Werner Altegoer
| Werner Altegoer | |
|---|---|
| Born |
18 June 1935 Bochum |
| Died | 9 January 2013 (aged 77) Dortmund |
| Nationality | German |
| Occupation | Coal Trading Company |
| Known for | VfL Bochum president and chairman |
Werner Altegoer (18 June 1935 – 9 January 2013) was a German entrepreneur; president and later chairman of the advisory board of football club VfL Bochum. He headed the club from 1993 until 2010, and was named honorary chairman of the supervisory board in 2011.
Altegoer was born in Bochum in the Ruhrgebiet-area in western Germany. Until the age of 15 he played in the youth sides of local club VfL Bochum. However, at that point he decided to not continue his football career and to commence an apprenticeship in the Bochumer Kohlenkontor, a subsidiary of the coal mine Zeche Vereinigte Constantin der Große. Subsequent career steps were the Stinnes AG and from 1964 on coal trading company Paul Roskothen GmbH, which he converted from a regional enterprise into a firm group with an international business network.
Altegoer maintained his interest for the VfL Bochum and visited regularly the home matches with family member as his parental house was also only at a few hundred meters distance from the Stadion an der Castroper Straße. His godfather – Willi Altegoer - introduced him to VfL Bochum's then president Ottokar Wüst. At the end of the 1970s Altegoer involved himself for the first time actively in the club and gave financial support to the transfer of goalgetter Jochen Abel from Westfalia Herne. In 1978, he officially became a member of the club.
Altegoer served twice as chair of the club's economic committee – from 1980 to 1982 and again from 1990 to 1993. 1993 he succeeded Ottokar Wüst and became the club's president, just after the club had been relegated to the Second Bundesliga. He continued to be the club's president until 30 October 2002, when the club took on a more modern, professional structure including a professional executive board. Werner Altegoer continued to act as chair of the board until 2010.
In Altegoer's 17 years at the top of the club VfL Bochum became a classic "yo-yo club", bouncing up and down between the first and second Bundesliga. Bochum relegated five times, but also managed to return five times directly to the highest levels. The club's best Bundesliga spells also felt in this time as 5th-place finishes in 1997 and 2004, which earned them appearances in the UEFA Cup tournament. In 1997, they advanced to the third round where they were put out by Dutch side Ajax Amsterdam, and in 2004, they were eliminated early through away goals (0–0 and 1–1) by Standard CL Liège of Belgium.
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