VfL Sportfreunde Lotte is a German association football club from Lotte,

North Rhine-Westphalia North Rhine-Westphalia (german: Nordrhein-Westfalen, ; li, Noordrien-Wesfale ; nds, Noordrhien-Westfalen; ksh, Noodrhing-Wäßßfaale), commonly shortened to NRW (), is a state (''Land'') in Western Germany. With more than 18 million inha ...

. The football team is part of a sports club with approximately 1400 members and departments for handball, walking, gymnastics, and swimming, as well as other activities.

History

The association was established as the gymnastics club ''Turnverein Lotte'' in 1929. After World War II the club was re-established as ''VfL Sportfreunde Lotte'' on 9 February 1946 and was built around football and handball departments. Sportfreunde Lotte Performance Chart

''Lotte'' reached the Verbandsliga Westfalen (V) in 1996 and after a title there in 2004 were promoted to the

Oberliga Westfalen The Oberliga Westfalen is the highest level football league in the region of Westphalia, which is part of the state of North Rhine-Westphalia. The league existed from 1978 to 2008, but was then replaced by the NRW-Liga, a new statewide league. Wit ...

(IV), later

Regionalliga West The Regionalliga West is a German semi-professional football division administered by the Western German Football Association based in Duisburg. It is one of the five German regional football associations. Being the single flight of the Western ...

. They won that league in 2012–13 but lost the promotion play-off to

RB Leipzig RasenBallsport Leipzig e.V. (), commonly known as RB Leipzig, and colloquially referred to as Red Bull Leipzig, is a German professional football club based in Leipzig, Saxony. The club was founded in 2009 by the initiative of the company Red Bul ...

. In 2013–14, the club finished in second place. They won the Regionalliga West once more in 2015–16 and, after defeating

Waldhof Mannheim SV Waldhof Mannheim is a multi-sports club, located in Mannheim, Baden-Württemberg. It is most known for its association football team; however, there are also professional handball and table-tennis sides. The club today has a membership of over ...

in the play-off, earned promotion to the

3. Liga The 3. Liga is a professional association football league and the third division in Germany. In the German football league system, it is positioned between the 2. Bundesliga and the fourth-tier Regionalliga. The modern 3. Liga was formed for th ...

for the first time. On 18 May 2019, they were relegated back to the Regionalliga. ''Sportfreunde'' plays their home matches in the Frimo Stadion (formerly the Sportpark am Lotter Kreuz) which holds 10,059 spectators.

Honours

The club's honours: *

** Champions:

2013 File:2013 Events Collage V2.png, From left, clockwise: Edward Snowden becomes internationally famous for leaking classified NSA wiretapping information; Typhoon Haiyan kills over 6,000 in the Philippines and Southeast Asia; The Dhaka garment fa ...

2016 File:2016 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: Bombed-out buildings in Ankara following the 2016 Turkish coup d'état attempt; the Impeachment of Dilma Rousseff, impeachment trial of Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff; Damaged houses duri ...

* Verbandsliga Westfalen ** Champions: 2004 * Landesliga Westfalen ** Champions: 1996 * Bezirksliga Westfalen ** Champions: 1989 *

Westphalia Cup The Westphalia Cup is a German football club Cup competition open to teams from the Westphalia region of the North Rhine-Westphalia state. The competition in its existing format is relatively new compared to many other regional cups in Germany. It ...

** Winners: 2015

Players

Current squad

Out on loan

Notable coaches

* Manfred Wölpper (2008) * Maik Walpurgis (2008–2013)

References

External links

*
Das deutsche Fußball-Archiv
historical German football league tables (in German)

Football clubs in Germany Football clubs in North Rhine-Westphalia Association football clubs established in 1929 1929 establishments in Germany Steinfurt (district) 3. Liga clubs {{Germany-footyclub-stub