Rudy Getzinger

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Rudy Getzinger (born April 9, 1943 in Sremska-Mitrovica, Yugoslavia) is a retired U.S.-Yugoslavian soccer midfielder. He spent most of his career with Chicago based teams, earned eight caps with the United States, and was inducted into the National Soccer Hall of Fame.

While born in Yugoslavia, Getzinger spent several years as a boy in Austria. In 1958, his family moved to the United States and settled in Chicago. When he arrived in Chicago, he joined the Schwaben soccer club as a youth player. That season, Schwaben won the Peel Cup. At the time that Getzinger joined the club, it was the dominant team in Chicago’s National Soccer League, having won the league title several years in a row. Getzinger would spend most of his career with Schwaben, winning the U.S. Amateur Cup with the team in 1964. Getzinger spent time with the Philadelphia Spartans. In 1975, Chicago was awarded a North American Soccer League (NASL) franchise. The new team, named the Chicago Sting, drew on local talent to form the core of the roster. Getzinger spent the 1975 and 1976 seasons with the Sting, scoring one goal in sixteen games in 1975 and no goals in three games in 1976.

In both 1963 and 1968, he was part of the U.S. Olympic soccer teams which failed to qualify for the 1964 and 1968 Summer Olympics. While Getzinger played with the Olympic team in both 1963 and 1968, he did not earn his first caps with the United States until 1972. That year, he scored in his debut, an August 20, 1972 loss to Canada. He went on to play a total of eight caps, but scored only that one goal. His last cap came as a substitute for Barry Barto in a November 3, 1973 loss to Haiti.

In 1991, Getzinger was inducted into the National Soccer Hall of Fame.