Florian Wirtz is Germany’s footballer of the year for the first time. There is a remarkable novelty for women – and coach Julian Schuster is also allowed to cheer.
A farewell gift for the prospective world star, a double consolation price for the narrowly failed EM hero and a deserved wage for the successor of a legend. Florian Wirtz, Giulia Gwinn, Ann-Katrin Berger and Julian Schuster have been elected by the German sports journalists for the best of German football.
Wirtz: “Honor and incentive”
“I find the title as a very special personal honor and as an additional huge incentive for the future”said Wirtz, who was for the first time for Bayer Leverkusen with 16 goals for Bayer Leverkusen last season and 15 templates for the first time.
The new star player of FC Liverpoollast year in the election of the specialist magazine “Kicker” second behind Toni Kroos, with 191 voices surprisingly clearly prevailed against Michael Olise von Meister Bayern Munich (81 votes), third place became national player Nick Woltemade from VfB Stuttgart (71).
The choice also reflects the expectations of Wirtz: quite a few see the future of German football in the offensive player, especially after moving to Liverpool. Be him “consciously”emphasized Wirtz, “The fact that at the age of 22 there is still a lot of work ahead of me in order to do justice to all the expectations that are also connected to the footballer of the year”.
Gwinn: “Confirmation of working as a team”
Meanwhile, the election to the “footballer of the year” was a remarkable novelty. With Gwinn and Berger, two players first took first place in the vote. The award is a “Confirmation of the work we did as a team “said Gwinn based on the expired European Championship, which was only ended for the German national team in the semi -finals against Spain.
The captain, who came to 145 votes in the election like Berger, had at the tournament in Switzerland despite her injury in the first game “True size” Showed and the team unexpectedly supported, Berger enthused. The goalkeeper won the award after her heroic deeds at Olympia for the second time in a row last year. Even with the European Championship, according to Gwinn, the 34-year-old is once again “Outstanding” been.
National goalkeeper Ann-Katrin Berger (left) and captain Guilia Gwinn (right)
Schuster leads Freiburg into the Europa League
The debut season of coach Schuster in the Bundesliga could be summarized in a similar way. As the successor of the Klublegende Christian Streich, the 40-year-old had the SC Freiburg to the Europe League led. Accordingly, he was chosen with 97 votes in front of Horst Steffen (76 votes), who narrowly missed the promotion to the Bundesliga with SV Elversberg in the relegation, and the former national coach Hansi Flick (60), who attributed FC Barcelona to the “coach of the year” in his debut season in Spain.