Eike Immel

Eike Immel (born 27 November 1960 in Stadtallendorf) is a former German football goalkeeper and manager.

A leading youth international goalkeeper for West Germany in 1978, Eike Immel was still seventeen years of age when he succeeded Horst Bertram as Borussia Dortmund's first-choice. He remained Dortmund's top choice until his two million Deutsche Mark transfer to VfB Stuttgart in 1986, the biggest fee ever paid for a goalkeeper in the history German football at that time. He served nine years as Stuttgart's regular goalkeeper, winning the Bundesliga title in 1992 and the UEFA Cup runner-up medal in 1989 with them. Afterwards he left for Manchester City, where he retired at the end of the 1995–96 season. He played 534 matches in the German top flight.

His West Germany career lasted for just eight years due to his decision to retire from the West German team following EURO'88. Immel had been the starting goalkeeper since Harald Schumacher's ban from the team in 1987, and his 19th appearance in the semi-final of the 1988 UEFA European Football Championship at Volksparkstadion, Hamburg, remained his final cap for his country and made him miss out on the title winning 1990 FIFA World Cup squad for which Bodo Illgner then served as starting goalkeeper. The mentioned 1988 UEFA European Football Championship was Immel's fifth participation in a big international tournament. The son of a farmer later admitted his decision to retire from the international game at barely 28 just because of the competition from Bodo Illgner for the goalkeeper's jersey, was extremely hasty. He was however part of the squad that won the 1980 UEFA European Championships.

Eike

Eike is a village in Karmøy municipality in Rogaland county, Norway. The village is located along the western shore of the Førresfjorden, just southeast of the town of Haugesund. The village of Eike, lies just south of the border with the neighboring municipality of Tysvær. Eike is considered part of the larger urban area of Førre, which is centered over the border in Tysvær. The village of Norheim lies about 4 kilometres (2.5 mi) to the west and the village of Vormedal lies about 6 kilometres (3.7 mi) to the southwest.

References

West Germany

West Germany is the common English name for the Federal Republic of Germany or FRG (German: Bundesrepublik Deutschland or BRD) in the period between its creation on 23 May 1949 to German reunification on 3 October 1990. This period is referred to as the Bonn Republic (German: Bonner Republik) by academic historians, an earlier term being the Bonn State (German: Bonner Staat).

During this period NATO-aligned West Germany and Warsaw Pact-aligned East Germany were divided by the Inner German border. After 1961, West Berlin was physically separated from East Berlin as well as from East Germany by the Berlin Wall. This situation ended when East Germany was dissolved and its five states joined the ten states of the Federal Republic of Germany along with the reunified city-state of Berlin. With the reunification of West and East Germany, the Federal Republic of Germany, enlarged now to sixteen states, became known simply as "Germany".

The Federal Republic of Germany was established from eleven states formed in the three Allied Zones of occupation held by the United States, the United Kingdom and France (the "Western Zones"). Its population grew from roughly 51 million in 1950 to more than 63 million in 1990. The city of Bonn was its de facto capital city (Berlin was symbolically named the de jure capital city in the West German Basic Law). The fourth Allied occupation zone (the East Zone, or Ostzone) was held by the Soviet Union. The parts of this zone lying east of the Oder-Neisse were in fact annexed by the Soviet Union and communist Poland; the remaining central part around Berlin became the communist German Democratic Republic (abbreviated GDR; in German Deutsche Demokratische Republik or DDR) with its de facto capital in East Berlin. As a result, West Germany had a territory about half the size of the interbellum democratic Weimar Republic.

Marco van Basten

Marcel "Marco" van Basten (Dutch pronunciation: [ˈmɑrkoː vɑn ˈbɑstə(n)]; born 31 October 1964) is a Dutch football manager and former football player, who played for Ajax and Milan, as well as the Netherlands national team, in the 1980s and early 1990s as a forward. He is regarded as one of the greatest players of all time and has scored 300 goals in a high-profile career, but played his last game in 1993 at the age of 28 due to an injury that forced his retirement two years later. He was later the head coach of Ajax and the Netherlands national team.

Playing for the Netherlands, Van Basten won, and was named player of the tournament, at UEFA Euro 1988, scoring five goals that included a memorable volley in the final against the Soviet Union. At the club level, he won three Eredivisie titles and the Cup Winners' Cup with Ajax, and three Serie A titles and two European Cups with Milan.

Known for his close ball control, attacking intelligence and spectacular strikes and volleys, Van Basten was named FIFA World Player of the Year in 1992 and won the Ballon d'Or three times, in 1988, 1989 and 1992. In 1999, he was ranked sixth in the FIFA Player of the Century internet poll, tenth in the European player of the Century election held by the IFFHS and 12th in the IFFHS' World Player of the Century election. He was also voted eighth in a poll organised by the French magazine France Football, consulting their former Ballon d'Or winners to elect the Football Player of the Century. In 2004, he was named by Pelé in the FIFA 100 list of the world's greatest living players. In 2004, a poll for the 100 greatest Dutch people was held in the Netherlands: Van Basten ranked number 25, the second highest for a football player, behind Johan Cruyff. In 2007, Sky Sports ranked Van Basten first on its list of great athletes who had their careers cut short.

World Cup

World Cup commonly refers to:

World Cup can also refer to:

Athletics

Badminton

Bandy

Baseball and softball

Basketball

Chess

Cricket

Equestrian

Football

American football

Association football