Friedrich "Fritz" Herkenrath (9 September 1928 in

Cologne Cologne ( ; german: Köln ; ksh, Kölle ) is the largest city of the German western state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and the fourth-most populous city of Germany with 1.1 million inhabitants in the city proper and 3.6 millio ...

– 18 April 2016) was a football

goalkeeper In many team sports which involve scoring goals, the goalkeeper (sometimes termed goaltender, netminder, GK, goalie or keeper) is a designated player charged with directly preventing the opposing team from scoring by blocking or intercepting o ...

for

West Germany West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 O ...

at the 1958 FIFA World Cup. He earned 21

caps Caps are flat headgear. Caps or CAPS may also refer to: Science and technology Computing * CESG Assisted Products Service, provided by the U.K. Government Communications Headquarters * Composite Application Platform Suite, by Java Caps, a Ja ...

between 1954 and 1958. He took his club team

Rot-Weiss Essen Rot-Weiss Essen is a German association football club based in Essen, North Rhine-Westphalia. The club currently plays in the 3. Liga, at the Stadion an der Hafenstraße. The team won the DFB-Pokal in 1953, and the German championship in 195 ...

to the peak of its history and won a national championship in 1955. The following season,

became the first German side to qualify for the European Cup. Initially, Herkenrath played handball. He started out as a right winger and only later became a goalkeeper. Soon after

World War II 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 opposing ...

, Herkenrath switched from handball to football. Herkenrath began studying at the

German Sport University Cologne German Sport University Cologne (German: Deutsche Sporthochschule Köln, DSHS, Spoho), is a sport university in Cologne, Germany. History The Sport University Cologne was founded in 1947. After the Sport University had changed its name to "G ...

where he first encountered

Sepp Herberger Josef "Sepp" Herberger (28 March 1897 – 28 April 1977) was a German football player and manager. He is most famous for being the manager of the West German national team that won the 1954 FIFA World Cup final, a match later dubbed '' The Mir ...

, who was a tutor there.Bitter, Jürgen. ''Deutschlands Fußball Nationalspieler'', Sportverlag, 1997, p. 179. Playing for 1. FC Köln in the early 1950s, Herkenrath was mostly the second goalkeeper behind the Dutchman Frans de Munck. He joined Rot-Weiß Essen in 1952 and soon rose to prominence playing for Essen. Herkenrath became known as the "flying schoolmaster" due to his main occupation as a teacher. He retired in 1962 after 336 games in the

Oberliga West Oberliga ( en, Premier league) may refer to: Association football * Oberliga (football), currently the fifth tier of the German football league system, formerly the first * DDR-Oberliga, the first tier of football in East Germany until 1990, re ...

and became a

professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an academic rank at universities and other post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin as a "person who professes". Professors ...

at the college of education in Aachen.Bitter, Jürgen. ''Deutschlands Fußball Nationalspieler'', Sportverlag, 1997, p. 180. He died on April 18, 2016, at the age of 87.Ex-Nationalspieler und RW-Essen-Legende gestorben

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* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Herkenrath, Fritz 1928 births 2016 deaths Men's association football goalkeepers German footballers Germany men's international footballers 1958 FIFA World Cup players 1. FC Köln players Rot-Weiss Essen players Footballers from Cologne People from the Rhine Province FC Viktoria Köln players West German footballers