Gerhard Hanappi (16 February 1929 – 23 August 1980) was an

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

n football midfielder who is often regarded as one of the greatest Austrian footballers. He is also the father of Hardy Hanappi.

Club career

A versatile midfielder, Hanappi started his career at SC Wacker Wien, where he made his Bundesliga debut in 1947. Deemed as Austria's biggest football talent, he then controversially moved to play for big city rivals

Rapid Vienna Rapids are sections of a river where the river bed has a relatively steep gradient, causing an increase in water velocity and turbulence. Rapids are hydrological features between a ''run'' (a smoothly flowing part of a stream) and a '' casca ...

from 1950 till 1965. His time at Rapid proved to be very successful, winning the Austrian Championship title 7 times. He also captained the side for seven years and was chosen in Rapid's Team of the Century in 1999.

International career

He made his debut for

at only 19 years of age in November 1948 against Sweden and was a participant at the

1954 World Cup Events January * January 1 – The Soviet Union ceases to demand war reparations from West Germany. * January 3 – The Italian broadcaster RAI officially begins transmitting. * January 7 – Georgetown-IBM experiment: The fir ...

in Switzerland, where they reached 3rd place, and at the

1958 World Cup The 1958 FIFA World Cup was the sixth FIFA World Cup, a quadrennial football tournament for men's senior national teams, and was played in Sweden from 8 to 29 June 1958. It was the first FIFA World Cup to be played in a Nordic country. Brazil ...

. He captained the national team from 1955 on. His last international was a September 1962 match against

Czechoslovakia , rue, Чеськословеньско, , yi, טשעכאסלאוואקיי, , common_name = Czechoslovakia , life_span = 1918–19391945–1992 , p1 = Austria-Hungary , image_p1 ...

. He earned 93 caps, scoring 12 goals. He has held the national team appearances record until

Anton Polster Anton "Toni" Polster (born 10 March 1964) is an Austrian professional football coach and former player. He is the all-time leading goalscorer for the Austria national team with 44 goals. Polster's top flight coaching debut at Admira Wacker la ...

earned his 94th cap in June 1998.

Playing style

One of the finest midfielders of his generation,Europe's best Player of the Century
– IFFHS Hanappi was nominally a goalscoring

wing half A midfielder is an outfield position in association football. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in that case known as defensive midfielders. As central midfielders often go across boundarie ...

, however his versatility allowed him to successfully play in almost all positions. Hanappi's technical abilities and creativity allowed him to play as an effective play-maker. He was also very intelligent with an excellent sense of anticipation which made him very useful in defensive duties, and also enabled him to make well timed runs in the box. This along with his accurate shot enabled him to be a prolific goalscorer, even once being league top scorer.

Retirement and death

After his football career Hanappi worked as an

architect An architect is a person who plans, designs and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...

. He planned the ''Weststadion'' in Vienna, which was renamed to

Gerhard Hanappi Stadium The Gerhard-Hanappi-Stadion was a football stadium in Hütteldorf, in the west of Vienna, Austria. It was the home ground of Rapid Vienna. It was officially opened in 1977 as ''"Weststadion"'' (Western stadium). In 1980 it was renamed to honou ...

after his death. He died of cancer in 1980, aged 51.

Honours

Club

Austrian Football Bundesliga The Austrian Football Bundesliga (german: Österreichische Fußball-Bundesliga, italic=no , "Austrian Football Federal League"), also known as Admiral Bundesliga for sponsorship reasons, is the top level of the Austrian football league system. The ...

(7): ** 1951, 1952, 1954, 1956, 1957, 1960, 1964 *

Austrian Cup The Austrian Cup (german: ÖFB-Cup), known as UNIQA ÖFB Cup for sponsorship purposes, is an annual football competition held by the Austrian Football Association, the ÖFB. During the 2008–09 season, Austria Wien won the tournament for 27th t ...

(1): ** 1961 * Zentropa Cup (1): ** 1951

International

FIFA World Cup The FIFA World Cup, often simply called the World Cup, is an international association football competition contested by the senior List of men's national association football teams, men's national teams of the members of the ' (FIFA), the ...

Third Place: ** 1954

External links

Player profile and stats
– Rapid Wien Archive *

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hanappi, Gerhard 1929 births 1980 deaths Footballers from Vienna Austrian footballers Austria international footballers 1954 FIFA World Cup players 1958 FIFA World Cup players SK Rapid Wien players Deaths from cancer in Austria 20th-century Austrian architects Association football midfielders Architects from Vienna