In his forthcoming book “In the moment – About success, the beauty of the game and what really counts in life”, national coach Hansi Flick reports on a private stroke of fate that still shapes him today.
Hansi Flick is having a really good time as national coach. The national football team experienced a remarkable upswing under him and reconciled with the fans who had been critical for a long time. Flick is always the focus, especially with a view to the desert World Cup in Qatar.
He is the center of attention because he is primarily responsible for the success, because he gives the players a good feeling, because he is likeable and authentic as a partner in the interview. As a DFB coach he is transparent, as a private person he is more closed. Insights are rare.
In his new book, which will be published next week, he talks about the hardest time of his life – a goosebumps story.
The hardest time in Flick’s life was a few years ago. It is a time of sadness and sorrow.
And she crashed right into his football euphoria! In the summer of 2010, the DFB team enchanted an entire country. Guided by national coach Joachim Löw and assistant coach Flick, the German soccer heroes around Manuel Neuer, Jérôme Boateng and Mesut Özil stormed into the World Cup semi-finals, where they suffered a narrow defeat against Spain. Doesn’t matter! Germany loved their national team and danced to the beat of the vuvuzelas.
“I was scared like I’ve never felt before”
But just a few weeks after the football festival in the Cape, the Flick family was shaken by two heavy blows of fate. First his best friend’s wife died before the couple Hansi and Silke had to deal with a shocking diagnosis.
“Silke was diagnosed with breast cancer,” reports Flick in a chapter of his new book “In the Moment – About Success, the Beauty of the Game and What Really Matters in Life”, which “Bild” previously published.
Flick gives intimate and moving insights into the moments after the shock: “I was afraid like I had never felt before. To this day I admire my wife for the strength and inner peace with which she mastered the difficult situation. I lay in the evening much more teary-eyed in bed than she was.”
“One-time support” from the DFB for Hansi Flick
He received “unique support” from the German Football Association (DFB). He withdrew for a while. At the time, it went relatively unnoticed.
“This phase of my life taught me humility and gratitude,” writes Flick. He now sees interpersonal encounters and relationships “in a different light and never taken for granted. And I no longer take sporting defeats so personally, I can classify them differently than I used to because I’ve learned: There are things that are bigger and more important are than football.”