Helmut Henig

Helmut Henig (born August 12, 1921 - August 4, 1996 ) was a German football player . As a goalkeeper of Eintracht Frankfurt , he won the South German championship twice in the rounds of 1952/53 and 1958/59 in the soccer Oberliga Süd .

career

First stage, until 1947

The youth footballer, who came to Eintracht Frankfurt from VfB Riederwald in 1937 at the age of 16, gained his first experience in senior management in the Gauliga Südwest in the years 1939/40 to 1943/44 . According to Matheja, he came in the time of the Second World War - initially under coach Péter Szabó (1939–31 May 1941) - on 16 league appearances for Eintracht. When the war was over, he went through a hectic phase of club changes. At the beginning stood until November 1945 his home club VfB Riederwald, it was followed by two months at the Eintracht in the first season of the Oberliga Süd in which he had recorded five league assignments before he from January to March 1946 the SG Rot-Weiss in Hessian amateur area joined. Then he was drawn to the FSV on the Bornheimer Hang, where he completed 17 league games for the Schwarzblauen from March 1946 to February 1947 alongside former national goalkeeper Willibald Kreß . Due to his new short-term change to TSG Ulm 1846 in March until the end of the round in July 1947, there were also 17 league appearances at Ulm in the 1946/47 season. On July 6, 1947, shortly before the end of the round in the 3-0 defeat at Eintracht, he guarded the Ulm goal and met his goalkeeper colleague Toni Turek in the case of the Riederwald-Elf. On June 8th he was a guarantor of the Ulm 1-0 home success against his former club FSV Frankfurt, where the "beautiful Willibald" demonstrated his still existing class in goal. For the round of 1947/48, a goalkeeper swap between Eintracht Frankfurt and Ulm 46 took place: Turek went to Ulm and Henig returned to Frankfurt.

Regular goalkeeper at Eintracht, 1947 to 1954

In the first few years Henig played with Eintracht in the midfield, they even fought against relegation in 1949 (13th place) and 1950 (14th place). The trip abroad to Spain for Christmas 1950 with games against Atletico Madrid (4: 3) and FC Sevilla (3: 5) was a joyful experience. It was only with coach Kurt Windmann that Eintracht moved into midfield in 1951 - Henig was only missing in one of the 34 round matches - with eighth place. The trip to the USA, which started on May 2, 1951, also went well with the upswing. From the trip organized by the German-American Football Association (DAFB), the Eintracht delegation did not return to Frankfurt until June 3, and had played eight games between May 6 and 30. In the 1951/52 season they improved to fourth place before they could win the championship in the south in 1952/53 with one point ahead of the German champions of 1952, VfB Stuttgart . In the 15 home games, Eintracht came to twelve wins, only lost three points in three draws. Henig guarded the goal of the new South German champion in all 30 rounds.

The start of the final round also succeeded with two successes against 1. FC Köln (2-0) and Holstein Kiel (1-0). In front of 68,000 spectators in the local Waldstadion, however, 1. FC Kaiserslautern prevailed on May 17, 1953 with a goal from Ottmar Walter and a week later also won the second leg in Ludwigshafen and thus made it to the final. In the last group game with Eintracht, Henig was able to keep his case goalless at 1. FC Köln on June 7 and was won against by national coach Sepp Herberger for his excellent performance throughout the season with the B national team on June 14 in Düsseldorf Spain rewards. Two months before his 32nd birthday, he celebrated with his defense comrades from the southern league, Fritz Rößling and Herbert Erhardt in defense, as well as Karl-Heinz Metzner , Fritz Sommer and Richard Gottinger in the runner row, after goals from the outstanding attackers Alfred Pfaff (half left, 2 goals) and Hans Schäfer (left wing, 3 goals) an impressive 5: 2 success. Pfaff, Henig's club colleague and Eintracht playmaker, made his debut in the senior national team on August 19, 1953.

Henig himself was in a test match of the national team on September 2, 1953 in Konstanz at the game of a DFB selection - with Werner Liebrich , Herbert Erhardt, Herbert Schäfer , Richard Gottinger, Fritz Semmelmann , Bernhard Klodt , Max Morlock , Horst Schade , Alfred Pfaff - against a Swiss selection in the goal of Herberger-Elf, who won 2-0 goals. Then he was also part of the provisional squad for the World Cup qualifier on October 11th in Stuttgart against Saarland, where Toni Turek was finally in goal and Fritz Herkenrath was on the bench.

As the defending champion in southern Germany, it was enough for the runner-up in the 1954 World Cup after a close three-way battle with VfB Stuttgart and Kickers Offenbach. Henig was missing in one of the 30 league games and Eintracht had the fewest hits with 31 goals conceded. In the final round of the German championship, which was shortened due to scheduling reasons due to the World Cup tournament in Switzerland, the goalkeeper was in the two games against 1. FC Kaiserslautern (0: 1) and 1. FC Köln (2: 3) Use, but then withdrew from the Oberliga and moved to Ulm in 1846 in the 2nd League South. In the following period, Eintracht relied on Egon Loy in goal.

Finishing off and again Oberliga Süd, 1954 to 1959

The veteran goalkeeper spent two rounds in the 2nd division in Ulm from 1954 to 1956 before preparing for the end of his career by returning to Hesse for SG Dietzenbach . So it was suspected, but the passionate goalkeeper returned to Eintracht as a reservist in 1957. Due to the injury to goalkeeper Loy, the 37-year-old completed the first eight games in the Oberliga Süd in the 1958/59 season under coach Paul Oßwald . Eintracht was in fourth place with 11: 5 points and 21: 9 goals. Loy returned to the Eintracht goal on October 19, in the 4-1 defeat at Bayern Munich, and Henig finally ended his long career in the summer of 1959 after a total of 259 appearances in the Oberliga Süd. Eintracht Frankfurt won the championship in the south and took the German championship in the final with a 5-3 win after extra time against Kickers Offenbach.

literature

• Ulrich Matheja: Schlappekicker and sky striker. The story of Eintracht Frankfurt . Publishing house Die Werkstatt. Göttingen 2004. ISBN 3-89533-427-8 .
• 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 .
• Hardy Grüne , Lorenz Knieriem: Encyclopedia of German League Football. Volume 8: Player Lexicon 1890–1963. AGON-Sportverlag, Kassel 2006, ISBN 3-89784-148-7 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Ulrich Matheja: Schlappekicker and Himmelsstürmer. The story of Eintracht Frankfurt. P. 344.
2. ^ Werner Raupp : Toni Turek - "Football God". A biography, Hildesheim: Arete 2019 ( ISBN 978-3-96423-008-9 ), p. 59.