German Football Culture Explained

Soccer in Germany is a big deal! In this video, we talk about what makes the football culture in Germany so special and how you can get involved.

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⏰ Timestamps:
00:00 – Introduction
00:48 – The National Level
05:35 – The Club League Level
21:24 – How to Get Involved

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if you want to hear a German talk passionately about something you can lead the conversation in one of three topics either beer bread or football we already did a video about the first two and in this video we’re going to talk about the football culture in Germany we will divide this video in three sections the first one is the national level you already see the excitement the second section is about the club League or the Bundesliga and the third section is how to get involved in this beautiful culture I’m not too much into football but here we are I could hear the sarcasm in your voice hey my name is Jen and I’m from Guatemala and mine is Ivon and I’m German and together we’re from simple gy.com where we create English content to empower Internationals to settle into life in Germany more [Music] smoothly it’s no news that Germany’s known as a football giant if you look at the world scheme and World Cup wins and all of that jazz however for my for myself in my lifetime I got to feel and see the emotion and energy football can generate in 2006 that was the year when Germany hosted the World Cup and I was old enough to witness it and something magical happened the country United and it was the first time that I ever saw so many German flags being waved from the cars from houses on the streets and people feeling proud to wear our colors I would say this is a massive kind of like accomplishment especially after the World War II and the shame that came along with waving a German flag kind of like that moment United people outside of that shame and outside of the political Arena especially yeah football is life in Germany and it is a way to express emotions and the German culture like no other way possible not just on the national level but especially on the club level which we will talk about later on of course but the fact that in my life so I would consider myself a football Enthusiast Jen and I often have discussions about fan versus Enthusiast versus I think you’re a fan yeah that’s a different topic we will get to that when we talk about Club level because there’s a real distinguishment in Germany between a fan and an Enthusiast so what I’m getting at here is that I never owned a club Jersey um I’m a sympathizer with a certain club which we can talk about later but I never owned a club Jersey However the fact that I own three different German National Team jerseys I would say expresses a lot so I own the one from 2006 obviously because of the World Cup happening here then I own the one from the women’s national team when also the World Cup was hosted in Germany and then we own these two this is from 2014 the the Jersey first we got that one before the World Cup started and after we won the World Championship the last time we got this one which is the fourth Star World Championship Jersey I would say that was the very first time I experienced a World Cup in a country where it was a strong Contender Germany and actually Germany won and I remember for the finale we went to see it uh in dorf there’s like the r prominade and we went there where it’s like a public viewing and it was the very first time in my life I had been here very shortly I think two or 3 years and it’s the only time since that I’ve seen actually German sing the national anthem and actually stand up and being proud of the sound and the music not everyone for sure there were some exceptions but in general like this Unity feeling that you you shared I felt it for the very first time also in such a public viewing here in dador now this summer in 2024 in just a few weeks the Euro Cup in German Europa M Shaft or in short am will start again in Germany Germany is the host country and you know it’s been the same process so far that the expectations and enthum is quite low beforehand but in 2006 the moment it started Just Energy started flowing in the country and we are having high hopes that this will be the same this time and that we are looking at another fairy tale summer of football yay anyway so how do you even watch these Em games so I would say like you say football is culture in Germany and the best way to do it is with with others is in a community there’s a lot of public viewings that happen every city organizes public viewing places and you simply have to Google public viewing actually you use the English word right plus em and your city and you’ll be able to find the locations where you can go watch a football game with others because I think watching it with others make it so much more exciting and emotional as well and you feel every goal or loss depends right I love uh supporting the German team when they win of course um but additional to that you can watch it where else like in public View and some bars bars yes as well they show the game and very rarely do you watch it at home alone unless maybe you have cable and you invite others to come to your home and watch it together but I would say watching the m and the World Cup usually it’s a thing that you watch with other people yes definitely yeah and speaking of public viewing every city organizes something like you said however Berlin is I would say world famous also for um it’s public viewing mile uh we call it nowadays it started again in 2006 and since then it’s been a tradition that the entire area in front of the brandonburg gate and the um the the connecting streets is blocked and closed and this time they will actually even put like fake grass to make it feel like a like a soccer court it’s uh it’s a beautiful place to be if you’re in Berlin or the area around and not just the German team playing but every game is being shown there also depending on the company culture it could be very common that your company organizes public viewing as well that you can watch with your colleagues I experienced this also for the World Cup the company that I was working on they also organized viewings and drinks and food well some snacks and we would all watch the game there together as well same in my company yeah totally now let’s talk about the club League level which I would say is where the heart of the German Football culture lays I couldn’t agree more yes and this is a constant where as a national team is something that pops up dies out pops up dies out whenever the event schedule pretty much allows it so as you’ve probably heard from my tone of voice in this video I am not into football that much I watch it when the national team plays to be honest and the rest I just hear couldn’t care less yes so that’s why I think before we start about the club League sorry if you already know this information but if you’re like a beginner football fan then we should talk about how it works maybe the basics the basics okay let’s introduce it real quick similar to other countries Germany’s Club football follows a league system the first League the a Bundesliga is the best league and where the best teams of the countries play in the professional Min soccer or football you can find three professional leagues bu and the profession women’s football you can find two leagues bundes a League season typically lasts from August till May then there’s a summer break and the whole shenanigan starts again all teams play against each other twice usually as the H pretty much August till Christmas and the r January till May against the other team there is a home game heimel in German and a away game SP in German and throughout the league um and throughout the season you collect points and at the end of the season at the end of the in May the team with the most points is the German champion and this year I would say something Fantastical happened in 2024 where nusen meaning like a team that would never ever has ever won the bundes league won the bundes for the very first time and gave it a nice change because in the past 10 years Bayern Munich has won so it’s kind of boring in a way for which is your favorite team by the way which is the team that I sympathize with yes yeah so this has been a very nice nice change and very refreshing especially because they didn’t lose one single game so super impressive and um Kudos like I’m I’m very much uh thrilled by that okay so that’s the Bundesliga but that’s not the only kind of like football thing that happens right there’s the dfb poal correct which is the German cup correct and how does that one work mhm again this is not news other countries have it as well and the German cup is a nice change to the league because here we are not collecting points throughout a season but every single match is a knockout match so you win or lose and if you lose you’re out of the entire cup what is so fascinating and thrilling about this cup is that regardless of which league a team plays in so first second or third League they all play against each other it’s pretty much a raffle where the matches get drawn and get assigned and it is very common that so-called underdogs from the second or third League kick out the um favorite team because they’re playing in the first league for example this season an underdog from the third League zaben threw out three first league teams in a row and that was very impressive including Bayan oh wow interesting I would also say there was the game between lusen which we just mentioned that won the bundes league and dorf Fortuna and yeah that was unfortunately not such an exciting match cuz leusen killed Fortuna 4-0 but it was an interesting game to watch at the pub uh all the Germans were very U enthusiastic whenever the ball would come close to the Leverkusen goalie um but unfortunately we never got a score I say we now because I’m So Into football the final of the dfb poal by the way dfb stands for deut FB bu b as in color no b as an association like with a d not a t mhm and pkal means cup but the final of the dfp poal is always always in Berlin and you might it’s very common in German culture for anything even completely soccer non soccer related that the chant goes bin binin and this arrives from the final of the cup in Berlin okay now that we got the basics covered like my big question is like what makes it so special don’t doesn’t other countries also have football leagues and stuff yeah of course every I mean not every but a lot of big nations are out there when it comes to leagues and football however Germany stands out and the reason why it stands out there is a lot of controversy around it but let me just explain what it is and then you make your own exactly you can form your own opinion about it Germany is world famous for it’s fan club culture and the reason behind it is that German Football on Club level is not based on capitalism as it is in a lot of other Leakes where billionaires from let’s say the Arab countries or other countries buy clubs push in money buy the most expensive players and pretty much just make it a capitalist game that is not possible in Germany because of a set rule that the entire league system is based on wait but there are two exceptions to this rule let me first explain okay sorry I the rule that I’m talking about is 50 plus one that’s what it’s called it’s been on the news tons because of its controversy and it pretty much says that the club itself needs to be 50% plus one vote so the majority in the hands of fan club members so not in the hands of external investors and because of that the fan club members have a voice they’re being heard and they are very strong in their opinion and protecting their culture and them being involved in the club and because of that foreign investors are not allowed they simply aren’t there’s two exceptions like you just said and those are lusen via lusen and wburg and the reason being is because those two clubs were originally founded from two companies Bayer the pharmaceutical company and fve uh vbook from fave the car company so they were they originate as a club based out of the company and because they were always company owned in that sense they are allowed to still be company own however they still have to abide by the general rules of not selling their shares to external investors and that since that is super interesting so meaning like the fan is taken very seriously in Germany correct maybe even more so than in other countries yes and because of that what Germany is known for is full stadiums like the stadiums in German club levels Club teams are always full not just in the first league but also in the second and even third League when I did my research I actually found some crazy statistics which is should not be a statistics videoa but just to give you a little bit of an idea for example the second league Bundesliga where Fortuna is currently playing when it comes to world statistics it is the fourth league in the world when it comes to Stadium tickets sold that is crazy that is more than first League tickets being sold in Spain Italy and France with huge I mean huge football teams and also culture and depending on the team like I said before even the third league has full stadiums I found a video on YouTube from a British football fan who you know wanted to experience the German culture and he went to a third League game in Dron the team is called Dina modren and the video that I saw was mesmerizing you can see fan blocks like the ultra fans standing chanting like all arm and arm jumping up and down making noise as if it was a first League game and this is what is so special and unique about the German Football culture and another thing that makes it so special and it’s because I think of all of also the history of Germany the local football club culture it is a very it’s it’s a pride thing people identify with it feel a sense of um community and integrity there and when you ask someone uh we did a video on German patriotism which you can watch up there Germans are way more if they’re into football to identify or generally speaking to their region than to Germany as itself and football plays a big role in that as well I totally agree and another shocking thing for example that we saw in D who for tunai in the second league that that the ticket prices were for free for fan club members to support the team and this leads also that ticket prices are relatively affordable to everyone that wants to go watch football right correct yeah generally speaking again if you compare to the English uh the Premier League ticket prices are so so so affordable and also there is a lot a very high percentage of permanent like um season tickets being sold there are each stadium has um standing spots so the those of course cheaper those create the ambience I mean the stadium in Dortmund is known the yellow wall worldwide people just want to go there to experience that feeling because you have just one entire wall of people standing jumping chanting in one color it is really really impressive and this is I think yes you have football around the world but this is something very very unique and because of that it’s also sometimes depending on the team quite difficult to get tickets that is super crazy right and I would also say it’s super impressive because this yellow wall that you described or any other kind of like decoration that we see within the super fans yeah it’s like self-organized which I think it’s super impressive because once you see like the whole like they have messages they have all kinds of different choreographies and stuff that they do which I find it super impressive it’s it’s a passion yeah they just do it because they believe in their team and um it’s their Community yeah actually only after living in Germany for a few years I came about to this term actually and it’s Ultras and I’ve seen for example Ultras being uh graffitied with f95 is like the tuna 95 which is again the second league of tusor where we live and Ultras have been seeing it everywhere and I’ve always wondered is this a like a cool name or is this offensive if you ask someone if they’re an ultra what is your experience with that so to be honest I that’s what I mean I’m an Enthusiast I’m not a fan because I’ve never owned a club Jersey I’ve never had a season ticket I’ve been a few times to a stadium of a club but not regularly so I wouldn’t consider myself a fan whereas an ultra that’s the ones who travel to the away games those are the ones that have the season tickets that do the the the choreographies and the chanting they get their tattoos they get their tattoos exactly they do their graffiti so those are the hardcore fans however in my impression and this is just my impression again there’s no statistics or research based on this if we speak of Ultras another term that comes to my mind is Hooligans which I don’t associate as much with German football fans as with other nations so yes there might be some very intense uh Ultras in Germany but I used to have a colleague who actually was part of the Ultras of the munchin gladbach team and I asked him once so tell me a little bit more about it why are you there what uh um is your purpose and what ignites you and he actually for him it was about community so he was already like a seasoned Ultra and for him it was about integrating and welcoming younger um teenagers or adolesents integrating them and giving them also a um um how do you say like a future like a purpose like a yeah like making them feel part of a community and and that they belong somewhere correct yeah so it was about the community really and not I mean of course soccer is the vessel in this sense but it wasn’t about being aggressive or being um I hate everyone else that’s not for my team he didn’t express it in that way so that was very interesting and also I would say he was a very nice colleague I liked him very much so not to point that not just because you’re an ultra you’re necessarily like radical radical yeah and super aggressive or something like that during my research cuz I wanted to dig a little bit deeper and not just talk about my perspective I was actually super surprised with some numbers that I found and that is that when we look at pure club members I would say there’s a distinguishment between a fan because if we think about football fans Real Madrid I think has the most fans around the world but that is just like a fan who likes to watch the games on TV like in guate where they have no football C culture themselves right we do wait hold on so first first of all is Real Madrid it’s not like Real Madrid second of all Guatemala has a football culture but it’s not World known and we do have the Rosas you know like the red and the and the whites but it’s not at the level of Real Madrid of course so watching a game from a Spanish or european league is a lot more higher level than a Guatemalan right but they’re just fans right they’re not club members I wouldn’t know cuz I never was involved but generally speaking yes I would agree so if we look at club members who actually pay a fee every year to be a member of the club of uh a local soccer team Bayern Munich is actually worldwide the football club with the most members that for me was what that shows again this this loyalty and the hardcore basis of actual club membership and what that means and currently they’re having around 320,000 club members which sounds little if you think of the world and the meons of fans but again we’re talking about club members people that actually pay to be part of it yes and what is even more interesting if we look at the top 10 of football clubs worldwide with club members Germany has three clubs in there sha and Dortmund being also amongst the top 10 no other country in the world has as many Club teams in the top 10 when it comes to members and that expresses again why the fan club culture in Germany is so special I have to be very honest and kind of like um I feel bad about it and I’m GNA try to fix it this year but I’ve never actually gone to see a football game in Germany um yeah but you’ve gone yes and how what was your experience like yes so actually like I said I’m not going regularly to uh to a club or to a game however two years ago we went with my sister and my dad uh into the Forbidden City if we come from dof to Cologne to support the FC then ason FC K and yes we got a scarf it was a birthday gift from my dad he likes the FC very much so we were all there dressed up and in the stadium it was uh relatively difficult to get tickets because the cologne team is one one of the ones that again has such a strong fan C bases that not many tickets get actually open to the public uh so you really have to want to go and we made it and the stadium was just amazing I mean the chance before the the game during the game the atmosphere it’s not just that the um cuz in the stadium you usually have like this block where the fans are like the Ultras who do the chance but the entire stadium was singing again because it’s a local identity there’s songs being played that any person from cologne is like proud to sing along and and wave the scarf and we were in the middle of that and it was just so beautiful and very very special and I felt very much like this is my haat cologne is your home but you live in D the area of thein okay B cologo it’s it’s the area inclusive yeah yeah and also I would say this is super interesting because your sister who lives in the south of Germany she has been to a couple of the Bayern games and I asked her if you compare T you know like the feeling or the vibe from a cologne game to a Bayern game and in her perspective she mentioned the same right that in the Bayern unless like the in the ultra section is where you feel the energy the most however in Cologne it was like the whole stadium you felt the vibe because the fans of cologne are different than the fans of Bayan yes yeah so that’s super interesting right and when it comes to chants and songs and all these things and if you want to participate for example it’s super easy you can go to Spotify and actually you can find you can actually type in the name of the club and there are all the songs that they generally yeah um to the sent that my brother-in-law who is not a football fan at all and mind you he’s from northern Germany yeah so he that he also went to this buend game and afterwards he was singing the Bion songs and playing the playlist in Spotify because again it’s like this feeling that gets created through music and community and unity I think which is super funny so I feel like I should I should go to to a football game question is which one a Fortuna yeah maybe I go to the colog one I’m kidding now how can you get involved in the German Football culture that is if you want to get involved of course so at the pro level meaning like all the games that we watch on TV that could either be EST Li the best thing I think is to uh follow uh the news and keep up to date with who is winning and what is happening in the Bundesliga and the pocal and this is an amazing Icebreaker for example in companies oh my God I would have colleagues that they would spend the whole Monday morning just talking about football and did you watch this and I don’t believe did like the whole analysis and all these things I would put my headphones because like I said I’m not interested that much but it would be a perfect Icebreaker to just get into conversation with someone so another interesting thing is that the club Lia games the Bundesliga are not on free TV in Germany so you cannot just watch the entire game on TV however sport show it’s uh from the from the I from the public broadcasting they do summaries of the games um Saturday Sundays evenings on TV and of course also on sport show. that’s where I watch the highlights of games that interest me on Mondays that’s when the videos become free and um yeah wherever I’m interested that’s how I can kind like keep up to date another very common not everywhere but in my former um teams and companies that was the case you can join a so-called tip R so usually before the season there is the colleagues the Germans whoever are involved they ask around who wants to join and you um sometimes even pay for it because you’re betting right on who wins the game or the league and then each week before the games happen you need to give you your tips of how the the games are going to end and someone usually keeps SC and it’s again another beautiful way to be in a community be involved um have a conversation topic and um yeah maybe even watch a few games together yeah I got this typical W experience during the World Cup and someone was actually asking around hey you want to participate it’s like five or something and I think I participated and lost of course because no idea other ways to do it is that especially when your Regional team is playing you can go to a traditional a brow house a German um Pub they play the games there of course you can also go to an Irish pub and all these things but I would say the bow house is where you feel the a lot more than in any other bar you can also there are kiosk especially in summertime well you said there’s a summer break so are there games in summer no but I mean we see in the fall and the spring we have this one kiosk here by the r that’s on the way from the city center to the stadium and it’s actually called the Fortuna kiosk and people are always standing there before after the game having a beer having a chat and um just throw on a scarf to kind of like show people you are here to talk soccer to talk football and and it’s a great way to start conversation people are very open-minded especially let’s say here in the rhand but I would say also probably in other areas of Germany yes I totally agree if you’re not into football one hot tip I can give you is that watch out for full trains and people we’ve had multiple experiences that we wanted to cycle into the city of dorf and it’s on a game day and that means there’s like hundreds of people everywhere on bikes thousands thousands okay already drinking beer on the way getting in the way and no matter how many ding dings you do with your bike they don’t get out of the way cuz there’s just so many people that is of course if you live in a city with a stadium nearby and and you’re in that area right vicinity yes and the trains as well I would say are super packed so if you are not into football and you want to avoid big crowds just make sure to have follow football just to know when the local games are happening to avoid um that time to go out also sometimes the other day we were on the highway actually and we saw two cars with their blue and white scarves out the windows it’s very common also if you are on the highway around a match day in the big Stadium to see the fans and to hang the scarf out of the car is super common you asked is this a wedding I’m like no they’re heading to the Sha game true also they’re like honking all the time it’s like very loud kind of like doing all the things you’re not supposed to be doing on the aaban they’re still driving probably now if you would like to play football yourself or actually your kids to join a football club you can do so by joining a fat it’s called in German and they exist like everywhere what did you say there’s 25 there’s 25,000 in Germany wow really many yeah and there’s both for children women men boys I mean there’s really for everything I would say so if you want to get involved and play some football yourself you can do so as well also in dor we have this really cool place called cage ball which is um a mini football it’s uh usually five on five and there you can also play you don’t need to be part of a fine you just need to rent the court and and do so bring your group and play here we used to do that for time for quite some time for quite some time yeah yeah until we retired from our football career see so you are interested football playing but not watching it’s too emotional for me like we’ve mentioned in many of our videos joining a fine whether that is for sports or for arts or for culture any of your hobbies or interests is a fantastic way to find a community and find likeminded people and possibly even friends we have also opened our own fa I mean it’s not officially a fa but you know since we’re talking about clubs and it’s our own club which is called the smooth club and it’s a Discord Community where like-minded people like are ourselves and probably you watching can hang out and interact and not only talk about football there’s a channel for sports not just football however to talk about everything else that has to do about moving and living and adapting to the life in Germany yeah and we have club members from all over the world literally from all continents more or less and uh some that are already in Germany others they’re about to move and it’s a very fluid happy encouraging conversation that is happening there on a daily basis it’s very active so if you’d like to become a member as well then you can uh click on the link in the description below or hit simple gy.com club and become a member as well yeah we can’t wait to welcome you personally into the club so we hope you enjoyed our football culture video and we’ll see you next Monday Chee