The 1943 German football championship, the 36th edition of the competition, was won by Dresdner SC, the club's first-ever championship, won by defeating FV Saarbrücken in the final.(West) Germany -List of champions rsssf.org, accessed: 26 December 2015Dresdner SC » Steckbrief Weltfussball.de – Dresdner SC honours, accessed: 26 December 2015
The twenty-nine 1942–43 Gauliga champions, four more than in the previous season,kicker Allmanach 1990, page: 243-245 competed in a single-leg knock out competition to determine the national champion.German championship 1943 rsssf.org, accessed: 26 December 2015 In the following season, the last completed one during the war, the German championship was played with thirty one clubs, expanded through a combination of territorial expansion of Nazi Germany and the sub-dividing of the Gauligas in later years.
The 1943 championship marked the end of the golden era of Schalke 04 which had reached the semi-finals of each edition of the national championship from 1932 to 1942 and won the competition in 1934, 1935, 1937, 1939, 1940 and 1942 while losing the final in 1933, 1938 and 1941. In 1943 defending champions Schalke was knocked out in the quarter-finals by Holstein Kiel, thereby ending the clubs quest for a twelfth consecutive semi-finals appearance.FC Schalke 04 » Steckbrief Weltfussball.de – FC Schalke 04 honours, accessed: 26 December 2015
Ernst Kalwitzki of FC Schalke 04 and Herbert Binkert of 1. FC Saarbrücken were the joint top scorers for the 1943 championship with five goals each, the lowest for any top scorer since 1925. For Kalwitzki it was the third and last time, after 1937 and 1939, to finish as top scorer.
Dresdner SC became the last club to be awarded the Viktoria, the annual trophy for the German champions from 1903 to 1944. The trophy disappeared during the final stages of the war, did not resurface until after the German reunification and was put on display at the DFB headquarters in Frankfurt until 2015, when it was moved to the new Deutsches Fußballmuseum in Dortmund.POKALE AUF REISEN: VIKTORIA UND CO. WANDERN INS FUSSBALLMUSEUM DFB website, accessed: 27 December 2015
Dresdner SC completed the 1942–43 season unbeaten, finishing the Gauliga Sachsen with 18 wins out of 18 games, and winning all five games in the championship to claim the title.Das Deutsche Fussball-Archiv Historic German league tables, accessed: 29 December 2015
Qualified teams The teams qualified through the 1942–43 Gauliga season: Club Qualified from VfR Mannheim Gauliga Baden Berliner SV 92 Gauliga Berlin-Brandenburg SV Neufahrwasser Gauliga Danzig-Westpreußen FC Mühlhausen 93 Gauliga Elsaß SG Warschau Gauliga Generalgouvernement Victoria Hamburg Gauliga HamburgKickers Offenbach Gauliga Hessen-Nassau SV Victoria Köln Gauliga Köln-Aachen SV 06 Kassel Gauliga Kurhessen TSG Rostock Gauliga Mecklenburg SV Dessau 05 Gauliga Mitte TuS Neuendorf Gauliga MosellandWestende Hamborn Gauliga Niederrhein LSV Reinicke Brieg Gauliga Niederschlesien 1. FC Nürnberg Gauliga Nordbayern Germania Königshütte Gauliga Oberschlesien First Vienna Gauliga Ostmark VfB Königsberg Gauliga Ostpreußen LSV Pütnitz Gauliga Pommern Dresdner SC Gauliga SachsenHolstein Kiel Gauliga Schleswig-HolsteinTSV 1860 München Gauliga Südbayern MSV Brünn Gauliga Sudetenland Eintracht Braunschweig Gauliga Südhannover-Braunschweig SDW Posen Gauliga Wartheland SpVgg Wilhelmshaven Gauliga Weser-EmsSchalke 04 Gauliga WestfalenFV Saarbrücken Gauliga WestmarkVfB Stuttgart Gauliga Württemberg Gauliga champions LSV Adler Deblin were replaced by SG Warschau. Stuttgarter Kickers and VfB Stuttgart finished on equal points and the same goal average and were therefore declared joint champions but only VfB advanced to the German championship.
Competition
Qualifying round
First round Holstein Kiel, SpVgg Wilhelmshaven, Kickers Offenbach and Westende Hamborn received a bye for the first round.
|align="center" style="background:#ddffdd" colspan=3|2 May 1943German championship 1943 – First round Weltfussball.de, accessed: 26 December 2015
Replay
|align="center" style="background:#ddffdd" colspan=3|9 May 1943
Round of 16
|align="center" style="background:#ddffdd" colspan=3|16 May 1943German championship 1943 – Round of sixteen Weltfussball.de, accessed: 26 December 2015
VfB Königsberg was disqualified and replaced by SV Neufahrwasser in the quarter-finals.
Quarter-finals
Semi-finals
Third place play-off
Final
DRESDNER SC 1898: GK Willibald Kreß DF Herbert Pechan DF Heinz Hempel MF Herbert Pohl MF Walter Dzur MF Helmut Schubert FW Heiner Kugler FW Heinrich Schaffer FW Richard Hofmann FW Helmut Schön FW Franz ErdlManager: Georg KöhlerFV SAARBRÜCKEN: GK Karl Dalheimer DF Heinrich Schmidt DF Hugo Decker MF Wilhelm Sold MF Heinz Plückhahn MF Johann Herberger FW Heinz Kurtsiefer FW Herbert Dorn FW Herbert Binkert FW Jakob Balzert FW Herbert BaierManager: Ernst Georg
References
Sources kicker Allmanach 1990, by kicker, page 164 & 177 - German championship
External links German Championship 1942–43 at weltfussball.de German Championship 1943 at RSSSF