An interesting review of a ’90s German fanzine…

fcumad:

Random Fanzine Review (Fantreff):

Returning home from Christmas, I was delighted to see a pile of post that didn’t just include the odd late card and the special offers listings from the local supermarket. No instead, due to friends in foreign climes and a bit too much time on ebay, there were a whole stack of fanzines to leaf through too!

First up was a German hooligan fanzine called “Fantreff” (translates as fan meeting, although I suspect they don’t mean a quiet pint in the pub together!). The issue I got was from 1993 and it really does show. There is a report on Kaiserslautern flirting with a fan-friendship with Sheffield Wednesday after they met in Europe(!), there are pictures of police wearing blazers, there are grounds that still have running tracks and there is some hilarious early 90s fan fashion. One contributor even goes under the Pseudonym of “Chevignon Fighter”. Brilliant! I bet he wore a leather jacket with a big Chevignon logo on the back to every match!

It doesn’t come as a surprise that some of the hooligans seem to be right-wing. More astonishing is a report by some Bielefeld hools (whopper alert! Claims of beer drinking prowess! Photos of them all with their tops off in the middle of winter!) where they casually point out that they don’t just attack rival fans, but immigrants too. At least today’s equivalent have to hide their racism behind claims of being “apolitical”. Other telltale signs are the adverts for clothing, the fanzine’s own range perhaps, that offer tshirts and jumpers featuring different team’s names, but invariably a bulldog or the classic dog with human muscles. “My other fanzine is Proust!”

Amusingly other aspects don’t appear to differ that greatly from todays football fanculture, where Ultras dominate. The fanzine decrys hooligans’ misrepresentation in the media, police brutality, studies different groups rather than being completely partisan, all trends that can be seen nowadays in publications such as Blickfang Ultra (although the complaints seem easier to justify with ultras, where at least the main raison d’etre isn’t hitting rival fans). Even the tracksuit bottoms with large print down the side of one leg, featured throughout the mag, would no doubt still hold appeal to your average Ultras.ws forum member!

Finally, in those days before internet, the “scene” is held together with a classified ads section. However rather than just offering a medium to swap stories or perhaps memorabilia, there are little greetings! Most of the greetings, list the various groups and teams that the person likes, but quite often there will also be a “No greetings to team X…” at the end, to convey hatred for one side. Cutting.

Anyway, a fanzine, seemingly run out of a bedroom by a one-man team and a smattering of hooligan contributors (some of whom are happy to provide their full addresses!), that in the long-run would no doubt start to grate due to the occasionally depressing politics, and let’s face it pointless fighting and bragging. As a one-off, it nevertheless offers, a little peek at what life was like at football in Germany during a, now startlingly aged, era.