in 1919, there were 150,000 registered football players in germany; by 1932, there were more than a million. in spite of the formation of a national association, german football held to an ideal of amateurism built around regional and local sports associations who felt that professionalism would diminish sportsmanship and local participation in the game. in the early 1930s, the dfb's president, felix linnemann, pushed for the creation of a professional league, or "reichsliga", in which the country's best teams would compete for the national championship. the idea was rebuffed by the regional federations dominating the sport.