List of rugby union clubs in Germany

This is a List of rugby union clubs in Germany. It lists all rugby union clubs in Germany registered with the German Rugby Federation, the DRV, or taking part in the German league system. As of April 2010, the International Rugby Board lists the number of clubs in Germany at 110.

Contents

• Clubs by state
• Baden Wrttemberg
• Bavaria
• Berlin
• Brandenburg
• Bremen
• Hamburg
• Hesse
• Lower Saxony
• Mecklenburg Vorpommern
• North Rhine Westphalia
• Rhineland Palatinate
• Saarland
• Saxony
• Saxony Anhalt
• Schleswig Holstein
• Thuringia
• Foreign clubs
• Germany
• East Germany
• References

Some of the clubs competing in the German league system are clubs of the US and British armed forces in Germany and therefore not necessarily members of the DRV. Examples of US Army rugby clubs in Germany are the teams in Illesheim, Ramstein and Vilseck, while other clubs, like in the RC Kaiserslautern, recruit some of their players from the US forces but have German players as well. Up to 32 US forces teams had been playing in Southern Germany at its peak, based in Hesse, Rhineland-Palatinate, Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg, being organised in the "United States Forces Europe Rugby Union" (USFERU). Most disappeared with the withdrawal of US forces from Germany at the end of the Cold War. A number of clubs remained but have since dropped out of the German league system, like the Bamberg RFC, Darmstadt 233rd BSB RFC, Hanau Hornets, Schweinfurt RFC, Spangdahlem RFC and Würzburg RFC, while a few, like the Ramstein Rogues RFC, Illesheim RFC and Baumholder RFC still compete in 2009-10.

The RC Mönchengladbach Rhinos and the Elmpt Falcons are rugby teams of the British Army in Germany and still active.

The oldest rugby union club in Germany is the DSV 78 Hannover, formed in 1878 as DFV Hannover, in a time when a differencation between rugby and football was not yet made in Germany. While there is older clubs in Germany then DSV 78, like the Heidelberger TV which was formed in 1846, their rugby departments were established after DSV's.