Fritz Walter

This article is about the footballer born in 1920. For other people named Fritz Walter, see Fritz Walter (disambiguation).
Fritz Walter

Fritz Walter with Kaiserslautern in 1956.
Personal information
Full name Friedrich Walter
Date of birth (1920-10-31)31 October 1920
Place of birth Kaiserslautern, Germany
Date of death 17 June 2002(2002-06-17) (aged 81)
Place of death Enkenbach-Alsenborn, Germany
Playing position Attacking midfielder
Inside forward
Youth career
1928–1929 FV Kaiserslautern
1929–1937 1. FC Kaiserslautern
Senior career*
Years Team Apps (Gls)
1937–1959 1. FC Kaiserslautern 364 (357)
National team
1940–1958 Germany 61 (33)

* Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only.


Friedrich "Fritz" Walter (31 October 1920 – 17 June 2002) was a German footballer. In his time with the German national team, he made 61 caps and scored 33 goals. He usually played as an attacking midfielder or inside forward.

Life and career

Early club career

Walter was exposed to football early with his parents working at the 1. FC Kaiserslautern club restaurant. By 1928 he had joined the Kaiserslautern youth academy, and he made his first team debut at 17, continuing an association with the club that would be his only professional club.[1][2][3]

International pro teams had repeatedly offered him hefty sums, but with support from his wife always declined in order to stay at home, to play for his home town, the national team and "Chef" (German for "boss") Herberger.

International debut

Walter debuted with the German national team in 1940 under Sepp Herberger, and scored a hat-trick against Romania.[2]

War

Walter was drafted into the armed forces in 1942, however, the end of the war found 24-year-old Walter in a Prisoner of War camp in Maramures in which he played with Hungarian and Slovakian guards. When the Soviets arrived they in general took all German prisoners back to a Gulag in Soviet Union where life expectancy was about five years. Fortunately, one of the Hungarian prison guards had seen Walter playing for Germany, and told them that Fritz was not German but from the Saar Territory.[4]

Return to Germany

Upon his return in 1945, Walter, who by now suffering from malaria, again played for Kaiserslautern,[5] leading them to German championships in 1951 and 1953. Sepp Herberger recalled him to the national team in 1951, and he was named captain.[2]

He was captain of the West German team that won their first World Cup in 1954. Ironically, given the intervention of the Hungarian guards during the war, that win came over Hungary. He and his brother, Ottmar Walter, became the first brothers to play in a World Cup winning team.[3]

But in 1956, after the crackdown by the Soviets of the Hungarian Uprising, the Hungarian football team were caught away from home, and for two years, Fritz managed their games and provided the financial backing and in small measure, paid them back for having saved his life. Walter received his last cap[6] during the semi-final against Sweden in the 1958 World Cup, suffering an injury which ended his international career, and he retired from football in 1959.

Memorial for the 1. FC Kaiserslautern players in the 1954 FIFA World Cup Final. From left to right: Werner Liebrich, Fritz Walter, Werner Kohlmeyer, Horst Eckel and Ottmar Walter.
Fritz Walter on a 1968 UAE stamp
Fritz Walter on a 1988 Paraguay stamp

Later life and legacy

The home stadium of FC Kaiserslautern was renamed the Fritz-Walter-Stadion in 1985.

Fritz Walter was named an honorary captain of the German football squad in 1958.[7] The other four are Uwe Seeler, Franz Beckenbauer, Lothar Matthäus and Bettina Wiegmann.

Walter died in Enkenbach-Alsenborn on 17 June 2002, aged 81.[8] It was his dream to see the World Cup 2006 in "his" town Kaiserslautern as the town had not been selected in the smaller tournament of 1974, but it was denied with his death. But on the fourth year anniversary of his death on 17 June 2006, the United States played Italy in Kaiserslautern and a minute of silence was observed in his memory. Today people may visit the "Fritz Walter Haus" in the town of Enkenbach-Alsenborn approx. 20 km east of Kaiserslautern (first exit from Kaiserslautern on Bundesautobahn 6 direction Mannheim).[9]

In November 2003, to celebrate UEFA's 50th anniversary, the German Football Association selected him as its Golden Player of the past 50 years (from 1954 to 2003).

During the eighties and nineties, there was another successful Bundesliga striker called "Fritz Walter", who mainly played for VfB Stuttgart. Although he had no relationship to the great Kaiserslautern captain, sports fans jokingly called him "Fritz Walter junior".

Career statistics

Club Season League
DivisionAppsGoals
1. FC Kaiserslautern 1939–40 Gauliga Südwest/Mainhessen 1530
1940–41 1216
1941–42 1439
1942–43 31
1945–46 Oberliga Südwest 1416
1946–47 1422
1947–47 2431
1948–49 2230
1949–50 2634
1950–51 195
1951–52 2719
1952–53 3038
1953–54 2920
1954–55 2110
1955–56 2516
1956–57 2115
1957–58 265
1958–59 2210
Total 364357

Source:[10]

Honours

Club

1. FC Kaiserslautern
German football championship: 1950–51, 1952–53[11]

Country

Germany
FIFA World Cup: 1954[11]

Individual

Personal life

Walter's wife of five decades was Italia Walter, a woman from Italy.

It was popular knowledge in Germany that Walter appeared to play better the worse the weather was, and so now the term "Fritz Walter's weather" is used to describe rainy weather conditions, often rendered with odd local dialect grammar "of Fritz, his weather". This is because he, as many other soldiers, had contracted malaria during the war, thus rendering him unable to stand the heat of the sun. The 1954 World Cup final was played in "Fritz Walter's weather" conditions.

On 6 October 1956 Walter scored a spectacular goal in Leipzig in front of 100,000 East Germans during a friendly against Wismut Aue, when he hit the ball back-heel while diving forward.

References

  1. ↑ "Tributes for the 'Hero of Berne'". UEFA. 18 June 2002. Retrieved 5 July 2010.
  2. 1 2 3 "Fritz WALTER – Germany's post-war hero". FIFA Classic Player. FIFA. Retrieved 5 July 2010.
  3. 1 2 "FIFA World Cup Star 1954: Fritz Walter". ContiSoccerWorld. Continental. Retrieved 5 July 2010.
  4. ↑ "Fritz Walter – A Footballing Grandmaster : "I was there in 1942. I have seen you play against us. Hungary lost 3-5"". http://www.goaldentimes.org. Retrieved 2 February 2015. External link in |website= (help)
  5. ↑ Arnhold, Matthias (14 January 2016). "Fritz Walter – Matches and Goals in Oberliga". Rec.Sport.Soccer Statistics Foundation. Retrieved 21 January 2016.
  6. ↑ Stokkermans, Karel (14 January 2016). "Fritz Walter – Goals in International Matches". Rec.Sport.Soccer Statistics Foundation. Retrieved 21 January 2016.
  7. ↑ The DFB Fritz Walter: Das Idol vom Betzenberg.
  8. ↑ "World Cup hero Walter dies". BBC Sport. British Broadcasting Corporation. 17 June 2002. Retrieved 5 July 2010.
  9. ↑ Dell'Apa, Frank (20 June 2006). "Immortal, beloved German icon still a presence". The Boston Globe. Retrieved 5 July 2010.
  10. ↑ "Fritz Walter Club-statistics". National Football Teams. Retrieved 28 March 2014.
  11. 1 2 3 4 "Germany's post-war hero". FIFA. Retrieved 16 July 2015.
  12. ↑ "Golden Players take centre stage". UEFA. 29 November 2003. Retrieved 5 July 2010.
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Fritz Walter.
Sporting positions
Preceded by
Paul Janes		 West Germany captain
1951–1956 		Succeeded by
Hans Schäfer
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