Frankfurt Water Battle
The water battle of Frankfurt (also known as the rain battle of Frankfurt in some media ) is the last group B match at the 1974 World Cup between the national teams of the Federal Republic of Germany and Poland on July 3, 1974.
Starting position
Poland and the Federal Republic of Germany had both won their first games against Sweden and Yugoslavia. According to the mode at that time without semi-finals, the game decided on the final, the second in the table reached the game for 3rd place. Due to the better goal difference, a draw was enough for the Federal Republic of Germany, while Poland had to win.
Before the start of the game, the table was as follows according to the two-point rule applied at the time :
| rank | country | Gates | Points |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |
 BR Germany
|
6: 2 | 4-0 |
| 2 |
 Poland
|
3: 1 | 4-0 |
| 3 |
 Sweden
|
2: 5 | 0: 4 |
| 4th |
.svg){kind=small} Yugoslavia
|
1: 4 | 0: 4 |
The game
Course of the game
Shortly before the game, a downpour had made the field in the Frankfurt Waldstadion unplayable, but the tight schedule of the World Cup tournament led to the decision to let the game take place. The fire brigade freed the field from the coarsest masses of water with pumps and rollers, so that the Austrian referee Erich Linemayr could finally whistle the game in front of 62,000 spectators with a 30-minute delay.
Germany played in white, Poland in red.
Due to the difficult space conditions, a short passing game, one of the strengths of the playfully strong Poles, was hardly possible because the ball was often slowed down. The German goalkeeper Sepp Maier was considered to be particularly strong because of several blocked balls, and several attempts at goal were thwarted by puddles in front of his goal. After a foul by Jerzy Gorgoń to Bernd Hölzenbein the Polish goalkeeper held Jan Tomaszewski to by Uli Hoeness shot penalty. Gerd Müller decided the game in the 76th minute for Germany.
The German captain Franz Beckenbauer was later quoted as saying: "In normal game conditions we probably wouldn't have had a chance". The Polish striker Grzegorz Lato later denied Polish conspiracy theories that the groundskeepers had only freed one side of the water to harm the Poles: "That's nonsense, first of all there was a change in the break and secondly we had the choice of side."
Game dates
| BR Germany | Poland | |||||||
        |
|
     |
||||||
Sepp Maier - Berti Vogts , Paul Breitner , Georg Schwarzenbeck , Franz Beckenbauer - Rainer Bonhof , Ulrich Hoeneß , Wolfgang Overath - Jürgen Grabowski , Gerd Müller , Bernd Hölzenbein Trainer: Helmut Schön |
Jan Tomaszewski - Antoni Szymanowski , Jerzy Gorgoń , Władysław Żmuda , Adam Musiał - Kazimierz Deyna , Henryk Kasperczak (80th Lesław Ćmikiewicz ), Zygmunt Maszczyk (80th Kazimierz Kmiecik ) - Grzegorz Lato , Jan Domarski , Robert Gadocha Coach: Kazimierz Górski |
|||||||
 1: 0 Müller (76.)
|
||||||||
 Missed penalty by Hoeneß (53.)
|
||||||||
Final table and further course
| rank | country | Gates | Points |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |
BR Germany
|
7: 2 | 6-0 |
| 2 |
Poland
|
3: 2 | 4: 2 |
| 3 |
Sweden |
4: 6 | 2: 4 |
| 4th |
Yugoslavia |
2: 6 | 0: 6 |
Germany reached the final against the Netherlands ( 2: 1 ) and became world champions for the second time. The Polish team beat defending champions Brazil ( 1-0 ) in the game for third place , which was Poland's best result in a World Cup to date - this success was repeated eight years later in Spain against France - and the only victory against Brazil is.