Of all of Germany football probably came first to Dresden. But, perhaps because of the destructions of the Second World War and the isolation of being in the East before unification the games history is hard to find. What appears to be indisputable, however, is that was brought by what seems to have been a substantial British community that had grown up in the city in the last third of 19th Century, reaching a peak in about 1895. The claim is that the formation of the Dresden English Football Club in 1873/74 was the such on the Continent. Brits began to practice a game on open ground along the Lennestrasse but to what rules is unknown.  

More generally we know that an Anglican church was completed in 1869 and that the chaplain in the city, John Smith Gilderdale, who died there in 1891, became Honorary President of the football club. However, there seems to have been little or no take up by locals. That would not happen for another generation. Dresden S.C. was not formed until 1898. And in the interim the game remained in-house, with one so-far, known exception. In 1892 the British communities arranged an Association fixture to take place in Saxony between a Dresden XI, and Berlin's English F.C. The later team was eclectic, but with two names that soon to feature again, this time in the beginnings of the game in Paris, Philip Dennys, later Vice-Captain of the White Rovers in the French capital, and Ernest Cotton, later captain of the same. By contrast the Dresden side had Clark in goal, Bell, the captain, and Hallam, Du Port, Gordon and Hessey, Vines, Thomas (T), Forrester, a second Thomas (H) and Sichel with perhaps three Scots in the line-up. And the home team ran out easy winners, 6-0.