Football Journey: September 2022

Austria. Ranked 8^th. Like Scotland, Austria was not as good as ranking suggests – based on UEFA's computation of teams performance in Europe, the ranking gives somewhat inflated picture sometimes. Austrian championship was modified into unusual for Europe scheme precisely because of financial troubles and relatively low quality: it was 2-phased championship. In the fall the top leagues played regular season. In the spring the top 8 in the fall continued between themselves to compete for the national title, carrying their fall records. The last 4 in the fall plus the Second Division top 4 in the fall played in another spring league, serving as promotion/relegation tournament – the top 4 in it moved to the top league for the first stage of the next season, the rest – to Second Division. No previous records were carried to this stage, naturally.

Starting from there: the last 4 of First Division – SK VOEST Linz, Linzer ASK, SK Austria Klagenfurt and VfB Modling were joined by the Second Division top 4 in the fall: VSE Sankt Polten, SK Vorwaerts Steyr, Kremser SC, and SV Austria Salzburg. Quite an interesting mix, at least at the level of trivia: both clubs from Linz found themselves in danger of relegation. SV Austria Salzburg was still a far cry from the strong club, which they became (under different name) in the 21^st century. Kremser SC enjoyed its best ever season, creating a sensation. SK Vorwaerts, practically unheard of club so far, was going very soon to employ the greatest Soviet player – Oleg Blokhin. But another world-famous player was already here:

Mario Kempes started his second season in Austria for Second Division VSE Sankt Polten – after playing for top-league First Vienna the previous season. Hardly noticed by anyone... Kempes was going down by some time and practically disappeared from sight and mind already. Now 33 years old, he was no good for big and famous clubs, but for modest St. Polten was great help.

VfB Modling finished last in the spring with 6 points and moved to second level for 1988-89.

Austria Salzburg was next to last with 9 points and stayed in Second Division. Kremser SC was unable to get promoted - 6^th with 12 points.

VOEST Linz ended 5^th with 15 points and after many years in First Division was relegated.

Vorwaerts Steyr earned 17 points and with that finished 4^th – and was promoted, which most likely moved them to importing Blokhin, very old by now – but that was later.

VSE Sankt Polten also succeeded: 3^rd with 17 points and promoted. Mario Kempes helped enough, himself moving back to top flight football.

Austria Klagenfurt put itself together after terrible fall stage and finished 2^nd with 18 points. Lost top position on worse goal-difference, but it did not matter – the main task to stay in First Division was completed successfully.

Same for Linzer ASK, which topped the table – goal-difference placed them above Austria Klagenfurt, but no matter – keeping place among the best mattered. They had somewhat amusing spring campaign: did not lose even a match – the only team in the relegation group without a loss – but did not win often either. They won 4 games and tied 10! Consequently, they were modest scorers – only 16 goals, less than relegated city rivals VOEST and not even close to Kempes-led VSE Sankt Polten, which scored 30 goals in their 14 games.

The championship play-off. Things were pretty much already decided in the fall, so there was exciting battle for the title. The lower one goes... it is safe to say that for at least half of the teams the real work ended in the fall – securing a place in the top league for the next season. In brackets is the club's position and points they had at the end of the fall stage.

Wiener Sportclub – last with 31 points (8^th with 22)

Grazer AK - 7^th with 35 points ( 3^rd with 27)

Swarovski Tirol - 6^th with 37 points (5^th with 25)

Admira/Wacker - 5^th with 38 points (4^th with 25)

First Vienna FC - 4^th with 39 points (7^th with 23)

Sturm Graz - 3^rd with 42 points (6^th with 24)

Austria (Vienna) - 2^nd with 46 points (2^nd with 28)

Rapid (Vienna) – champions with 54 points (1^st with 36 points). They dominated the full championship, way stronger than the usual rival Austria. 22 wins, 10 ties, 4 losses, 81-40. Austria outscored them by 2 goals, but that was nothing. Otto Baric kept his great work with the team, which,as usual, was completed with Yugoslavians – Zlatko Kranjcar (31 years old), Sulejman Halilovic (32), and Zoran Stojadinovic (25). Somewhat lesser names than Austria's imports (Hungarian Tibor Nyilasi, Czechoslovak goalkeeper Vladimir Borovicka, and Argentine Jose Percudani), but as a whole Rapid's selection performed much better.

Eventually, a Soviet player was added to the squad – the 31 years old former national team midfielder Sergey Shavlo. How much he contributed to Rapid is even unimportant: the big note here is the real start of USSR exporting players. Shavlo was one of the first, soon to be followed by many, but there was significant gap of years until the Soviets decided to follow up their over-careful opening some years ago, when Zinchenko was let play for same Rapid. In any case Rapid won one more title and no reason to mention how many they had.

The Cup final was quite unusual – Swarovski Tirol reached the final, which, in general, was nothing new, but the other finalist was Second Division Kremser SC. Hardly heard of club outside Austria. The underdog won the first leg of the final at home 2-0 and surprisingly scored a goal in Innsburck. They lost the second leg, but this goal proved to be pure gold: 1-3. The away-goal rule made Kremser SC the winner.

Swarovski Tirol, a new ambitious project, was more ambitious than strong at the moment and unexpectedly lost the final. Too bad for the project... which was just a typical Austrian example of desperate efforts to keep football alive: the Innsbruck club was fairly well known and successful name, but behind the familiar name a history of trouble lurked: the club changed names, reformed, amalgamated, re-started, the famous sponsor Swarovski came to help, dropped out, came back again. This was fresh re-incarnation, barely 2 years old and not fully developed. Hence, ambition did not match strength and they lost.

Kremser SC from the city of Krems was modest club, usually playing somewhere deep down in the Austrian football system. Of course, they never won anything substantial and, to a point, playing well in the Second Division was the best they probably dreamed of. But they played well this season and had a chance even to get promoted to the top league. That chance they lost, but reaching the Cup final fueled hopes for success. They won the final a bit luckily, but cannot blame them for winning. A great victory of the underdog – their first and last! Such historic victory and one never repeated deserves better memory than the club has... their website practically does not mention the success and there is no picture of the club's greatest heroes. Let put it like that: as a whole, Austria is not all that crazy about football and prefers alpine sports.