Rhein Fire is one of the three
German teams in the
NFL Europe. It is named after the river which flows through Rhein Fire's home city
Düsseldorf:
Rhein (or
English:
Rhine). They play in the
Rheinstadion, which is normally the
stadion of the soccer team
Fortuna Düsseldorf. They joined the
NFL Europe together with
Scottish Claymores and
Amsterdam Admirals.
Together with
Frankfurt Galaxy they are the most successful team, when counting the won
World Bowls. Both won two World Bowls, Rheinfire their first in
1998 in their only fourth season. After having loosing seasons in their both starting years (
1995: 4-6,
1996: 3-7).
1997 was finished with a 7-3 record. They entered the
World Bowl, but lost against the
Barcelona Dragons.
1998 regular season ended with the same record and they got into the
World Bowl for the second consecutive time. After
1999, which was again a winning season, but not crowned with the participation in the
World Bowl,
2000 was a more successful year: In the foruth winning season in row (7-3), they won the
World Bowl against the
Scottish Claymores.
2001 was finished with the first even record in team history.
A most of the normal players change from year to year, Rhein Fire's only real star is the ex-soccer hero
Manfred Burgsmüller who does the kicking (but mainly
extra points). This practice was later copied by
Berlin Thunder, as their
kicker is a ex-
soccer player, too.