• Source: Kreisliga Odenwald

The Kreisliga Odenwald (English: District league Odenwald) was the highest association football league in the northern part of the German state of Baden and the southern part of the state of Hesse from 1919 to 1923. The league was disbanded with the introduction of the Bezirksliga Rhein in 1923.
The league was named after the Odenwald, a forest in the border region of Hesse and Baden.




Overview






= Predecessor

=
From 1907, four regional leagues were formed within the structure of the Southern German football championship, in a move to improve the organisation of football in Southern Germany, these being:

Ostkreis-Liga, covering Bavaria
Nordkreis-Liga, covering Hesse
Südkreis-Liga, covering Württemberg, Baden and Alsace
Westkreis-Liga, covering the Palatinate, Lorraine and the southern Rhine Province
In 1908, a first Westkreis-Liga (English: Western District League) was established. With the outbreak of the First World War, league football came to a halt and, during the war, games were only played on a limited level.




= Post-First World War

=
With the collapse of the German Empire in 1918, no Westkreis championship was played in 1918-19 but football returned to a more organised system in 1919.
Southern Germany, now without the Alsace and Lorraine regions, the later having been part of the Westkreis and had to be returned to France, was sub-divided into ten Kreisligas, these being:

Kreisliga Hessen
Kreisliga Nordbayern
Kreisliga Nordmain
Kreisliga Odenwald
Kreisliga Pfalz
Kreisliga Saar
Kreisliga Südbayern
Kreisliga Südmain
Kreisliga Südwest
Kreisliga Württemberg
The new Kreisliga Odenwald was made up from ten clubs from the Westkreis region. The league winners of the Kreisligas advanced to the Southern championship. This system applied for the 1919-20 and 1920-21 season.
In 1921-22, the Kreisliga Odenwald was split into two groups of eight, increasing the number of tier-one clubs in the region to 16. The two league winners then played a final to determine the Odenwald champion, which in turn advanced to a Rhein championship final against the Pfalz champion. This "watering down" of football in the region lasted for only one season, in 1922-23, the number of top clubs was reduced to eight clubs in a single division, with a Rhein final against the Pfalz champion once more.
In 1923, a league reform which was decided upon in Darmstadt, Hesse, established the Southern German Bezirksligas which were to replace the Kreisligas. The best four teams each from the Kreisliga Odenwald and Pfalz were admitted to the new Bezirksliga Rhein. The four clubs from Odenwald were:

Phönix Mannheim
SV Waldhof Mannheim
VfR Mannheim
VfTuR Feudenheim




National success


The clubs from the Kreisliga Odenwald were not particularly successful in this era and none managed to qualify for the German championship.




= Rhein championship

=
Played in 1922 and 1923, these were the finals:

1922:
Odenwald final: VfR Mannheim - Lindenhof 08 5-0 / 1-1
Rhein final: VfR Mannheim - Phönix Ludwigshafen 0-0 / 3-2
1923:
Rhein: Phönix Ludwigshafen - Phönix Mannheim 4-1 / 3-1




= Southern German championship

=
Qualified teams and their success:

1920:
SV Waldhof Mannheim, Group stage
1921:
SV Waldhof Mannheim, Group stage
1922:
VfR Mannheim, Second round
1923:
Borussia Neunkirchen, not qualified




Winners and runners-up of the Kreisliga Odenwald






Placings in the Kreisliga Odenwald 1919-23



1 Viktoria moved from the Kreisliga Odenwald to the Kreisliga Nordmain in 1920 and then to the Kreisliga Südmain in 1921.




References






= Sources

=
Fussball-Jahrbuch Deutschland (in German) (8 vol.), Tables and results of the German tier-one leagues 1919-33, publisher: DSFS
Kicker Almanach, (in German) The yearbook on German football from Bundesliga to Oberliga, since 1937, published by the Kicker Sports Magazine
Süddeutschlands Fussballgeschichte in Tabellenform 1897-1988 (in German) History of Southern German football in tables, publisher & author: Ludolf Hyll




External links


The Gauligas (in German) Das Deutsche Fussball Archiv
German league tables 1892-1933 (in German) Hirschi's Fussball seiten
Germany - Championships 1902-1945 at RSSSF.com

Kata Kunci Pencarian:

• SV Waldhof Mannheim
• Kreisliga Odenwald
• SV Waldhof Mannheim
• Kreisliga Pfalz
• SV Darmstadt 98
• VfR Mannheim
• Kreisliga Südmain
• Kreisliga Württemberg
• Kreisliga Bayern
• Kreisliga Südwest
• Kreisliga Saar