 | ||||
| Full name | Fußballclub Hansa Rostock e. V. | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nicknames | Hansa, Hanseaten, Kogge, Hansa-Kogge, Ostseestädter | |||
| Founded | 28 December 1965; 59 years ago (1965-12-28) | |||
| Ground | Ostseestadion, Rostock | |||
| Capacity | 29,000[contradictory][citation needed] | |||
| Chairman | Robert Marien[citation needed] | |||
| Manager | Daniel Brinkmann | |||
| League | 3. Liga | |||
| 2024–25 | 3. Liga, 5th of 20 | |||
| Website | https://www.fc-hansa.de | |||
 Current season | ||||
FC Hansa Rostock (German:[ʔɛfˈt͡seːˈhanzaˈʁɔstɔk]) is aGerman association football club based in the city ofRostock, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. The club is also called "thecog" because of its club crest. They have emerged as one of the most successful clubs from the formerEast Germany afterGerman reunification and have made several appearances in thetop-flightBundesliga. With over 29,000 club members, the club is one of the largest sports clubs in Germany.
After being in the Bundesliga for ten years, from 1995 to 2005, Rostock went into a steady decline. In 2012, the club was relegated to the3. Liga for the second time, regaining its place in the2. Bundesliga in2021. They returned to the 3. Liga after three seasons following relegation in2023–24.[1]
The club was originally founded on 1 November 1954 as the multi-sportsports club SC Empor Rostock. The football squad, however, could not be recruited from local enterprise sports communities (German:Betriebssportgemeinschaft, BSG) like the squad of the handball section, so a transfer of BSG Empor Lauter's squad fromLauter to Rostock was considered.[by whom?] The area around Lauter, near theCzech border, was well represented inEast German football by competitive sides, includingWismut Aue,Fortschritt Meerane andMotor Zwickau, so the footballers ofBSG Empor Lauter were delegated to Rostock, over the futile[tone] protests of the team's local supporters. ThenSED First Secretary inBezirk Rostock Karl Mewis and SED functionaryHarry Tisch were instrumental in the relocation of BSG Empor Lauter to Rostock.[2][3] Karl Lewis was allegedly the initiator of the relocation.[4] This was not an uncommon occurrence in the 1950s of East German football, where clubs were regularly renamed, re-structured, dismantled or shuffled from city to city at the direction of well-placed communist officials. The new club would be sponsored by the fishingcombine VEB Fischkombinat Rostock.
The wholesale transfer of theLauterers to Rostock part way through the 1954–55 season led to the disappearance of that association from play. A new club was formed in 1956 as BSG Motor Lauter and on 1 August 1990, it took up the tradition of the original side to play as Lauterer Sportverein Viktoria 1913.
Newly formed SC Empor Rostock took the place of the former Lauter-based club in first division play in November 1954. They finished second the next season, but in 1956 plunged[tone] to 14th place and were relegated. They quickly bounced back,[tone] rejoining the DDR-Oberliga in 1958, before going on to become a very competitive side[according to whom?] with a series of three vice-championships to their credit from 1962 to 1964, as well as several appearances in the final of theFDGB Pokal. The re-organization of East German sports in 1965 led to the association's football department becoming independent as Fußball Club Hansa Rostock, which was designated as one of the country's 10 dedicatedfootball club intended to groom talent for the development of a strongEast Germany national team. The new club's name acknowledged Rostock's history as one of the major trading centres of northern Europe'sHanseatic League. FC Hansa Rostock would be sponsored by the maritime combine VEB Kombinat Seeverkehr und Hafenwirtschaft.[5] And the club would bepatronaged by the SED First Secretary of Bezirk Rostock, as well as futureFree German Trade Union Federation chairman andPolitburo member Harry Tisch.[6][7]
By the 1970s, the club was consistently finishing in the lower half of the league table and was relegated to the second divisionDDR-Liga for a single season on three occasions late in the decade. They returned to form[tone] in the 1980s, and, as the football leagues of West Germany and East Germany were merged in 1990 after there-unification of the country, Rostock won its first national championship in the final season of East German football, played out in the transitionalNOFV-Oberliga. This is their only top flight title to date in play in East Germany or the unified Germany.
They also captured[tone] the last East German Cup with a 1–0 win overFC Stahl Eisenhüttenstadt.[8]
The club's success in the Oberliga earned them a place in the Bundesliga alongsideDynamo Dresden when the top-flight Bundesliga was briefly expanded from 18 to 20 teams for the1991–92 season to accommodate two former East German teams. Hansa, however, was unable to stay up and was relegated after falling just a single point shy ofSG Wattenscheid 09. Three seasons of tempering[vague] in the 2. Bundesliga would return the club to the top flight for the1995–96 season. In ten years spent in the Bundesliga, the team's best results were a pair of sixth-place finishes. In spite of frequent placings in the bottom-half of the league table, they would persist as the only former East German side able to consistently challenge the well-heeled[tone] clubs of the west. On 1 December 2002, Rostock became the first club to field six foreigners from the same country in a Bundesliga match (Rade Prica,Marcus Lantz,Peter Wibrån,Andreas Jakobsson,Magnus Arvidsson andJoakim Persson – allSwedes).
In the first half of the2004–05 season, Hansa earned only 1 win and 5 draws in 17 matches. They were unable to recover despite the late arrival of Finnish strikerJari Litmanen and at season's end were relegated, leaving the former GDR without a club in the top flight for the first time since re-unification. Like other East German teams, they were the victims of a harsh economic reality[tone] as the wealthier, well-established western sides bought up the most talented[tone] eastern footballers as their clubs struggled to survive financially: Rostock'sStefan Beinlich,Oliver Neuville andVictor Agali were just three players sent west in exchange for cash.[citation needed] After two years in the 2. Bundesliga, the club returned to the top-flight for the2007–08 season, but was again relegated.
The club's poor form continued in 2009–10 and they finished third-last. With this season, a new promotion/relegation format accompanied the introduction of the3. Liga and Rostock faced a playoff versus the third place third division clubFC Ingolstadt. Hansa lost both legs of the contest and was sent down to the 3. Liga, while Ingolstadt won promotion to the 2. Bundesliga alongside the top two third-tier teams which advanced automatically by virtue of their finishes. Their stay was a short one as they were sent back down after finishing bottom table in2011–12.
Hansa Rostock drew an average home attendance of 11,433[9] in the 2016–17 3. Liga, the third-highest in the league.
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| Season | Division | Tier | Position |
| 1984–85 | DDR-Oberliga | I | 10th |
| 1985–86 | 13th↓ | ||
| 1986–87 | DDR-Liga | II | 1st↑ |
| 1987–88 | DDR-Oberliga | I | 9th |
| 1988–89 | 4th | ||
| 1989–90 | 6th | ||
| 1990–91 | NOFV-Oberliga | 1st | |
| 1991–92 | Bundesliga | 18th↓ | |
| 1992–93 | 2. Bundesliga | Ii | 11th |
| 1993–94 | 8th | ||
| 1994–95 | 1st↑ | ||
| 1995–96 | Bundesliga | I | 6th |
| 1996–97 | 15th | ||
| 1997–98 | 6th | ||
| 1998–99 | 14th | ||
| 1999–2000 | 15th | ||
| 2000–01 | 12th | ||
| 2001–02 | 14th | ||
| 2002–03 | 13th | ||
| 2003–04 | 9th | ||
| 2004–05 | 17th↓ | ||
| 2005–06 | 2. Bundesliga | II | 10th |
| 2006–07 | 2nd↑ | ||
| 2007–08 | Bundesliga | I | 17th↓ |
| 2008–09 | 2. Bundesliga | II | 13th |
| 2009–10 | 16th↓ | ||
| 2010–11 | 3. Liga | III | 2nd↑ |
| 2011–12 | 2. Bundesliga | II | 18th↓ |
| 2012–13 | 3. Liga | III | 12th |
| 2013–14 | 13th | ||
| 2014–15 | 17th | ||
| 2015–16 | 10th | ||
| 2016–17 | 15th | ||
| 2017–18 | 6th | ||
| 2018–19 | 6th | ||
| 2019–20 | 6th | ||
| 2020–21 | 2nd↑ | ||
| 2021–22 | 2. Bundesliga | II | 13th |
| 2022–23 | 13th | ||
| 2023–24 | 17th↓ | ||
| 2024–25 | 3. Liga | III | 5th |
| 2025–26 | TBD |
AfterGerman reunification, the last regularDDR-Oberliga season was played inNOFV-Oberliga. During1990–91 NOFV-Oberliga season, Hansa Rostock became the lastEast Germany champion.
Note: Flags indicate national team as defined underFIFA eligibility rules; some limited exceptions apply. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.
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Note: Flags indicate national team as defined underFIFA eligibility rules; some limited exceptions apply. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.
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| Position | Name |
|---|---|
| Manager |  Daniel Brinkmann |
| Assistant manager | Dirk Flock Simon Pesch Marcus Rabenhorst |
| Goalkeeper coach | Dirk Orlishausen |
| Fitness coach | Tomislav Stepic |
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A study published in 2007 bySportfive reported Hansa's fanbase to be the seventh largest in Germany, involving up to two million supporters.[12] According to another study published in 2008 byAllensbach Institute, Hansa is the most popular German football club in theNew Länder and the most popular club of the former GDR in reunited Germany.[13] Hansa Rostock's officialanthem is "FC Hansa, wir lieben Dich total" ("Hansa FC, We Totally Love You"), recorded in 1995 by East German bandPuhdys.
Hansa struggles withhooliganism (particularlyright-wing andfar-right hooliganism),[14] estimating up to 500 supporters to be leaning towards violence.[15] The club itself, as well as some fans' associations, are anxious to curtail these in several ways.[vague][16] In 2005, the club successfully sued threestreakers who disrupted their 2003 match againstHertha BSC to recoup the€20,000 they were fined by theGerman Football Association (DFB) for failing to maintain adequate security at their ground.[vague]
The original Ostseestadion was built in 1954, with the participation of several hundred citizens of Rostock who helped for free.[citation needed] The first international match in the Ostseestadion of East Germany was on 26 September 1956.[citation needed] In 2001, the stadium was refurbished and modified to accommodate 30,000[contradictory] spectators.
Theclub's reserve team,FC Hansa Rostock II, has played as high asRegionalliga level, last playing in theRegionalliga Nord in 2009–10. The team currently[when?] plays in the tier fiveNOFV-Oberliga Nord. It first reached Oberliga level in 1992 and has won three league championships at this level, in 2000, 2005 and 2012.[17][18]
In 1998, 2005 and 2006, it also won theMecklenburg-Vorpommern Cup, the local cup competition in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, and qualified for the first round of the DFB-Pokal through this, but never advanced past its first round.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
