Alfred Adi Preissler (1921-2003): Decisive is what happens on the pitch. Gray is all theory, but what matters is on the pitch - that line by Adi Preissler, the grand seigneur of BVB, has been adopted by generations of coaches. The captain of the championship teams of 1956 and 1957 shaped the club's first great era.\n\nAlongside Alfred Niepieklo and Alfred Kelbassa he formed the legendary inner-forward trio known as the Three Alfredos.
Preissler also won six West German championships with Borussia and scored 175 goals in 294 Oberliga West matches for Dortmund and Preussen Muenster, plus eight in ten European games. In 1999 he was voted the club's striker of the century.\n\nLong before marketing experts noticed it, Preissler and Borussia already represented true love. Yet one thing never stopped bothering him: he played only twice for Germany, because Fritz Walter stood higher in Sepp Herberger's esteem.
The war, too, stole his best footballing years.\n\nThe Nazis, he once said, quite certainly stole 50 international caps from him.
