At the age of 16 he then joined the Kickers, trained with the first team as a youth player and he also worked in the offices at the Offenbach club as part of his apprenticeship. In November 1977, at the age of 17, he made his first-team debut. But he had to wait a while for his first goal. On matchday three in the 1978/79 season in the Bundesliga 2 South he opened the scoring for Offenbach on 20 minutes in their 3-2 defeat against Wormatia Worms.
After two and a half years at Kickers Offenbach, Rudi signed for 1860 Munich in the Bundesliga for the 1980/81 season. But his nine goals were unable to prevent the Lions from Munich being relegated. The following season Rudi really took off in Bundesliga 2. He was the top scorer with 37 goals. 1860 were unable to get promoted even with the goals from Völler. But he then made the next step in his career: Werder Bremen signed the pacy striker for the 1982/83 season.
In the next five years, Rudi scored 97 goals in 137 Bundesliga games for the North German side and in 1982 he made his first of 90 international appearances for Germany, was a runner-up at the 1986 World Cup and in 1987 he moved to Italy to play for AS Roma.
In 1990 he celebrated his biggest success in the Italian capital with Germany in winning the World Cup. A year later he secured his first club title – he won the Italian domestic cup competition with AS Roma in 1991. The same year saw them reach the UEFA Cup final where they lost to Inter Milan (0-2, 1-0).
After five successful years where Rudi Völler became a crowd favourite for the Rome side he moved on to France to play for Olympique Marseille. With the French club, he was the first German player to win the first UEFA Champions League, previously the European Cup, with a 1-0 victory against AC Milan.
The Bayer 04 boss Reiner Calmund succeeded in bringing Rudi to Leverkusen in 1994. In two years at Bayer 04 he played 62 Bundesliga games and scored 26 goals and he ended his great playing career on 21 May 1996 with a testimonial in front of a full house at the Ulrich Haberland Stadium.
Reiner Calmund took him under his wings from 1996: Rudi was the Bayer 04 sporting director for the next four years. In the autumn of 2000 he was the caretaker coach for Germany. Originally he was to be in charge until the contract of the then Bayer 04 coach Christoph Daum ran out in the summer of 2001. But that all changed with the affair involving the Werkself coach.
Rudi was the Germany coach for the next four years and in 2002 he led the team to finish runners-up at the World Cup in Japan and South Korea. Two years later he resigned after a disappointing Euros in Portugal where Germany went out at the group stage. After a brief period as a coach at AS Roma he signed a contract as sporting director at Bayer 04 in the summer of 2004 and he stayed with the club to the summer of 2022. During his long time under the Bayer Cross, Rudi Völler was the face of Bayer 04. On the last matchday in the 2021/22 season he received a farewell from the Bayer 04 fans with a big choreography.
Today Rudi is director of the Germany team.
Zoltan Sebescen was born on 1 October 1975 in Ehingen and he started playing football as a child. His talent stood out early on and he was accepted into the youth section at Stuttgarter Kickers in 1982. There he progressed through all the youth teams and continued to develop. His breakthrough in the men's game came in the mid-1990s, when he moved up to the Kickers first team squad. With his speed, dynamism and attacking drive, he soon made a name for himself beyond the region. He and his team were promoted from the Regional League South to Bundesliga 2 in 1996 and stayed in the league with Stuttgart for three years.
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Jens Nowotny was born on 11 January 1974 in Malsch, Baden-Württemberg. As a youngster, he played for SV Spielberg and Germania Friedrichstal and later joined the youth section at Karlsruher SC. As a 15-year-old, he became an integral part of the DFB national youth set-up and played for all of the Germany junior teams. One highlight was an U15 international against England at Wembley.
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It is Tuesday, 20 October 2015 - a Champions League night at the BayArena. The visitors: AS Roma. What awaits the spectators is a memorable football match full of drama, speed and emotion. The Werkself get off to a flying start and literally overrun the slightly favoured Italians in the early stages. The scoreline was 2-0 after just twenty minutes - both goals were scored by Mexico international Chicharito. Bayer 04 put the visitors under constant pressure with their aggressive pressing and bold attacking play and even had a chance to make it 3-0. Then the AS Roma captain Daniele De Rossi brought his team back into the game with a brace making it 2-2 at half-time.
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In the video you can see impressive and important goals in Bayer 04 history from the month of October. It's not always about the beauty of the goals, but also a reminder of special games and players.
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On 23 October 1960, a highly anticipated local derby took place in the DFB Pokal, which the team had to qualify for via the regional association cup competitions at the time: SV Schlebusch hosted the Werkself from Bayer 04 Leverkusen. Around 2,000 spectators flocked to the "Am Bühl" stadium to watch the game kicking off at 3 pm.
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