BFC Dynamo had the best material conditions in the league and the best team by far. But there had been controversial refereeing decisions in favor of BFC Dynamo in the league, which gave rise to speculations that the dominance of BFC Dynamo was not solely due to athletic performance, but also due to manipulation. Allegations of referee bias was nothing new in East German football, and was not isolated to matches involving BFC Dynamo. Alleged referee bias as a source of unrest was a thread that ran from the very first matches of the DDR-Oberliga, and had caused unrest already back in 1950, when ZSG Horch Zwickau defeated SG Dresden-Friedrichstadt 5–1 in a match which decided the title in the 1949–50 DDR-Oberliga. Another example occurred when ASK Vorwärts Berlin defeated SC Chemie Halle away in Halle in 1960. The home ground of 1. FC Union Berlin was closed for two match days as a result of crowd trouble over the performance of referee Günther Habermann during a match between 1. FC Union Berlin and FC Vorwärts Frankfurt in 1982. The police had been forced to come to the rescue of referee Günther Habermann. German sports historian Hanns Leske claims that referees throughout the history of East German football had a preference for the teams sponsored by the armed and security organs.