Unique and historic award for First Vienna Football Club
Sheffield FC, the first and oldest football club in the world, appoints Vienna as member of the Club of Pioneers, a worldwide unique network of the oldest football clubs in each country.
The club house of the First Vienna Football Club 1894 is adorned with a very special certificate. It is the membership in the "Club of Pioneers". This special honour was given to Vienna, Austria's first and oldest football club, in its 125th year of existence. The Pioneer‘s Club is a worldwide network of the oldest existing football clubs in each country.
The initiative for this network came in 2013 from Sheffield FC, the first and oldest football club in the world. The club was founded on 24 October 1857. This date is the birth of football. And Sheffield is the home, the birthplace of football and consequently the mother of all football clubs.
The certificate says "Based on today's historical knowledge, Sheffield FC, the world's first football club, recognizes First Vienna FC 1894 as the oldest existing football club in the country." It is also stated that Vienna is "the banner of football “ in the spirit of the founding fathers. The founders and pioneers of Sheffield FC were Nathaniel Creswick, a lawyer, and William Perst, a wine merchant.
Several football rules were established in Sheffield, including the first corner kick, the first free kick and the crossbar. In 1860 the first football game also took place in Sheffield, and the club now plays in England's seventh division. Incidentally, in 1872 England played the first international game in history, against Scotland. That is why England is considered the motherland of modern football.
The historic award, a kind of order of merit, praises Vienna's special contribution to football. It also highlights that Vienna has hosted and promoted football and its values ??in all its facets for more than a century. In professional football, but also in grassroots football with the amateurs, the heart of football, the real soul of the game.
The motto of the Club of Pioneers is "Integrity - Respect - Community". The network wants to celebrate the actual, originally amateur values ??of football. The Pioneers' Club, which unites all of the country's oldest football clubs under one roof, was created to preserve the history of football in the present and future - a legacy that has been defended for over 163 years.
In the meantime, the Pioneers’ Club has 25 members from all over the world, from India, Chile, Japan and South Africa to Europe. Among them are FC Genoa, Italy's oldest football club, St. Gallen, founded in Switzerland in 1879, Royal Antwerp from Belgium as well as amateur clubs such as Berlin FC Germania 1888. Every club, whether professional or amateur, has its history.
"Vienna is a very special club," says Richard Tims. Tims is the founder of the "Club of Pioneers" and also chairman of Sheffield FC. He knows what he is talking about. The Club of Pioneers first contacted the Viennese club a year and a half ago. Last December Tims travelled to Vienna-Döbling to pay tribute to Austria's oldest football club on the occasion of its 125th birthday. A lunch at the Pastor's Inn, the pub where First Vienna was founded, was followed by a tour to the former Rothschild facility, the private gardens of club patron Nathaniel Mayer Anselm Freiherr von Rothschild and a visit to the Hohe Warte stadium, the club's home ground. Tims' conclusion: “You can live here. You can play soccer here. I'll be back."
