Hartwig Koepcke

Hartwig Köpcke (born January 30, 1944 ) is a former German soccer player. In 1970 he played for BSG Stahl Eisenhüttenstadt in the GDR Oberliga , the top division in GDR football .

Athletic career

Before Hartwig Köpcke was called up for military service in the National People's Army (NVA) in May 1964 , he had helped TSG Wismar to move up from the third-rate district league Rostock district to the GDR league . As an NVA soldier, he was able to continue playing football in the GDR league with the Army Sports Association (ASG) Vorwärts Neubrandenburg . In the eighteen months of his army service, he played 26 league games and scored thirteen goals. In November 1965 he returned to TSG Wismar, where he completed all of the remaining twenty GDR league games and scored three more goals. After he had only been used in eleven of the thirty point games for TSG in 1966/67, he joined the GDR league club Stahl Eisenhüttenstadt for the 1967/68 season. But even there he did not succeed in playing his way into the regular eleven, in the two seasons 1967/68 and 1968/69 he only made 26 appearances in 60 league games. When Eisenhüttenstadt was promoted to the GDR league in 1969, Köpcke was involved with thirteen matches and two goals. In the 1969/70 season he was first used in the second team, for which he played seventeen games in the first half of the GDR league. When midfielder Peter Krzikalla was out on a long-term basis in the second half of the season , Köpcke replaced him in the league team, with whom he was called up in eleven point games in midfield until the end of the season and justified his commitment with four goals. Then Stahl Eisenhüttenstadt was determined to be relegated. Since the GDR football association had found violations of the statutes, the Eisenhüttenstädter were downgraded to the district league. After the immediate rise, Stahl played again in the GDR league from 1971/72. After the league was expanded to five seasons, only 22 games were played there. Köpcke only made twelve appearances in the league games in 1971/72, but was relatively successful with five goals. Eisenhüttenstadt reached the league promotion round, in which Köpcke played seven of the eight qualifying games and scored another goal. The team missed promotion with third place. In the following four GDR league seasons Köpcke was able to establish himself as a regular player. Of the 88 point games played up to the 1975/76 season, he completed 77 games. Already in 1973 he was together with Matthias Jahn top scorer with seven goals in Eisenhüttenstadt. With nine and thirteen goals respectively, he was the team's top scorer in 1974 and 1975. Even in the 1976/77 season he was happy to shoot with seven goals, but only made fourteen league appearances. In the line-up for the GDR league season 1977/78 Köpcke was mentioned again, but was not used. In the summer of 1979, Stahl Eisenhüttenstadt reported that Hartwig Köpcke had ended his career as an active soccer player. In his twelve seasons in the GDR-wide league operation, he was used in eleven league games (4 goals) and 203 GDR league games (81 goals).

literature

• German sport echo : born 1964–1978. ISSN  0323-8628
• Hanns Leske : Encyclopedia of GDR football . Verlag Die Werkstatt, Göttingen 2007, ISBN 978-3-89533-556-3 , p. 263.
• Andreas Baingo, Michael Horn: The History of the GDR Oberliga. 2nd Edition. Verlag Die Werkstatt, Göttingen 2004, ISBN 3-89533-428-6 , p. 309.

Web links

• Hartwig Köpcke in the database of the German Football Association
• Hartwig Köpcke in the database of weltfussball.de