Sports magnets from Grabfeld to Würzburg
At first glance, Bad Königshofen and Würzburg do not have much in common. On the one hand, there is the tranquil spa town in the Grabfeld area with its population of only about 6,000. On the other hand, Main Franconia’s major city with countless administrative offices, churches and shops. And yet Bad Königshofen and Würzburg do have something in common: Both cities are home to a sporting first division team that is considered a crowd puller and is increasingly knocking on the door to the play-off ranks. Only the size of the ball differs considerably.
While a table tennis ball weighing just 2.7 g flies over the tables at the highest level in Grabfeld, a basketball weighing around 650 g is regularly dunked in the basket in Würzburg. In both cases, the teams thrill the crowds. Around 600 spectators on average make the pilgrimage to the Shakehands Arena for TSV Bad Königshofen’s home table tennis matches, which corresponds to a considerable ten per cent of the local population. Only record champion Borussia Düsseldorf had a higher attendance average in recent years.
The Würzburg Baskets cannot compete with the best clubs in their class with this value. But that is mainly due to their small hall, which “only” holds 3,140 fans. The tectake Arena is almost always nearly full at the home basketball games though – and as loud as hell.
Good vibes, good position? Not quite. Both Main Franconian clubs have rather small budgets compared to the rest of the league and have to stretch them quite a bit every year to put together a solid squad. After all, the sporting aspirations are pretty ambitious. All the more reason to value the fact that the table tennis and basketball players regularly excel, thus boosting the region’s image and creating a buzz at grassroots level.
Main Franconia definitely has something to be proud of when it comes to other sports too. It is well known that football is the most popular sport in Germany. The figureheads here are the regional league teams Würzburger Kickers, FC 05 Schweinfurt and TSV Aubstadt. Incidentally, the latter is at home in the Grabfeld area, just like TSV Bad Königshofen. Aubstadt actually has less than 1,000 inhabitants. In the hilly landscape not far from the Rhön, they obviously excel at sport. In 2019, the Aubstadt team made the leap to the fourth highest division for the first time.
Würzburg Kickers have played twice in the Second Bundesliga in recent years – and caused a sensation there under coach Bernd Hollerbach. In any case, the preliminary round of the 2016/17 season was memorable, with the red team finishing sixth in front of 12,475 spectators at the Stadion am Dallenberg with a 3:0 home win over the great VfB Stuttgart. Nevertheless, after a second half of the season without a win, the team was relegated. At the end of the season, the Kickers lost 1:4 to the same Stuttgart team, who managed to return to the Bundesliga as a result. Never before had a Lower Franconian sports team played in front of the backdrop of the Mercedes-Benz Arena at that time (around 60,000 spectators).
Meanwhile, the Covid-19 pandemic and a sporting slump led to a drop in fans for the Rimpar second-division handball team, which renamed itself Wölfe Würzburg in August 2022. Sadly, this change of name turned out not to be a good omen. In June 2023, the Wolves suffered bitter relegation after exactly ten years at this level. The Green-Whites even came knocking on the Bundesliga’s door twice during this period. In the 2016/17 season, they only failed to achieve the sensation on the very last match day when they came up short on goals in Lübeck. Otherwise, the club from the market town north of Würzburg would have moved on to face THW Kiel, SC Magdeburg and Rhein-Neckar Löwen.
But despite all the joy about the sporting highs of Main Franconia’s top clubs, other local heroes are always needed. In other words, players who have their roots in the region. At TSV Bad Königshofen, that is Kilian Ort. He has been playing table tennis there ever since he was old enough to pick up a paddle – and has always remained loyal to his club over the years. In January 2023, Ort beat former world number one Timo Boll for the first time in his life.
Among the Würzburg Baskets, the local hero is Felix Hoffmann. In the “Main-Post” local newspaper, the long-time captain talked about the support from the fans and the people around the team after a victory in the spring of 2023 that nobody believed to be possible: “We have a very special situation in Würzburg that does not exist at every location. Every player, the coaches, the people in the office. That’s what often gives us an extra push.” One that Dirk Nowitzki might also remember fondly. The former German basketball star began his impressive career here and was even inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in August 2023.
In Rimpar, an entire generation of players from the town even made the leap from the Landesliga (state league) to the second Bundesliga within a few years. Such local colour is an absolute rarity in professional sport. And over the years, more and more players from the outside have joined the Wolves.
Besides the team sports, the individual sports and their champions are also more than worth a mention. Würzburg swimmer Leonie Beck, for example, has won gold, silver or bronze over 5 and 10 kilometres in open water several times in recent years. After her biggest triumph to date, gold in the 10 km at the 2022 European Championships in Rome, she won both distances in Fukoka, Japan, in 2023 and was suddenly double world champion. This also qualifies her for the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris. Foil fencer Leonie Ebert has also recently achieved great success on the planche. In rowing, too, the two Würzburg clubs repeatedly produce German champions and also celebrate international successes. The list goes on in other sports.
But in Main Franconia, of course, there’s more than just elite sports. Popular sport has just as big a following. After the slump in club memberships due to Covid-19, a reversal in this trend could be seen again in 2022. At that time, almost half a million people across Lower Franconia were members of one of the 1,627 clubs, according to the official figures from the Bayerische Landes-Sportverband (BLSV). Würzburg hosts two annual running events, the Residenzlauf around the UNESCO World Heritage Site and the city marathon, which impressively combine popular and elite sports. And the many open-air competitions outside the cities, for example in the Rhön-Grabfeld district, are also very popular.
Motive 1: The tectake Arena is almost always nearly full at the Würzburg Baskets home games – and as loud as hell, and in fact true hell for the Baskets’ opponents. Photo: Victor Meshko
