Two legendary clubs, one friendship!
Once upon a time three was a girl called Monika. She was a big fan of the Club, and would travel far and wide to support 1. FCN at all its away games. Thus began the story of Schalke 04 and the Club.
One day, late on a Saturday afternoon, she was on the way home from a game, travelling back to Nürnberg from Mönchengladbach. Clad in her beautiful back and red scarf she strode through the train to stretch her legs a little.
Suddenly she saw a man standing at the back wearing a Schalke 04 jersey. She got a huge shock – hadn’t she been warned about the terrible fans in Gelsenkirchen? But the young man said hello to her, and they began a conversation.
She was joined soon afterwards by Stefan, another Nürnberg fan. The three of them ended up chatting for a long, long time, until the train pulled in at the station in Nuremberg. The Schalke fan said his goodbyes and carried on home to Regensburg.
Monika and Stefan told their Club friends Joachim, Thomas and all the others how nice and friendly the Schalke fan was, nothing like what people had always expected of Schalke fans. She decided to meet up with him again...
And we all know what happened next!
This fairytale-like story dates back from the year 1980. The three actors in were members of the “Gelsen-Szene” and the “Red Devils”, and their names haven’t changed!
At 1. FCN’s away game against FC Schalke 04 in the 1980/81 season, the friendship between the two clubs wasn’t yet fully solidified. After the game, some Schalke fans wanted ’payback.’ The “Gelsen-Szene” boys offered our fans their help as well, and it led to the first great celebration involving the two sets of fans in the ‘city quarter.’ There then followed the first invitations to tournaments where both sets of fans travelled together. It marked the beginning of a genuine and unique friendship between fans of two European clubs.
Over the years countless other individual associations between FC Schalke 04 and 1. FC Nürnberg have been established. And in every 1. FCN fan club, this kinship with Schalke is experienced in a new and different way.
These many different experiences are surely the reason for the countless stories of how Schalke and 1. FC Nürnberg’s affiliation began.
We hope that these two traditional clubs can enjoy even more success in the future and continue to celebrate side by side.
Heino Hassler
