No sooner has the season in the 3rd division ended than some fans can hardly wait for the new series. But a little patience is called for here.
Just over two months to go: then the ball will be rolling again in the 3rd Division. The 1st matchday of the 2023/2024 season is scheduled for the weekend of 4 to 6 August 2023.
The colleagues of the portal “liga3-online.de” asked the German Football Association (DFB) when the always eagerly awaited match schedule can be expected. The DFB’s answer: The match schedule is to be published by the second week of July.
The bad news is that the number of free-TV matches is to be drastically reduced. As things stand, Telekom is only obliged to show ten matches on free TV from the coming season. Until now, ARD was allowed to broadcast 86 games per season on the First or Third channels. Therefore: In future, it will be better to watch the games in the stadium instead of on TV.
So: In about a month, the fans of Rot-Weiss Essen, MSV Duisburg and all the other traditional teams in the 3rd division will know when they will play against whom in the 2023/2024 season. Then some fan calendars will certainly be marked with an exclamation mark. But some dates are already fixed.
And the 20 teams are also known: 1. FC Saarbrücken, Dynamo Dresden, Waldhof Mannheim, TSV 1860 München, Viktoria Köln, SC Verl, FC Ingolstadt, MSV Duisburg, Borussia Dortmund II, FC Erzgebirge Aue, Rot-Weiss Essen, Hallescher FC, VfB Lübeck, Preußen Münster, SSV Ulm, SpVgg Unterhaching, SC Freiburg II, Arminia Bielefeld, SV Sandhausen, SSV Jahn Regensburg.
The most important dates at a glance:
Start of the third division season: 4 – 6 August
1st DFB Cup round: 11 – 14 August
2nd DFB Cup round: 31 October / 1 November
Round of 16 DFB Cup: 5/6 December
Last third division matchday 2023: 19-20 December
First third division matchday 2024: 19 – 21 January
DFB Cup quarter-finals: 30/31 January and 6/7 February
DFB Cup semi-finals: 2/3 April
Last third league matchday: 18 May
Relegation: 22 – 29 May
DFB Cup final: 25 May