There is much to like about the DFB-Pokal.

First of all, its’ format contrasts nicely with all other season long competitions. A pure knockout tournament. 90 minutes minimum. 120 minutes and penalty shootouts if necessary. No draws. No rematches. No second legs. If you are the away team, live with it. If you have a bad day, it’s goodbye.

Then there is what the English like to call the “romance of the cup” and what less romantic Germans file under the saying “the cup has its’ own rules”. What these rules are? No German really knows. What these rules do? Help underdogs to famous upsets, so that the English can have their romance.

And finally, regular league football doesn’t give you 120th minute buzzer beaters.

Famous 45
Sometimes asking a 6th division amateur side to knock out a global player with €300m+ in yearly revenue is just a little too much. Holding Bayern Munich to a scoreless draw in the first half, only conceding three and scoring a consolation goal in the second half, was still good enough for probably the proudest chapter in SpVgg Neckarelz’s 88 year long history. And if said global player can only rack up in excess of €100m a year, and if you are a freshly promoted 4th division side, then even a 1-0 lead at half time is possible – as SG Sonnenhof Großaspach proved against Stuttgart (1-4).

Heroic 90
Going a little down the Bundesliga rankings and a little up the 4th division rankings and we end up with the first of two giant killings of the first round. Eintracht Trier, coached by all dancing, drinking and smoking former German international Mario Basler, knocked out Hannover 96 3-1. Hannover took the lead in the first half and looked modestly comfortable. In the second half Hannover then lost control of the match and Trier deservedly turned the score around. Following Hannover’s modestly successful attempts to equalize, Trier killed the game with a counter attack in the 88th minute. The only positive Hannover’s coach can take from this match is, that he still has his job.

Epic 120
Different to Jörn Andersen – former coach of FSV Mainz 05. Following his former club’s defeat to 4th division side VfB Lübeck, Andersen unsuccessfully tried to argue how his 120 minutes are better than Hannover’s 90 minutes, during 3 hours worth of crisis talks with the management. The management then said, that there had been a rift developing between him and the team and management over the past couple of weeks already and then Andersen was gone.

While not a giant killing, SC Preußen Münster’s game against Hertha (1-3) is at least worth a mention. Not because 4th division side Preußen Münster forcing Hertha to extratime and almost to penalties is such an amazing feat. Even die hard Preußen Münster fans must admit that holding or forcing Hertha to anything in the DFB-Pokal is not really that special. But given that Berlin are the antithesis to cup competitions, it’s a bit of a surprise that Hertha are in the second round.

St. Pauli’s days of mythical DFB-Pokal runs during which they claimed the scalps of illustrious clubs such as Bayern Munich and Werder Bremen are also over. Welcome to being forced to extra time by 5th division side FC Villingen – you belong to the big boys now.

Transcendental 119:57
One out of three in picking the game of the round should see me comfortably compete with the chimp hired by GolTV to plan their Bundesliga schedule. Five minutes into the match between Fortuna Düsseldorf and Hamburg SV and I feared I could be drawing a blank yet again. Fortuna’s coach Norbert Meier had promised that his team won’t just sit back and defend, but attack and punish Hamburg instead. The way Bruno Labaddia’s side sliced through the Düsseldorf defense and confirmed their excellent pre-season form in the fourth minute, this looked like a very bad idea. In the end though, it was just a matter of the football gods forgetting to press the button labelled “own rules”. They hastily made up for it, presumably frantically pressing the button three or four times, resulting in a first half performance by Fortuna Düsseldorf, that would be every Werder Bremen fan’s wet dream. All of a sudden Fortuna started to send one smart through ball after the other through a disastrous Hamburg defense, while giving a lesson on how to quickly switch from defense to offense and back again. A little exaggeration on my side maybe – yet, at half time Düsseldorf should have been 4-1 up without exaggerating anything, but could still take an encouraging 2-1 lead into the break. Hamburg eventually gained a better hold on to the match and reduced Düsseldorf’s attacking threat, but had rather little to offer going forward, except for a long range shot by Trochowski, which came out of the blue, but leveled the score nonetheless and sent the game into extra time. It was up to Trochowski again, to change the course of the game. A penalty early in the first half of extra time put Hamburg into the lead once more and the game on its’ way to the climax. Fortuna’s attacks became more desperate. Hamburg’s counter attacks came ever closer until the clock stood at 119m:57s.

Unless you are very disciplined, you probably took a peak at the video already, and if not: you may now.

That was the last bit of good fortuna for Fortuna though and they had to settle for an English styled glorious and romantic defeat, rather than a clinical and efficient German penalty job well done. Most Fortuna fans won’t remember anyway, as they probably lost their consciousness after 119m:58s.

From our Team Blogs

St. Pauli Offside – FC St. Pauli takes extra time to advance in the cup
Dortmund Offside – Deutscher Fußball-bund Pokal: SpVgg Weiden
Hertha Offside – Things That Hertha Berlin Are Not
Bayern Offside – Pokal Preview
Leverkusen Offside – Derdiyok saves face for the squad

Personal Picks of the Round:
Kickers Offenbach – Eintracht Frankfurt (Fierce Derby, Arch Rivals = Fun and Violence – not that the two should go together and hopefully it’ll be mostly peaceful)
Fortuna Düsseldorf – Hamburger SV (sure to become a 51500 sell out)
Union Berlin – Werder Bremen (Union’s fan renovated Old Forestry stadium deserved no less than the title holder for it’s first official match)

Everybody else
Germania Windeck – Schalke 04
Concordia Hamburg – TuS Koblenz
Sportfreunde Lotte – VfL Bochum
Tennis Borussia Berlin – Karlsruher SC
Dynamo Dresden – 1. FC Nürnberg
SG Sonnenhof Großaspach – VfB Stuttgart
Torgelower SV Greif – Alemannia Aachen
SpVgg Unterhaching – Arminia Bielefeld
SpVgg Weiden – Borussia Dortmund
SpVgg Neckarelz – Bayern Munich
Eintracht Braunschweig – 1. FC Kaiserslautern
Eintracht Trier – Hannover 96
FC Ingolstadt 04 – FC Augsburg
FC Oberneuland Bremen – TSG Hoffenheim
FC Villingen – FC St. Pauli
FC Magdeburg – Energie Cottbus
SV Babelsberg 03 – Bayer Leverkusen
SV Elversberg – SC Freiburg
VfB Lübeck – FSV Mainz 05
VfB Speldorf – Rot-Weiß Oberhausen
Rot-Weiß Erfurt – MSV Duisburg
SC Paderborn – 1860 Munich
VfL Osnabrück – Hansa Rostock
FSV Frankfurt – Borussia Mönchengladbach
Wehen Wiesbaden – VfL Wolfsburg
Wormatia Worms – SpVgg Greuther Fürth
Wacker Burghausen – Rot Weiss Ahlen
Kickers Emden – 1. FC Köln
Preußen Münster – Hertha Berlin

From left to right: Mesut Özil, Per Mertesacker, Claudio Pizarro, Tim Wiese, Torsten Frings et al celebrate their DFB-Pokal victory over Bayer Leverkusen on Saturday (1-0).

Photo: Martin Rose/Bongarts/Getty Images

I stripped as much complexity from all of this in the quick guide, and tried to not make too many mistakes in the complicated one.

The Quick Guide
Just make sure to finish first or second in the table. This guarantees you Champions League group stage football and a nice fat sum of money from the UEFA to sign new superstars or keep the old ones.

At the moment this privilege would go to Wolfsburg and Hertha, though with at least three more clubs hot on their heels they may also want to take a peek at the complicated guide…

The Complicated Guide

3rd Place – Champions League Qualification
A two-legged knock-out tie to decide whether your team plays in the Champions League or Europa League group stage. This is a small improvement over previous seasons, where teams losing this tie would still need to play an additional knockout tie to make it to the UEFA Cup group stage. So managers can at least budget with the Europa League group stage. The UEFA has yet to announce how much money they’ll pay to the clubs competing in their new competition. It’s presumably a tiny sum and compared to the Champions League it’s presumably a microscopic sum even.

4th Place – Europa League Play-Off
A two-legged knock-out tie to qualify for the Europa League group stage.

5th Place – Europa League 3rd Qualification Round
A two-legged knock-out tie to advance to the Europa League play-off round. UEFA could have probably just called the play-off round 4th qualification round instead, but that would have been too easy – and admittedly not a lot less confusing anyway.

Intertoto Cup – Dead and Buried
Finally.

DFB-Pokal Winner – Europa League Play-Off
There are some special cases connected to the DFB-Pokal. If the cup winner has finished the season in the top three (Champions League) the losing finalist will compete in the Europa League play-off round instead. If the losing finalist also finished in the top five the Europa League spot will go back to the league allowing the 6th placed team to compete. If the cup winner has finished 4th or 5th in the league the Europa League spot will go back to league as well. None of this will be the case this season though.

UEFA Cup Special Cases
The UEFA grants the UEFA Cup winner direct qualification for the new Europa League group stage but only in the case that the club couldn’t qualify for any European competition through the league. Ahead of this week’s semi-final this means that both Bremen and Hamburg have one more lifeline to get to Europe. In fact if you want to see as many Bundesliga clubs as possible in next seasons European competitions you should hope that a) Bremen/Hamburg win the cup b) Bremen/Hamburg don’t qualify through the league or DFB-Pokal.

UEFA Fair Play Ranking
An additional Europa League spot would be available to the fair play kings of the European leagues finishing in the top three of UEFA’s Fair Play ranking. But based on UEFA’s provisional ranking the Bundesliga won’t be one of them this season.

OK, I think everything should be as clear as mud now.

Mainz 05 1-0 Schalke 04
Is there anyone still keeping track of the number of setbacks Schalke has to endure this season? They are out of the Champions League, out of the UEFA Cup, underperforming in the league and now they are out of the DFB-Pokal as well. Thanks to the curious nature of the Bundesliga this season, they still have one last lifeline, or better, there is still one more setback waiting for Schalke. The game emphasized what Schalke 04 is all about in 08/09. It looks like they can control a match, but beyond that can’t do much more, which leads to Schalke losing control of a match by conceding late goals. The team lacks creativity and two to three strikers worthy of their position.

For Mainz though it’s the first ever DFB-Pokal semi-final. The way they played, none of the other teams has to be particularly scared yet.

Hamburg 2-1 Wehen-Wiesbaden
Hamburg had similar problems as Schalke and conceded a late goal by the 2. Bundesliga bottom dwellers. Different to Schalke though, Hamburg had taken care of the match and progress to the second round in the 85 minutes prior to Wiesbaden’s consolation.

Wolfsburg 2-5 Bremen
7 Goals, 7 yellow cards, 5 substitutions, 4 different goalscorers, 3 braces, 2 teams, 1 winner, 0 defense.

Leverkusen 4-2 Bayern Munich
Bayer Leverkusen both overcame their Bayern Munich jinx and cleansed their temporary home from any suspected bad karma. Now that they played so well again, another nosedive in the league can be expected pretty soon.

Bayern Munich have some problems which are overarching their whole season. These problems didn’t stop them from going on an undefeated Bundesliga, CL and DFB-Pokal run from October to January. These problems were the first to come under scrutiny though, when the results all of a sudden no longer went their way. Now the players and the coach are fiddling with a more defensive approach and other little details, to overcome what is more than anything a mental problem now.

The Semi-Final
The draw for the semi-final will take place on Saturday. Until then you can fantasize about your ideal match-ups. I would fancy a northern derby in the final, so Hamburg and Bremen should take on Mainz and Leverkusen respectively. Given that Hamburg had two second division sides in a row, it’s time for them to prove that they belong into the final. Werder Bremen had to deal with five consecutive away games in the cup against some tough opponents, so they deserve an easy home game against Mainz for a change.

DFB-Pokal Round of 16

SC Freiburg – FSV Mainz 05
VfB Stuttgart – Bayern Munich
Bayer Leverkusen – Energie Cottbus
Hamburger SV – 1860 Munich
Karlsruher SC – SV Wehen Wiesbaden
VfL Wolfsburg – Hansa Rostock
Carl Zeiss Jena - FC Schalke 04
Borussia Dortmund – Werder Bremen

Matches will be played on January 27th/28th 2009. We can look forward to a promising looking rematch of last year’s round of 16 clash between Dortmund and Bremen, while Stuttgart vs Bayern is obviously the one to watch in this round. Carl Zeiss Jena are the lone remaining third division (and lower) side and will take on Schalke.

UEFA Cup Group Stage

Group A: Schalke 04 (GER), Paris Saint Germain (FRA), Mancherster City (ABU DHABI), Racing Santander (ESP), FC Twente (NED)

23.10.08 Schalke – Paris Saint Germain
06.11.08 Racing Santander – Schalke
27.11.08 Schalke 04 – Manchester City
03.12.08 FC Twente – Schalke
17.12.08 -

An attractive and tough group for Schalke. Fred Rutten gets to play his former club FC Twente featuring Steve van Klaren. The home game against Man City looks promising.

Group B: SL Benfica (POR), Olympiacos (GRE), Galatasaray (TUR), Hertha Berlin (GER), Metalist Kharkiv (UKR)

23.10.08 Hertha – Benfica
06.11.08 Metalist – Hertha
27.11.08 -
03.12.08 Hertha – Galatasaray
17.12.08 Olympiacos – Hertha

Hertha’s manager Dieter Hoeness will probably have some € signs in his eyes at the moment. Hertha got an attractive group with home games against Benfica and Galatasaray. Lucien Favre might be worried that the game against Galatasaray could turn into a hostile away match, with a large Turkish community living in Berlin probably ready to send a delegation over to the Olympiastadion. The away matches look tricky as well.

Group C: Sevilla FC (ESP), VfB Stuttgart (GER), UC Sampdoria (ITA), FK Partizan (SRB), Standard de Liège (BEL)

23.10.08 Sevilla – Stuttgart
06.11.08 Stuttgart – Partizan
27.11.08 Sampdoria – Stuttgart
03.12.08 -
17.12.08 Stuttgart – Standard de Liege

A though group for Stuttgart and to make matters worse, they aren’t even getting any of the revenue guaranteeing home games against Sevilla and/or Sampdoria. Stuttgart will probably just hope to get out of the group.

Group E: AC Milan (ITA), SC Heerenveen (NED), SC Braga (POR), Portsmouth FC (ENG), VfL Wolfsburg (GER)

23.10.08 -
06.11.08 Wolfsburg – Heerenveen
27.11.08 Braga – Wolfsburg
03.12.08 Wolfsburg – Portsmouth
17.12.08 AC Milan – Wolfsburg

Wolfsburg play against AC Milan – just not at home, which is probably a bit of a disappointment for Wolfsburg’s fans.

Group F: Hamburg (GER), Ajax Amsterdam (NED), Slavia Praha (CZE), Aston Villa (ENG), MŠK Žilina (SVK)

23.10.08: MŠK Žilina – Hamburg
06.11.08: -
27.11.08: Hamburg – Ajax Amsterdam
04.12.08: Slavia Praha – HSV
17.12.08: Hamburg – Aston Villa

Hamburg fans can look forward to attractive home games against Ajax and Aston Villa, while planning a short holiday in the beautiful city of Prague. David Jarolim can look forward to a small family reunion, as Slavia is managed by his father and a cousin of him is in the squad.

1. Relegation Play-Offs
Starting this season, the 16th placed team of the Bundesliga will face the 3rd placed team of the 2nd Bundesliga in a two-legged knock-out tie. This will make the Bundesliga a marginally safer place.

More important though: the same rule applies to the 2nd Bundesliga and the newly formed 3rd Liga. In previous seasons four 2nd Bundesliga teams were relegated, and two teams each from the Regionalliga North and South were promoted. With the unified 3rd Liga in place, a three-team relegation format has been adopted here as well. Thus the 2nd Bundesliga has become a much safer place. This is good news for the long term economic development of some second division sides.

2. No Intertoto Cup
VfB Stuttgart will have been the last club to play out embarrassing and unconvincing Intertoto Cup ties. The UEFA has reformed the UEFA Cup and replaced the Intertoto Cup with new UEFA Cup qualification rounds.

I don’t know whether the Intertoto Cup spot will be converted into an additional UEFA Cup spot or not though. Anyone?

3. Live in 172 Countries
Last season’s record of 171 countries broadcasting live Bundesliga matches has been beaten. Bayern Munich vs. Hamburg will be broadcast live in 172 countries. According to Bundesliga Offside internal research conducted by our regular reader Diana (Happy Birthday BTW!), the 172nd country is Singapore.

If I were Uli Hoeness, I would convert the potential reach into actual viewers (NFL and EPL style), and brag how Bayern vs. Hamburg is bigger than the Superbowl.

4. Up to three Sunday Fixtures
The DFL has brokered a deal with TV networks, allowing them to schedule a third match on Sunday, in case there’s a conflict with UEFA Cup matches played out on Thursday. I.e.: no more 48h per match grinds.

Although, with Hertha having picked up an extra UEFA Cup spot and with Schalke still potentially dropping down to the UEFA Cup, even three Sunday fixtures might not to be enough.

5. More DFB-Pokal price money
An agreement was reached with pay-TV network Premiere, who will broadcast all 63 matches of the DFB-Pokal live, for the first time in the competition’s history – previously there had been one or two live matches on free-to-air TV only. The extra money coming from Premiere has bumped the price money a team receives for each round:

1st Round: €97942 (+82%)
2nd Round: €227133 (+100%)
3rd Round: €454267 (+88%)
Quarter-Final: €908533 (+61%)
Semi-Final: €1567067 (+72%)
Losing Finalist: €1707307 (+33%)
Cup Winner: €2560960 (+50%)

The increases in the early rounds are particularly important to teams from lower divisions (3rd division downwards). A Bundesliga side enjoying a successful cup campaign can look forward to €5-6m in price money. Combined with sponsorship and matchday revenue this figure could increase to €10m + x.

via: 101 Great Goals

SpVgg Unterhaching vs SC Freiburg
August 8, 2008 20:30 CET
Generali Sportpark, Unterhaching

SpVgg Unterhaching
Last Cup apperance: 2007-08
Last Cup title: Still waiting..
Last year: Lost in 1st round to Hertha Berlin
What their supporters will be drinking: Löwenbräu
Did you know…Tobias Schweinsteiger, older brother of Bastian, is on the roster. Photo evidence appears to exonerate him of any poor role modelling re: the younger Schweini’s hairstyle choices.

Unterhaching finds itself an inaugural member of the Dritte Liga. They have a win and a draw under their belt so far this season. Former Czech national player Roman Týce scored last time out against Paderborn, and is one of the few recognizable names.

SC Freiburg
Last Cup Appearance :2007-2008
Last Cup Title: Not once
Last year: Lost in 2nd round to Hamburger SV
What their supporters will be drinking: Ganter
Did you know…Freiburg were 2. Bundesliga Champions in both 92-93 and 02-03

Having his 1st season promotion dreams dashed, coach Robin Dutt looks to this season to carve out his own niche and step out of the sizeable shadow of former headman Volker Finke. Freiburg was a sensation in the 90’s and in the early 00’s, due in large part to Finke’s singular tactics and philosophy. Mohammadou Idrissou (Duisburg) and Tommy Bechmann (Bochum) are a couple new arrivals whose exploits you may remember from the Bundesliga last season.

The pick: ‘Haching 1-2 Freiburg (AET)

 
Preussen Münster vs VfL Bochum
August 8, 2008 20:30 CET
Preussenstadion, Münster

Preussen Münster
Last Cup Apperance: 1997-98
Last Cup Title: Maybe this year?
Last year: Westfalen Cup champions
What their supporters will be drinking: Perhaps Herforder or Pinkus, though Warsteiner is a sponsor
Did you know…Preussen Münster was an original member of the Bundesliga. They were relegated that first season..and have never been back. Sort of a bizarro Hamburg.

I guess the most interesting thing I can tell you about this team is that they have that rare type of player for a German team: an Italian! They were the Oberliga Westfalen champions and now find themselves in the new Regionalliga West.

VfL Bochum
Last Cup Appearance: 2007-08
Last Cup Title: Twice in the final, but never hoisted the cup.
Last year: Lost in the 2nd Round to Alemannia Aachen:
What their fans will be drinking: Fiege, unless they are sellouts and drink Dortmund-brewed products.
Did you know…“4630 Bochum” by Herbert Gronemeyer is still one of the most popular German recordings of all time. I’ll still take the German version of “I Want to Hold You Hand”, thank you very much.

You’ve got to figure this is the year the elevator goes down for Bochum, despite being buyers this offseason…but for now, Shinji Ono and Christian Fuchs gets their first tastes of the Pokal. Bochum was quietly a very strong home side in the Bundesliga last season, so if they get the right draws, they may have some staying power here.

The pick: Preussen 1:3 Bochum

 
Erzgebirge Aue vs St. Pauli
August 8, 2008 20:30 CET
Erzgebirgestadion, Aue

Erzgebirge Aue
Last Cup Apperance: 2007-2008
Last Cup Title: An East German Cup in 1955 is all they can boast.
Last year: Lost in the 1st round to Wuppertaler SV
What their supporters will be drinking: The club would have you think Hasseröder, but more likely Freiberger
Did you know…The club won four East German Oberliga (top flight) titles under the alias “SC Wismut Karl Marx Stadt”?

I hate trying to say “Erzgebirge Aue”. I hope it’s more pleasing to German tongues. They took the drop into the Dritte Liga, and have started the season off badly, losing twice. Even when they were a midtable squad in the 2nd division in recent years, this was the kind of team that would put you to sleep. All the style points will be going to their opponents.

St. Pauli
Last Cup Apperance 2007-2008
Last Cup Title: None, I’m afraid
Last year: Lost in 2nd round to Werder Bremen (amateurs)
What their supporters will be drinking: Astra
Did you know…The clubs met twice in the 2. Bundesliga last season, St. Pauli taking the first match 4-2, the second ending 0-0.

Well, what can I add to the legend that is St. Pauli? Every neighborhood needs a football team, and this is the Reeperbahn’s. Although St. Pauli may be better known for what happens in the stands than on the field, this is a squad with the edge in experience and offense in this matchup, and it’s always a good thing to see them go far. For their sake, let’s hope they don’t run into Bayern this time around.

The pick: Aue 0:2 St. Pauli

 
Kickers Offenbach vs Greuther Fürth
August 8, 2008 20:30 CET
Bieberer Berg, Offenbach

Kickers Offenbach
Last Cup Apperance: 2007-2008
Last Cup Title: 1969-1970
Last year: Lost in the 2nd round to Hansa Rostock
What their supporters will be drinking: Henninger is a sponsor
Did you know…The DWD (German equivalent to the National Weather Service) is headquartered in Offenbach.

I can’t say I’m particularly impressed with Offenbach’s roster, but Steffen Haas, a young midfielder on loan from Hoffenheim, might be one to watch. This is a team that has been in a slow decline over the last couple years, and finally finds itself out of the 2. Liga. They won their first home match of the year against Wacker Burghausen last weekend.

Greuther Fürth
Last Cup Apperance 2007-08
Last Cup Title: None, but surely some fair weather supporters celebrated with Der Club.
Last year: Lost in 2nd round to Hoffenheim
What their supporters will be drinking: I’m going to say Tucher predominately
Did you know…One of the clubs that merged to form the current side (TSV Vestenbergsgreuth) defeated Bayern Munich in 1st round of the 1994-95 Pokal in a tremendous upset.

This is a team that has not done a lot to improve itself, after flirting with promotion for a good stretch last season. Success will not come as easily this year, and maybe home field is enough for Kickers to pull the upset. Then the club’s fans can focus on the Nuremburg grudge matches in the 2. Liga this season.

The pick: Offenbach 6:5 Fürth on penalites

 
FSV Frankfurt vs VfL Osnabrück
August 8, 2008 20:30 CET
Commerzbank Arena, Frankfurt

FSV Frankfurt
Last Cup Apperance: 1995-96
Last Cup Title: Made the final once (more on that below)
Last year: Regionalliga Süd Champions
What their supporters will be drinking: Henninger
Did you know…FSV Frankfurt are one of only two teams to lose the Pokal final to..an Austrian team! Austrian sides were permitted to play in the tournament after the Anschluss, and Rapid Vienna took the title in 1938.

This is an old team by 2nd division standards, which gives one the sense that it’s cobbled together from 1st division castoffs and other assorted spare parts rather than young superstars in the making. They have really put together some cool t-shirts to commemorate the match though..that’s got to count for something.

VfL Osnabrück
Last Cup Apperance: 2007-08
Last Cup Title: Zilch
Last year: Lost in 1st round to ‘Gladbach
What their supporters will be drinking: Well, Herforder is their jersey sponsor..
Did you know…King George I was born in Osnabrück. King George I of England that is. Ah, the House of Hannover, always good for a little trivia…

Remember what I said about FSV Frankfurt being old by 2. Liga standards? That also applies is Osnabrück, but with a few exceptions…First, Bayer Leverkusen seems to have loaned about half their youth system to Osnabrück..Secondly, they have former Bayern Munich and Cologne keeper Stefan Wessels in goal.

The pick: FSV Frankfurt 1:2 VfL Osnabrück

SV Nierderauerbach vs 1. FC Köln
August 7, 2008 20:30 CET
Sportpark Husterhöhe, Pirmasens

1. FC Köln
Last Cup appearance: 2007-08
Last Cup title: 1982-83
Last year: Lost in 1st round to Werder Bremen (amateur squad)
What their supporters will be drinking: Gaffel Kölsch
Did you know…I’d pay good money to hear Ray Hudson attempt to correctly pronounce Köln!

The newly promoted Geisböcke look to improve upon last year’s embarrassing early exit. The addition of Petit in the midfield should improve Köln’s overall playmaking ability. I’m optimistic that they will actually make some noise in this year’s competition.

SV Niederauerbach
Last Cup Appearance: Never, as far as I can tell!
Last Cup title: Dream on.
Last Year: Runners up to 1. FC Kaiserslautern (amateur squad) for Südwest Cup
What their supporters will be drinking: Park..(instead of white wine we hope!)
Did you know…Niederauerbach is a section of Zweibrücken, which once housed a major U.S. airbase.

SV Niederauerbach is also newly promoted…to the 4th division! They benefitted from the new regulation which does not allow amateur sides to take part in the Pokal and so here they are. Last Saturday, they lost their opening Oberliga match to hosts FK Pirmasens, 2-0. Thursdays’s match will be played on the same field. The squad boasts two players formerly of FC Homburg who do have Pokal match experience under their belt.

The pick: Köln 6:0 Niederauerbach