Karl Gönner

Karl Gönner (born September 6, 1911 in Mannheim ; † unknown) was a German football player who played a total of 109 league games in the Gauliga Baden as a defender at the Mannheim district club VfL Neckarau from 1933 to 1944 , and the championship with Neckarau in the 1940/41 war season in Baden.

Athletic career

Karl Gönner made his debut on the start day of the new Gauliga Baden, September 10, 1933, in a 1: 2 away defeat at the old master Karlsruher FV in the VfL team. He acted as a left defender in the World Cup system used at the time in front of goalkeeper Otto Diringer . He represented the regular defender Siegel and had three missions at the end of the round when he reached 7th place in the table in the Gauliga Baden. In the last round before the outbreak of World War II, in 1938/39, he completed 17 rounds as a regular defender, but only reached 8th place with Neckarau. The frequent failure of top performers Siegfried Hessenauer , Willi Preschle and especially selection player Gottfried Wenzelburger could not be compensated for during the course of the round. At the end of the round there was one point difference between 5th place (VfB Mühlburg) with 16:20 and 9th place (Sandhofen) with 15:21 points. By order of the Reichsfachamt, on May 18, 1939, a playoff to determine the second relegated team between the two teams Sandhofen and Neckarau took place in the Mannheim stadium. Without captain, patrons and top performers like Hessenauer, Preschle and Wenzelburger, VfL lost 0-2 in front of 5000 spectators. Gönner stayed with Neckarau in the 1939/40 season in the Gauliga Baden, as this was divided into three groups North, Central and South due to the war and the northern group consists of SV Waldhof, VfR Mannheim, VfL Neckarau, SpVgg Sandhofen, SptVgg Amicitia Viernheim and the FG Kirchheim put together.

Due to the outbreak of the Second World War, the championship games 1939/40 could only be held again from the end of November 1939. Neckarau took fourth place. In the second round of the war, 1940/41, VfL Neckarau celebrated with goalkeeper Diringer, defender couple Georg Lutz and Gönner, as well as the other players Hermann Klostermann, Theo Wahl, Richard Wahl, Gottfried Sälzler , Hermann Veitengruber, Richard Mannale, Kurt Gärtner, Oskar Benner, Gottfried Wenzelburger, Oskar Wilhelm and Torjäger Preschle won the championship ahead of VfB Mühlburg, SV Waldhof and the tied teams VfR Mannheim and Freiburg FC. In 16 games, the champions scored 27: 5 points with a goal difference of 46:17. Gönner had led his VfL onto the field in all 16 games. Neckarau allowed the opponents only two wins in the entire round: On the third first round match day, October 20, 1940, VfL lost 1-0 to their toughest rivals for the title, the Karlsruhe district club VfB Mühlburg, and completely surprisingly on December 1, 1940 at the old master Karlsruher FV with 1: 2. At the end of the round, the KFV finished last with 4:28 points. After the defeat in Karlsruhe, Neckarau started an impressive series with nine wins, including the successes against Waldhof (1: 0, 4: 2), VfR Mannheim (1: 0) and, above all, the second leg on March 2, 1941 against Mühlburg with 4: 1.

In the following group games for the German soccer championship , captain Gönner played all six group games against Rapid Vienna, Munich 1860 and the Stuttgarter Kickers. The Baden division champion landed level on points with Stuttgarter Kickers, both teams had 4: 8 points to show, in fourth place in the group. In the two games against the eventual German champions Rapid Wien, the Neckarauer Defensive conceded 15 goals. Patrons and colleagues were unable to cope with the vortex of attacks by Willy Fitz , Georg Schors , Franz Binder , Hermann Dvoracek , Matthias Kaburek and Wilhelm Holec . On March 9, 1941, Gönner and his club mates Lutz, Richard Mannale, Preschle and Wenzelburger participated in the Baden district selection in the semifinals of the competition for the Reichsbund Cup in Dresden against the selection of things in a 2-7 defeat. There, too, the class of players like Herbert Pohl , Walter Dzur , Helmut Schubert , Heinrich Schaffer , Fritz Machate , Herbert Weigel and Gustav Carstens was simply too high to be able to seriously survive.

As the defending champion, Neckarau came in second behind master SV Waldhof in 1941/42. When in 1942/43 VfR Mannheim won the title with 36: 0 points with the outstanding goalscorer Walter Danner (58 goals), Neckarau with 15:21 points and 40:35 goals finished the round in 8th place, far behind Defensive routinier accrued in 14 league games. In the 1943/44 series in KSG VfL / 07 Neckarau, he was able to play five more rounds for Neckarau. The last verifiable association game was the 0: 4 home defeat on December 19, 1943 against the sovereign champions VfR Mannheim. He and his long-time VfL colleague Wenzelburger formed the defender couple. The defender had played a total of 109 association games in ten years at Gauliga Baden from 1933 to 1943.

literature

• Andreas Ebner: When the war ate football. The history of the Gauliga Baden 1933–1945. Publishing house regional culture. Ubstadt-Weiher 2016. ISBN 978-3-89735-879-9 . Pp. 388/389.
• Lorenz Knieriem, Hardy Grüne : Player Lexicon 1890 - 1963 . In: Encyclopedia of German League Football . tape 8 . AGON, Kassel 2006, ISBN 3-89784-148-7 , p. 111 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ cf. CD-ROM supplement in: Andreas Ebner: When the war ate football. The history of the Gauliga Baden 1933–1945. Publishing house regional culture. Ubstadt-Weiher 2016. ISBN 978-3-89735-879-9 .
2. ^ Klaus Querengässer: The German Football Championship, Part 1: 1903-1945. Agon Sportverlag. Kassel 1997. ISBN 3-89609-106-9 . Pp. 204, 206
3. ↑ cf. CD-ROM supplement in: Andreas Ebner: When the war ate football. The history of the Gauliga Baden 1933–1945. Publishing house regional culture. Ubstadt-Weiher 2016. ISBN 978-3-89735-879-9 .