By Dan Gaichas
On Friday, the DFB Pokal gets underway with 64 teams all hoping to be at Berlin’s Olympiastadion come May 27th. The 64 teams included the 36 teams in the Bundesliga and 2. Bundesliga, the top four teams from 3. Liga from last season, 21 regional cup winners from last season’s Verbandspokal, and three additional teams from regions that supply the most men’s teams that normally go to those regions’ runners-up.
This is the 74th edition of the Pokal and 65th consecutive dating back to the 1952-53 season. Rot-Weiss Essen won that edition of the Cup while Bayern Munich have won the most with 18 including last year’s edition over Borussia Dortmund on penalties. The next biggest winner is Werder Bremen with six.
For the first round, the participating teams will be split into two pots. The first pot contains all teams which have qualified through their regional cup competitions, the best four teams of the 3. Liga and the bottom four teams of the 2. Bundesliga. Every team from this pot will be drawn to a team from the second pot, which contains all remaining professional teams. The teams from the first pot will be set as the home team in the process.
Bayern Munich were draw against FC Carl Zeiss Jena from the fourth-tier Regionalliga Nordost on August 19th. Jena won the Thuringia Cup last season and knocked off Hamburg SV in last year’s Pokal. Borussia Dortmund have a Monday date with Rhineland Cup winner Eintracht Trier of the Regionalliga Südwest.
Below is the full draw of the first round of the DFB Pokal which begins play on Friday. All times Central and tier of the club in parenthesis if not in the top flight:
Friday, August 19th:
VfB Lübeck (IV) vs. FC St. Pauli (II), 1:45pm
FV Ravensburg (V) vs. FC Augsburg, 1:45pm
FC Carl Zeiss Jena (IV) vs. Bayern Munich, 1:45pm
Saturday, August 20th:
SV Drochtersen/Assel (IV) vs. Borussia Mönchengladbach, 8:30am
Würzburger Kickers (II) vs. Eintracht Braunschweig (II), 8:30am
SV Babelsburg (IV) vs. SC Freiburg, 8:30am
Viktoria Köln (IV) vs. 1. FC Nürnberg (II), 8:30am
Rot-Weiss Essen (IV) vs. Arminia Bielefeld (II), 8:30am
FC 08 Villingen (VI) vs. Schalke 04, 8:30am
Dynamo Dresden (II) vs. RB Leipzig, 8:30am
BFC Preussen (VI) vs. 1. FC Köln, 8:30am
Hallescher FC (III) vs. 1. FC Kaiserslautern (II), 8:30am
1860 Munich (II) vs. Karlsruher SC (II), 11:30am
FC 08 Homburg (IV) vs. VfB Stuttgart (II), 11:30am
FSV Frankfurt (III) vs. VfL Wolfsburg, 1:45pm
Sunday, August 21st:
Sportfreunde Lotte (III) vs. Werder Bremen, 8:30am
MSV Duisburg (III) vs. Union Berlin (II), 8:30am
Eintracht Norderstedt (IV) vs. Greuther Fürth (II), 8:30am
Astoria Walldorf (IV) vs. VfL Bochum (II), 8:30am
1. FC Magdeburg (III) vs. Eintracht Frankfurt, 8:30am
SpVgg Unterhaching (IV) vs. Mainz 05, 8:30am
Germania Egestorf/Langreder (IV) vs. 1899 Hoffenheim, 8:30am
SC Hauenstein (V) vs. Bayer Leverkusen, 8:30am
Bremer SV (V) vs. Darmstadt 98, 8:30am
SG Wattenscheid (IV) vs. 1. FC Heidenheim (II), 11:30am
Jahn Regensburg (III) vs. Hertha BSC Berlin, 11:30am
Erzgebirge Aue (II) vs. FC Ingolstadt, 11:30am
Monday, August 22nd:
Kickers Offenbach (IV) vs. Hannover 96 (II), 11:30am
FSV Zwickau (III) vs. Hamburger SV, 11:30am
SC Paderborn (III) vs. SV Sandhausen (II), 11:30am
Eintracht Tier (IV) vs. Borussia Dortmund, 1:45pm
