In that year, when his ten years older brother Werner ended his football career at the age of 28 and started working for Bayer AG, Hemmi, as his teammates called him, stepped up to the first-team. He made 215 appearances between 1964 and 1972 and scored 16 goals. As a centre half, today comparable with a holding midfielder, he played a big part in the success of the 1960s. Out of the blue, Helmut Röhrig won the Regional League West title with Bayer 04 in 1968. The club was on the verge of making it to the Bundesliga but the Werkself lost out to Kickers Offenbach.
For the 1972/73 season, Hemmi moved on to VfR Heilbronn in the Regional League South. With that club he achieved promotion to Bundesliga 2 South. But Heilbronn were relegated after a season. Hemmi was the team captain and he only played 18 games in that season due to a knee injury that saw him spend half the season in the stands. After another year and missing out on going back up, he moved on to SV Neckargerach at the age of 31 before ending his career a couple years later at SpVgg Frankenbach.
Helmut, who still lives in Heilbronn, went on to coach after his playing career at SV Neckargerach, VfR Heilbronn, SpVgg Frankenbach, SG Bad Wimpfen and Union Böckingen.
Dear Hemmi, I wish you many happy returns on your 80th birthday! Have a good one and stay fit and healthy.
Michal ‘Katsche’ Kadlec was born in the Czech town of Vyskov on 13 December 1984. At the age of six, he moved to the Pfalz region in Germany with his parents because his father Miroslav accepted an offer from FC Kaiserslautern where he played as a sweeper for the Red Devils for eight years. Katsche learned German in the kindergarten at Kaiserslautern. And he played football at an early age: first as a teenager at SV Alsenborn and then for FC Kaiserslautern.
Show moreHelmut Röhrig was born in Leverkusen on 14.12.19 44. He learned to play football at Bayer 04 and became a Middle Rhine champion with the U19s in 1963 finishing ahead of FC Köln. He played in the second team at the Werkself in his first year in senior football.
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Bernd Schuster was born in Augsburg on 22.12.19 59. His first club as a teenager was local side SV Hammerschmiede. From that time there was an anecdote that a former groundsman told us when we had a Pokal game in Augsburg in 1993. Bernd was always the first person on the training ground after school. With a running track around the pitch and goals without nets, the young Bernd practised free kicks and corners in the knowledge that he had to collect the ball himself. In that way he not only practised his technique but also worked on his stamina as a teenager.
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Wolfgang ‘Wolle’ Rolff was born on 26.12.1959 in Lamstedt, a community in the Lower Saxony administrative district of Cuxhaven. He started his football career at TSV Lamstedt. He moved on to OSC Bremerhaven with the U17s as he trained to be a retail salesman. He started in senior football at the Nordsee Stadium in Bremerhaven.
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The 1969/70 season begins with four defeats for Bayer 04. That puts the team coached by Theo Kirchberg bottom of the table. The Werkself only lift themselves out of the relegation zone on Matchday 10 with a 4-2 away win in Marl-Hüls. The position in the table improves over the course of the season.
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