Harold Abrahams – Special Correspondent for TSS
On May 1, for as long as it has been recorded, and most certainly for as long as anyone can remember, representatives from the 64 teams of the Austrian League have met at Georg’s Pub in Klagenfurt – admittedly, only recent renovations, and by recent I mean those done in 1962 and 1971, have made it possible for those jovial and spirited deputies to meet without one’s elbows crowding another’s well-filled stein. The cause of this much-anticipated convergence at the (still-disputed) home of Wiesespiel is the annual renewal of the Meadow Cup. Sixty-four teams, sixty-three matches, and one champion, who will fulfill what the other sixty-three hoped was their destiny when every jersey was still dry and unstained.
Last summer, another of the Original Eight, Villach, secured the Cup as had their brethren in origin, Vienna, the year prior, prolonging the stretch of years where the Tyrol champion was unable to accomplish the famed Parzer Pair, that being winning the Tyrol and Meadow Cups the same year. Jürgen Parzer, the Salzburg coach who took over for the Flowers after Klagenfurt won the first two Cups of 1873 and 1874, commissioned to “bring down the dragons” (and he did just that, if only barely – the Cup count after his final match was Salzburg 6, Klagenfurt 5), coached Salzburg when they won their first six Tyrol Cups, and each time the Edelweiss followed up one Cup with the other. Will the Bern Armed Bears, fresh off their dominating 17-2-0 season, parlay that success into their 7th Meadow to go with their 12 Tyrols?
As is customary, Upper Level teams incorporate their bench players and junior members much more boldly for the summer classic, partly for rest’s sake and partly for the sake of other commitments about the community, so no one is surprised when a team from the three lower leagues finds its form, defeats several favored or more storied teams, becomes – inevitably – the darling of the legions of Austrian League fans following this summer classic – and outlasts six opponents to hold up the Meadow Cup on that final, warm Saturday afternoon. No more emblematic example of that story exists than that of the 1931 Männedorf Otters, who faced Munich on a day when only four of the Lederhosen’s ten established starters were in the line-up, and crushed the Hose 23—10. Each week, as the Brown Pelts won in exuberant style, more and more fans were raising their beers to the tournament’s adopted darlings. Five matches later, after a pulsing 20—18 victory, the Pelts had etched their name into Meadow Cup lore. Also as tradition holds, the O8 anchor the four divisions, two teams in each of the Alps, Castles, Farms, and Valleys. They are bracketed such that the possibility exists that the final eight teams could be those eight, though that has happened only once since there were more than eight clubs, and that was the first year there were sixteen, in 1882.
This year’s meeting was as rousing as ever, fewer than a dozen delegates were making their first trip to Georg’s. Longtime shopkeeper Aurel Dreher, a local celebrity in his own right, had prepared his usual spread of wiener schnitzel and goulash, while his wife Helga produced her famous strudels. Six days a week for 36 years, Helga had awoken the day with the aroma of her enticing strudels, and for the Meeting, she held back none of her culinary mastery, offering versions of apple, cherry and sweet apricot to compliment the fresh walnut, compliments of the neighboring grove. There was beer and pretzels, and pretzels and beer, and bragging and boasting and laughing. And in the end, the field was set. To hear them tell it, each team was going to beat every other team, and by a score that would bring both glory and shame.
So, faithful readers, your annual thirst for the meadow game following the completion of the Austrian League season is about to be quenched, at least until the long days of summer crawl their way towards the cool of the autumn, seemingly never to reach the promise of the St Leopold’s Day Classic. The Meadow Cup is upon us, the teams are getting back into form, and this special correspondent couldn’t be happier.