Football
Stephan Uersfeld, Germany correspondent 9y

German football unites to mourn victims of French Alps plane crash

German football is mourning the victims of the Germanwings plane crash in the French Alps, which claimed 150 lives.

The aircraft, which had been flying from Barcelona to Dusseldorf, crashed on Tuesday morning.

"It's had an impact on everyone and it overshadows everything," German FA president Wolfgang Niersbach, speaking at the UEFA congress in Vienna, said.

"As a football family, we owe it to the victims and their families to pay our respects."

The Germany national team will commemorate the dead with a minute's silence before the home friendly against Australia on Wednesday and will wear black armbands.

Several German clubs used social media to offer their sympathies to those affected by the tragedy.

"FC Bayern are in mourning for the relatives of all the victims of flight 4U9525 and our thoughts are with you all," the Bundesliga champions said on their official Twitter account.

Borussia Dortmund, Hamburg and the official Bundesliga website all posted messages of condolence.

"Football remains in the background on days like this, and our thoughts go out to the families of all the victims," Schalke sporting executive Horst Heldt was quoted as saying on his club's official website.

Schalke skipper Benedikt Howedes sent his condolences to his hometown Haltern am See, close to the city of Gelsenkirchen. Sixteen school pupils and two teachers from the city had been on board the flight.

"Everyone knows that I'm from Haltern am See and I have a lot of friends and relatives there," the Germany international said.

"I'm unbelievably sad about this terrible tragedy and wish all the families and friends of the victims all the strength to get through this."

Third tier club Duisburg announced that all the takings from Friday's friendly against Bundesliga II side Kaiserslautern would be donated to the relatives of the pupils and teachers who died.

In Sweden, third division club Dalkurd said their players had narrowly escaped the tragedy after last-minute changes were made to their flight schedules.

"We were supposed to be on that plane," sporting director Adil Kizil told Aftonbladet in quotes reported by AFP. "There were four planes that left around the same time and flew north over the Alps.

"Four planes, and we had players on three of them. You can say we were very, very lucky."

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