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The fans of FC Schalke 04 had never seen anything like it, which is why they wanted to take a closer look.

The first penalty shoot-out on German soil this Wednesday 50 years ago was something of "stars in the ring".

At first there were dozens of them next to and behind the goal, but as more and more came, the shooters were circled on the field at some point.

“That was irregular!

What are the spectators doing on the pitch?

That made my people completely confused, ”said the coach of the defeated VfL Wolfsburg, Imre Farkasinski, after four missed penalties, quite understandably.

Ingo Eismann, one of the four missed shooters from the point, remembers after 50 years: “No steward held them back.

When approaching there were whistles and calls from close by.

You can put our balance sheet on the external circumstances. "

On that historic day before Christmas Eve 1970, when a child was born to German football that would give him a lot of joy, VfL sniffed the sensation.

The cup game of the second division with the first-class Schalke players was already the replay after a 2-2 draw in Wolfsburg, and nobody expected it to be as exciting again.

But when the score was 1: 1 after 120 minutes, a German invention finally had its premiere.

The Bavarian Football Association was the first to take up the idea

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The referee Karl Wald from the Bavarian town of Penzberg, whose main job is a hairdresser, had long struggled with the existing rule of deciding on knockout games in the event of a tie by tossing a coin.

For example, 1. FC Köln were eliminated from the European Cup against Liverpool in 1965, and Italy made it to the final at the 1968 European Championship.

Wald had already had penalties carried out at local tournaments under his own power, "and the players thought it was great," as he reported at the time.

In May 1970, the Bavarian Football Association first took up his idea, and Uefa and DFB followed suit in the same year.

Which is why the first of the now 242 penalty shoot-outs in the DFB Cup took place on December 23.

It wasn't until 1984 that such a final was decided, and Gladbach's Lothar Matthäus missed his shot against his upcoming club, Bayern.

Five cup winners have so far been determined at the chalk point, including a second division with Hannover 96 (1992).

Two world champions have to live with the stigma of not winning the lottery until after the final whistle: Brazil (1994) and Italy (2006).

Three German clubs owe a European Cup victory to this regulation: Leverkusen (1988) and Schalke (1997) each in the Uefa Cup, Bayern (2001) in the Champions League.

But they were the only ones to lose a final - of all things 2012 "at home" against Chelsea.

The English trauma

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Nevertheless, the Germans in particular benefited from the invention of their compatriot and hardened the cliché of always well-prepared professionals.

The national team won six of eight penalty shootouts, also because their goalkeepers Toni Schumacher and Jens Lehmann knew beforehand where the opponents were shooting.

In theory, anyway.

The German clubs won the European Cup in 24 of 35 cases.

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“A penalty, a German, a formality,” wrote an English newspaper once when Michael Ballack shot Chelsea FC one round further.

The desire to create more justice than a coin toss had a side effect: the tingling aftermath gave birth to heroes and failures, created myths.

One is that of the English trauma: The British have said goodbye to major tournaments six times because of their weakness at the penalty spot.

And Uli Hoeneß, despite all his successes with Bavaria and Germany, was always associated with his missed shot in 1976 in the “Belgrade night sky”, because it cost the European title.

"Now I don't have to worry about 100 years with accusations?" He asked himself the morning after.

He has to deal with that with himself, it is at least a possibility to become immortal.

The losers from Wolfsburg, incidentally, carried it with humor.

At a garden party near Burgdorf, Eismann and the then Schalke goalkeeper Dieter Burdenski only took the penalty from 1970 again in 2018, and as then Burdenski threw himself in the dirt.

Eismann hit the post again using a tree.