The 1903 German football championship was the first tournament sanctioned by the

German Football Association The German Football Association (german: Deutscher Fußball-Bund ; DFB ) is the governing body of football in Germany. A founding member of both FIFA and UEFA, the DFB has jurisdiction for the German football league system and is in charge of t ...

(DFB) to crown a national champion. At the time, the newly founded DFB only had about 150 member clubs in 30 mostly local associations. Every champion of these associations was eligible for play in the championship. Additionally, associations from outside Germany were allowed to take part, such as the Prague association that sent her champion to Germany. Although thirty teams would have been eligible, only six eventually entered the competition. VfB Leipzig became the first club to be awarded the '' Viktoria'', the trophy for the German champions from 1903 to 1944. The trophy later disappeared during the final stages of the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, did not resurface until after the

German reunification German reunification (german: link=no, Deutsche Wiedervereinigung) was the process of re-establishing Germany as a united and fully sovereign state, which took place between 2 May 1989 and 15 March 1991. The day of 3 October 1990 when the Ge ...

and was put on display at the DFB headquarters in

Frankfurt Frankfurt, officially Frankfurt am Main (; Hessian: , "Frank ford on the Main"), is the most populous city in the German state of Hesse. Its 791,000 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located on its na ...

until 2015, when it was moved to the new ''

Deutsches Fußballmuseum The German Football Museum (german: Deutsches Fußballmuseum) aka DFB-Museum is the national museum for German football Football (or "soccer") is the most popular sport in Germany. The German Football Association (german: Deutscher Fußb ...

'' in

Dortmund Dortmund (; Westphalian nds, Düörpm ; la, Tremonia) is the third-largest city in North Rhine-Westphalia after Cologne and Düsseldorf, and the eighth-largest city of Germany, with a population of 588,250 inhabitants as of 2021. It is the la ...

Qualified teams

The qualified teams:

Competition

Quarter-finals

The German Football Association had scheduled the match to be played in Munich, but Prag lodged an official complaint as they would receive greater revenue if the match was played in Prague, while Karlsruhe protested against travelling Prague. Due to time constraints, the match was scratched and both teams entered the semifinals.

Semi-finals

The match had been scheduled to be held in Leipzig, but Karlsruhe received a telegram, supposedly sent by the German Football Association, informing them that the match had been postponed. The team never went to Leipzig, and was subsequently disqualified.

Final

References

{{1902–03 in European football (UEFA) German football championship seasons 1

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ger ...