Bundesliga against World Cup frustration: The key point remains the (soccer) ball

Rainer Schlipf is a good grandpa. He reads every wish from his two grandsons’ eyes, and the retired teacher from Swabia had an educational plan for next Saturday: a men’s trip to the Stuttgart stadium for the VfB game against Mainz 05. Tickets for the “Lego Block” in the Untertürkheim curve he wanted to find a place where grandpas with little boys would be in good hands – but he quickly looked stupid. “Everything full,” marvels the grandfather.

And that in a game that only the lucky winners voluntarily treat themselves to a free ticket. And then shortly after the World Cup embarrassment. The 50,000 Swabians didn’t even notice what was going on in Qatar – why are they refusing the bad mood? Where is the alienation?

The Germans are a bit tired of football, Bob Hanning recently claimed. He was Vice President of the German Handball Association for a long time, is now head of the Bundesliga at the Berlin Foxes and sees the opportunity to “overshadow football” with the Handball World Cup that has just started. Handball players are authentic and robust guys, without a muzzle and hungry, he said in a “Bild” column and also wrote his fingers sore in an essay in the “Tagesspiegel” to let the air out of Qatar’s damaged football: no plan, no fire, no guts. What Hanning says makes sense – but is that why handball is stepping out of the shadow of football right now?

The difference is this: When Andreas Wolff, the goalkeeper hero in the World Cup opening game, limps off the floor with a damaged calf and a pained expression on his face, that upsets us Germans, like the much-cited bicycle that occasionally falls over in Beijing – but if it fills the screen in the News breaking news “Manuel Neuer breaks his leg skiing” is electrifying everyone. This tragedy has been keeping us in suspense for weeks, flanked by the scary question of whether Sven Ulreich might have to face Messi, Mbappe and Neymar in the Champions League soon, and Bayern coach Julian Nagelsmann almost called out in desperation these days Strick: “If Ulle tears his inner ligament next week, what do we do then?”

The hottest question: will Rudi become a DFB manager?

Will Bayern still buy Yann Sommer, the Gladbacher, in a flash? Or will you bring back Alexander Nübel, whom you loaned to AS Monaco? He said on Friday: “Anything can happen in football.” That’s exactly what doesn’t kill football, these exciting, daily questions of fate. Is summer coming for newbies? Is Nübel the next newcomer? Will Reus soon storm with Ronaldo for the Saudis? Will Völler become the new Bierhoff?

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Rudi as the new DFB manager, that is currently the hottest question. The “image” has put Völler that his life plan looks fundamentally different, while the “kicker” senses Völler’s clear willingness. In any case, the tension is unbearable, every decent German can feel: If Rudi as team boss with his rumble kickers became vice world champion in 2002, he will also make us European champions in 2024 as manager. The DFB expert council, a five-person task force to which Völler himself belongs, wants to meet this week. Does he do it like Adenauer, who once elected himself Chancellor with his own vote? Does Rudi say yes to Völler? The DFB hopes for it. “A good guy,” says President Neuendorf. A good person. Ruuuuudi, with at least five u.

And if necessary, a Rudi Rambo, but always with heart, like back then, in his angry speech against Waldi Hartmann and the ARD moaners Delling and Netzer (“The Günter! What shit they used to play! They played standing football! “). His outburst of anger made Völler eternally popular. Shortly thereafter, presenter Johannes B. Kerner looked for the greatest Germans of all time on the TV show “Unsere Beste” and Völler easily passed Richard Wagner, Friedrich Schiller and Hermann Hesse in the vote and Thomas Mann.

Qatar was a disaster, yes, but the magic of football lives on. They are also inviting footballers more than ever to the RTL jungle camp, recently even their wives. Season 16 has been running since Friday, this time with Claudia Effenberg. She injured herself a bit on the very first test and complained in pain: “I’m disabled.”

World Cup long-term damage is limited

Whereupon some Tessa found that one shouldn’t say such things because there are real handicapped people, and then the noise ensued. But for such cases, the former jungle camper Thorsten Legat is now standing by as a TV expert, who used to be a notorious left-footed player in the Bundesliga and now also hit Tessa, let’s listen briefly: “I say: she’s crazy. For me it’s crazy, to be honest.” Many honestly believe that it can’t get much more crazy than in the jungle camp – but in any case it can’t be done without football.

It’s the kick we need. According to surveys, two out of ten Germans are still upset about Qatar and are suffering from the consequences of the World Cup, but the remaining eight are already expecting the Bundesliga to go with goosebumps again, because on Friday it starts with a bang, Leipzig against Bayern . Admittedly, the league doesn’t spoil us directly with magical newcomers who drink a beer in a headstand – but everyone is all the more looking forward to the sentimental return of Sebastien Haller in Dortmund. In his comeback after his testicle operation, he now managed a hat-trick in seven minutes against FC Basel, and his coach Edin Terzic says with anticipation: “Extraordinary.”

Qatar was bad, but that doesn’t change the three really important things in German life: football, football and football. “The key point is the ball,” said old coaching guru Dettmar Cramer. He meant the big ball – not handball.

Nobody kills the old habits

Bob Hanning is probably overly optimistic about this. He’s too young, he didn’t even realize that the Bundesliga is the navel of the German way of life. Two years before his birth, 1860 Munich was German champion, so he can’t even know the following anecdote. It revolves around Rudi Brunnenmeier, the legendary goalscorer of the 1960s, and it goes like this: father and son realize at the stadium that they have forgotten their tickets. The boy quickly runs home again – and comes back confused and stuttering: “Babba, the brother…, Babba, the brother…”. Until he finally gets it out: “Babba, the postman is in bed with Mama!” Whereupon the father breathes a sigh of relief and laughs: “And I was afraid that Brunnenmeier wouldn’t play.”

That’s how it was back then. And that’s how it is today, Mick Jagger sang about this feeling with the Stones: “Old habits never die.” Nobody kills the old habits, not even Qatar.

It continues on Friday.