DJK Ammerthal

The DJK Ammerthal is a German association football club from the town of Ammerthal, Bavaria. DJK stands for Deutsche Jugendkraft, a sports organisation associated with the Catholic Church.

The club's greatest success came in 2012 when it qualified for the new northern division of the expanded Bayernliga, the fifth tier of the German football league system.

History

For most of its history the club has been a non-descript amateur side in local Bavarian football. The club played in the Bezirksliga Oberpfalz-Nord from 1993 onwards, earning promotion to the Bezirksoberliga in 1997 courtesy to a runners-up finish.

DJK made its first appearance in the Bezirksoberliga Oberpfalz, the highest league in Upper Palatinate and the sixth tier of the league system in 1997–98 but lasted for only one season before being relegated back to the Bezirksliga. It returned to the Bezirksoberliga in 2001 as a much stronger side and would play at this level for the next eight season. It finished in the top four on six occasions but missed out on promotion in the promotion round in 2007 and 2008 when it came runners-up in the league. In 2009 however promotion to the Landesliga finally came when it won the league.

The next three seasons the club spent in the Landesliga Bayern-Mitte which would also be the last three seasons the league existed in this format. DJK finished in the upper half of the table in each of those three seasons and a fourth place in 2012 was enough to qualify for the new northern division of the Bayernliga.

In the Bayernliga the club came seventh in its first season and twelfth in its second. After a fourteenth place in 2014–15 the club had to enter the relegation round where it lost to ASV Burglengenfeld and was relegated. Ammerthal bounced back immediately, winning its Landesliga division and earning promotion back to the Bayernliga.