Heinz Budion

Heinz Budion (* December 18, 1924 ; † June 16, 2017 ) was a German soccer player who played a total of 259 league games from 1946 to 1960 as an active member of Viktoria Aschaffenburg in the first-class South Soccer League from 1946 to 1960, scoring 56 goals. The Aschaffenburg club legend had been active as an offensive player in the World Cup system mainly on the left wing and also belonged to the three promotion teams of Lower Franconia to the upper league in 1945/46 (regional league), as well as 1950/51 and 1954/55 from the 2nd division South on. The playmaker on the left wing and later honorary captain belonged to the first team of the White-Blue team from Mainfranken without interruption from 1945/46 to 1959/60 and is led at Viktoria with a total of 394 competitive games with 109 goals.

career

As a street footballer, the boy got his first basic gaming experience before he joined the youth department of Viktoria Aschaffenburg at the age of 14. The Second World War interrupted the hopeful beginnings in the senior sector and led the young football talent from "Aschebersch" to French captivity, from which Budion was released in 1946 and was still able to actively participate in the promotion to the Oberliga Süd at the end of the 1945/46 season. One of the highlights of the 1946/47 season in the Oberliga Süd was the 1-0 home win on December 15, 1946 against the eventual southern champions 1. FC Nuremberg. Budion scored the winning goal against the "Club", who had won the championship with a 13-point lead, and Viktoria achieved relegation with 15th place in the 20-league. Unexpectedly, the team from the western Spessart overtook the relegation in the second league year, 1947/48, with the 17th rank: Unexpected because ex-national player Ernst Lehner had moved from Augsburg to Aschaffenburg and despite his 35 years still as reinforcement for the Men around Heinz Budion was true. Since the league was reduced from 20 to 16 clubs for the next season, the relegation battle was tough and with Fürth, Neckarau, RW Frankfurt, Wacker Munich and Sportfreunde Stuttgart, another five clubs accompanied the Aschaffenburgers to the amateur camp.

Budion remained loyal to his Viktoria but saw that the white-blue team needed three attempts to return to the league. Only from the new sub-structure of the Oberliga, the 2nd League South, Aschaffenburg returned as runner-up in the Oberliga Süd in 1950/51. Viktoria won the home game on September 24, 1950 against fellow promoters and champions Stuttgarter Kickers 3-1 and Budion scored all three goals.

In the first league season after returning, in 1951/52, Budion and colleagues laid the foundation for relegation in the unbeaten home games, including three draws against champions VfB Stuttgart, runner-up 1. FC Nürnberg and Kickers Offenbach in third place; Aschaffenburg defied a 1: 1 draw in all three matches against the championship contenders. The dangerous left winger Budion scored the equalizer against Nuremberg on November 11, 1951, his left half-forward Hubert Staab against Kickers Offenbach on January 27, 1952 and player-coach Lehner against VfB Stuttgart on March 3, 1952 in front of 17,000 spectators in the Schönbusch stadium . In the following season 1952/53 the Aschaffenburg came again to 28:32 points and finished 12th; Budion had scored ten goals in 29 league appearances. In the third year after returning to the league, things didn't go well; The first victim was player-coach Lehner, who was released on November 29, 1953. It didn't help the white-blue team, however, at the end of the round, Viktoria was relegated to bottom of the league table.

Under Lehner's successor Ludwig Janda , the Budion team achieved an immediate return to the league with the runner-up in 1954/55 in the 2nd South League behind champions and co-promoted Munich 1860. The vigor of the promotion round with 113: 41 goals could be transported into the league and in the season 1955/56 the white-blue to playmaker Budion occupied fifth place, the best placement in the club's history in the Oberliga Süd. Budion had played 28 league games alongside Rudolf Hoffmann and Hans Neuschäfer and scored eight goals. Against the later South German champions Karlsruher SC (2-2), Budion scored the equalizer in the second half of the season on January 22, 1956 after being 0-2 deficit in the 60th minute. In contrast to the two younger players Hoffmann and Neuschäfer, he was not appointed to the national team by national coach Sepp Herberger, despite the surprisingly good lap performance; it remained with his two selection appointments from 1953 in the run-up to the 1954 World Cup in Switzerland: On June 4 in Augsburg, the national coach carried out a screening game between a DFB selection and a southern German selection. In the 5: 3 success of southern Germany, the left wing of Aschaffenburg with Budion and Staab came on in the 46th minute for Uli Biesinger and Richard Herrmann . When Budion was active on September 2nd in the ranks of a DFB selection in a 2-0 win against a Swiss team, he tore a muscle in his thigh and was out of the running for weeks in the race for the squad for the World Cup.

Including the round 1957/58, Budion had scored two goals in 29 missions, the playmaker on the left wing belonged to the regular line-up of Viktoria in the Oberliga Süd. When the Main Franconians managed to keep their league in 1958/59 with 14th place just before BC Augsburg and SV Waldhof, the 34-year-old senior had played in 18 association games. The club legend played his last league game on November 1, 1959 in a 0-2 away defeat against the Stuttgarter Kickers. Both opponents suffered relegation to the 2nd League South at the end of the round. On the last round of the match, Aschaffenburg only scored 1-1 with their immediate rivals for the saving 14th place, Ulm 1846, and the draw was enough for Ulm to keep the class tied with the better goal difference.

literature

• Hardy Grüne , Lorenz Knieriem: Encyclopedia of German League Football. Volume 8: Player Lexicon 1890–1963. AGON Sportverlag, Kassel 2006, ISBN 3-89784-148-7 , p. 46.
• Werner Skrentny (Ed.): When Morlock still met the moonlight. The history of the Oberliga Süd 1945–1963. Klartext, Essen 1993, ISBN 3-88474-055-5 , p. 58 ff.
• Hardy Greens: Legendary football clubs. Hesse. Between FC Alsbach, Eintracht Frankfurt and Tuspo Ziegenhain. AGON Sportverlag, Kassel 2005, ISBN 3-89784-244-0 , p. 176 ff.

Web link

• Far more than an “oldie idol”: Viktoria icon Heinz Budion turns 90 - article on sva01.de