The game was lost with 1: 2 goals after extra time against 1. FC Nürnberg . In this final, too, Zwolanowski, called "Sir", was in the left connector position in Fortuna's attack. In the 1936/37 season Zwolanowski and Co celebrated successes in the cup. In the semifinals on December 5, 1937 in front of 10,000 spectators in Hanover, Fortuna managed a 5-2 win against Dresdner SC . The Saxons weakened themselves decisively by three dismissals in the second half of the game. One after the other, Walter Kreisch, Willibald Kreß and Richard Hofmann were hit . The final took place on January 9, 1938 in the Cologne stadium in front of 72,000 spectators. After a goalless first half, Schalke 04 decided the game in their favor with a double strike in the 46th and 47th minutes. The team of coach Karl Flink lost in the end with 1: 2 goals. For eight years from 1932 to 1940 success after success lined up under the flag of Fortuna Düsseldorf. Felix Zwolanowski was an indispensable part of the team. In 36 finals for the German championship, he scored 10 goals for his Fortuna. After the end of the Second World War , the 35-year-old veteran made himself available to rebuild. In the 1946/47 round, Fortuna on the Lower Rhine won the championship in the Berg-Mark group and thus promoted to the Oberliga West . In the league he came from 1947 to 1949 again to 14 missions and then ended his playing career. Stubborn shoulder injuries played a part in this.

Selection / national team

Already on July 2, 1933, the 21-year-old Zwolanowski made his debut in the association selection of the Lower Rhine in the game against Rheinhessen / Saar. Four more appointments were made by 1937. It was not until the age of 28 that he was appointed to the national team by Reich coach Josef Herberger . On September 15, 1940, he made his debut during the Second World War in a 1-0 victory in Pressburg against Slovakia as a right runner together with the other newcomer Hermann Eppenhoff in the DFB team. On November 3, 1940, he came in Zagreb against Yugoslavia for his second assignment. He was still a member of the squad for the international match against Denmark on November 17th in Hamburg, which took place 14 days later, but was not used and thus ended his international career.

Coaching career

The ex-national player completed his coaching training at the German Sport University in Cologne in 1952. He held coaching positions at VfB Kleve, TuS Lintfort , Ratingen, SSV Oberkassel and Wersten 04. With TuS Lintfort he was promoted to the 2nd League West in 1958. Professionally, the passionate hunter was employed by the Düsseldorf Rheinbahn.

Web links

• Felix Zwolanowski in the database of weltfussball.de
• Felix Zwolanowski on dfb .de
• Felix Zwolanowski on f95.de

literature

• 100 Years of German Championship, Die Werkstatt publishing house, 2003, ISBN 3-89533-410-3 .
• Jürgen Bitter : Germany's football. The encyclopedia. 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 .
• Lorenz Knieriem, Hardy Grüne : Player Lexicon 1890 - 1963 . In: Encyclopedia of German League Football . tape 8 . AGON, Kassel 2006, ISBN 3-89784-148-7 .