SpVgg Fürth
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| Full name | Spielvereinigung Greuther Fürth e. V. |
|---|---|
| Nickname(s) | Kleeblätter (Shamrocks) |
| Founded | 23 September 1903 |
| Ground | Sportpark Ronhof |
| Capacity | 18,500 |
| Chairman | Helmut Hack |
| Manager | Janos Radoki |
| League | 2. Bundesliga |
| 2015–16 | 9th |
| Website | Club home page |
SpVgg Greuther Fürth (German pronunciation: [ˈɡʁɔʏ̯tɐ ˈfʏʁt]) is a German association football club based in Fürth, Bavaria. The club got its current name when the senior football side of newcomers Turn- und Sportverein Vestenbergsgreuth joined traditional club Spielvereinigung Fürth on 1 July 1996. SpVgg is an abbreviation of the German term "Spielvereinigung", literally "playing association", a traditional term used for a team (German: Verein) or club engaged in sports other than gymnastics.
In the 2012–13 season, the club played in the Bundesliga for the first time, having won promotion from the 2. Bundesliga, but was uncompetitive at that level and was promptly relegated again.
The origins of SpVgg Fürth are in the establishment on 23 September 1903 of a football department within the gymnastics club Turnverein 1860 Fürth. The footballers went their own way as an independent club in November 1906. The team played in the Ostkreisliga and took divisional titles there in 1912, 1913 and 1914 before moving on to participate in the Süddeutsche (South German) regional playoffs for the national championship round. Right from the beginning, there was a great rivalry between the SpVgg Fürth and the 1. FC Nürnberg, predicated on the historical rivalry between the two neighbouring cities. The club grew rapidly, and by 1914, it had 3,000 members and was the largest sports club in Germany.
Fürth won their first national title in 1914 under English coach William Townley. They faced VfB Leipzig – the defending champions with three titles to their credit – in the final held on 31 May in Magdeburg. A 154-minute-long thriller, the longest game in German football history, ended with Fürth scoring a golden goal to secure the title. The team had a solid run of successes through the 1920s and into the early 1930s, beginning with an appearance in the national final in 1920 against 1. FC Nürnberg, which was the dominant side of the decade. The rivalry between the two clubs was such that a star player with SpVgg was forced to leave after he married a girl from the city of Nuremberg. In 1924, for the first and only time, the German national side was made up exclusively of players from just two sides – Fürth and 1. FC Nürnberg – and players of the two teams slept in separate rail coaches.
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