Dhe Bundesliga club 1. FC Köln will have to do without their best striker by far in the game against RB Leipzig on Friday (8.30 p.m. in the FAZ live ticker for the Bundesliga and on DAZN). Anthony Modeste will not be able to travel to Saxony due to illness. The club confirmed this on Thursday. “If the player category fails, it will be difficult to absorb it,” said coach Steffen Baumgart of the “Bild” newspaper: “But in football there are always replacements. We will also replace Tony on a one-for-one basis.”
The Frenchman has scored 14 of Cologne’s 33 goals this season and thus made a significant contribution to FC’s rise to sixth place. In the top scorer list in the Bundesliga, the 33-year-old is fourth behind Robert Lewandowski (FC Bayern/21 goals), Patrik Schick (Bayer Leverkusen/18) and Erling Haaland (Borussia Dortmund/16).
Coach Baumgart, on the other hand, returns to the sidelines after his corona infection. The FC coach is released from isolation after a negative test. “I’m happy that I have this job and can stand on the sidelines again,” said Baumgart: “I love it.” Most recently, Baumgart had to watch FC’s 1-0 win over SC Freiburg from the couch at home.
A video showing how Baumgart followed the game emotionally in front of the television made some smiles – including from his Leipzig colleague Domenico Tedesco. “I am happy that he is healthy, that he did not have a difficult course. I think the video showed that again,” said the RB Leipzig coach with a smile. Tedesco will witness Baumgart’s temperament, which can hardly be tamed, in Friday’s home game against 1. FC Köln.
The game of the table neighbors from Cologne (6th) and Leipzig (7th) is also a duel of the coaches, who come across as so different. Here Baumgart, who has a gut feeling, verbally and physically exemplifies the courageous and aggressive style of play on the sidelines. There is the head human Tedesco, who is always analyzing and looking for the best tactics, speaks six languages and coined the phrase: “The pressure on the ball determines the collective behavior.” Baumgart can’t do anything with that at all. For him it is “always about straightforwardness”. And about emotions. “I play football with great passion, precisely because it’s still a game.”
Tedesco, who was born in southern Italy, also has a lot of fire in him, he brings this emotionality into the dressing room. The most important thing about his job is “leading people,” the former Schalke coach once said: “At the end of the day, eleven people plus x have to want to and be able to walk through fire with you.” The fact that some call him a “laptop coach” he can’t understand: “We coaches, whether young or old, simply use all possibilities nowadays.” And that includes “also technical data”.
Before the direct trainer duel, there is great respect for one another. Baumgart’s Cologne team is “very compact, very aggressive,” says Tedesco, “it has little to do with coincidence that they are where they are now.” “You’ve gotten better and better under Tedesco.”
