Promotion back to the Bundesliga

A football match lasts 90 minutes if there is no extra-time. Plus stoppages, of course. That may be true, but at times it only partially reflects the truth. Some matches have a story that precedes them, a story with which they are inextricably entwined. And sometimes this story stretches back a long way and is painfully long.

The story of the 3-2 (1-0) victory over 1. FC Nürnberg on 23 June 1976 begins on 3 June 1972. Nowadays, some of the more senior figures among the BVB faithful even maintain that the real starting point was the European Cup Winners' Cup triumph over Liverpool on 5 May 1966. Basking in the afterglow of the success, the club's leadership was responsible for a series of sporting and economic mistakes that saw the Black and Yellows come within a whisker of relegation from the Bundesliga three years later. Back then, BVB managed to preserve their top-flight status on the last day of the season thanks to a 3-0 win over Kickers Offenbach; reigning champions 1. FC Nürnberg went down in their stead.

Relegation in 1972

But the drop was only delayed – not avoided. In the spring of 1972 it was BVB's turn to bow out of the top flight, with relegation confirmed on Matchday 32 following a 2-0 defeat to VfB Stuttgart. Having spent 36 successive years plying their trade in the top flight of German football, the men from Westphalia were forced to drop down to the second flight. They were now in the Regional League, where they were no longer facing the likes of Bayern Munich, Borussia Monchengladbach and Schalke – but teams such as Lüner SV, SVA Gütersloh and Eintracht Gelsenkirchen instead.

It was a bitter end to what was an unforgettable season in every respect. The bottom club was Arminia Bielefeld. The German Football Association had deducted all of the East-Westphalians' points following the bribery scandal that took place in 1971. At the top end of the table, FC Bayern won their third Bundesliga title on the last day of the season thanks to a 5-1 win over direct rivals Schalke – with Beckenbauer & Co. setting new record after new record in the process. Their points' tally of 55:13 points, which would have been 79 points in the modern day, was a Bundesliga record until BVB racked up 80 in the 2011/12 season. The 101 goals scored that season have yet to be surpassed, as have the 40 goals Gerd Müller scored on the way to finishing as the league's top-scorer.

Borussia set some records of their own, too – but at the other end of the table. A total of just six wins and eight draws meant BVB suffered 20 defeats and finished in 17th with 20:48 points. And there were some wallopings too. At the Rote Erde Stadium they were beaten 3-0 by Schalke, 4-0 by Stuttgart and 5-1 by Bremen, while their trips to Gladbach and Kaiserslautern saw them hammered 7-1 and 6-0 respectively. The wheels completely came off on Matchday 16, when BVB lost 11-1 at Sportpark Unterhaching – their second-heaviest defeat in Bundesliga history. No wonder, then, that coach Horst Witzler was replaced by Herbert Burdenski in the winter break. But the new man was unable to arrest the slide.

Fourth-place finish in first Regional League season

Six years after reaching their zenith on the European stage, and with only Dieter Kurrat still in the team that lifted the trophy on that memorable night in Glasgow, Borussia Dortmund had reached rock bottom. And there was to be no rapid recovery either. They finished their first season in the Regional League in fourth. Barely 1,500 fans attended the club's last home game, a 9-0 thrashing of Preußen Münster. The following year, the figure was up to 8,900 on average. But a sixth-place finish again meant no promotion.

Then came the 1974/75 season. The first in the newly-founded 2. Bundesliga, played in two parallel divisions. And the first in the Westfalenstadion, which had been newly-built for the 1974 World Cup. Though the club could only muster another sixth-place finish, the average numbers coming through the turnstiles had tripled to 25,400. And the new home gradually became a fortress, injecting fear into opponents and making BVB a force to be reckoned with. In the following season a Borussia side containing the likes of Horst Bertram, Helmut Nerlinger, Lothar Huber, Miroslav Votava, Hans-Gerd Schildt und Zoltan Varga were unbeaten at home, drawing only four and boasting a 64:9 goal difference. Bayer Leverkusen were dispatched 7-0. Wacker 04 Berlin, SpVgg Erkenschwick and 1. FC Mülheim-Styrum were each on the end of a 6-0 hammering. Strikers Hans-Werner Hartl (18 goals), Gerd Kasperski (15) and Peter Geyer (13) almost scored at will. Across the entire season they scored 93 times – plus four in the two play-off matches.

And yet the run which preceded the 3-2 triumph over 1. FC Nürnberg was not entirely straightforward. Coach Otto Knefler was granted leave following the 2-2 stalemate with Arminia Bielefeld on Matchday 21. The Black and Yellows had slid to fourth in the table. Horst Buhtz took over the sporting leadership, and began poorly with a 3-2 defeat away to VfL Osnabrück. Ultimately, however, the new coach was able to steer BVB into second place behind champions Tennis Borussia Berlin, who were promoted directly.

The second-place finish saw BVB go into a play-off against the runners-up from the Regional League South, a Nürnberg side coached by Dortmund goalkeeping legend Hans Tilkowski. And then came the second coach dismissal of the season, with the club leadership relieving Horst Buhtz of his duties directly before the play-off. The coach had signed a contract with play-off opponents Nürnberg for the following season. He was facing a moral conflict that neither he nor BVB could accept, decided Chairman Heinz Günther, who concluded – despite the players speaking out in Buhtz's favour - that the coach's contract should be annulled in a "friendly atmosphere".

Borussia secure narrow lead in first leg

And so it was Otto Rehhagel who found himself in the dugout in Nürnberg's Städtisches Stadion in front of 55,000 spectators on 17 June. The then 37-year-old from Essen had been prised away from Werder Bremen in a cloak-and-dagger operation, and went on to steer Borussia to a 1-0 success. Though BVB enjoyed half a dozen gilt-edged chances, it took until the 85th minute before Egwin Wolf scored the all-important winner. In addition, Nürnberg's sweeper Rudolf Hannakampf had been shown a red card following a foul on Hartl and was suspended for the return leg.

The win might have put BVB in a good position but it was by no means a guarantee for the second meeting six days later in front of a 54,000 sell-out crowd at the Westfalenstadion. What followed was a performance of heroic proportions. If anyone epitomised the Westphalians' will to win, it was the energetic Geyer. The Dortmund man clashed heavily with Nürnberg's Manfred Rüsing in the opening stages of the match and had to receive treatment on the sidelines, before staggering back onto the pitch and breaking the deadlock in the 23rd minute. Then, on the half-hour mark, he was properly knocked out. When referee Ferdinand Biwersi blew the half-time whistle, Geyer was already on the way to hospital. Upon regaining consciousness, he had no memory, declaring: "I don't remember a goal!" The diagnosis? Severe cerebral concussion.

The second period developed into a downright promotion battle. Miodrag Petrovic equalised from a free-kick on the hour mark for the Franconians, before Der Club restored parity again through Hans Walitza (79') to make it 2-2 after Hartl had put BVB 2-1 up (74'). It wasn't until Huber's "left-foot thunderbolt", which even surprised the man himself, that BVB confirmed their promotion back to the top flight following four long and hard years down in the second tier. In the Westfalenstadion the fans stormed onto the pitch and the players sprayed champagne in the changing rooms.

Borussia were back in the top tier – and they've been there ever since. Rehhagel stayed on for two seasons, leaving under a cloud after the 12-0 defeat at the hands of Borussia Mönchengladbach on the last day of the 1977/78 season. The tabloids temporarily changed the club's name from BVB 09 to "BVB 012". But that's a story for another day.

Frank Fligge