Hans-Joachim Watzke has risen to become the most important German football official because there has been a power vacuum alongside him. The BVB boss and chairman of the supervisory board of the DFL therefore shapes such an important week in German football all the more.
The storm after the early end at the 2018 World Cup in Moscow calmed down quite quickly. A few interviews after landing in Frankfurt, then Joachim Löw withdrew it into a week-long analysis, which revealed that everything will remain the same as far as possible, even if some things have to change.
Watzke involved in Bierhoff decision
After the early end at the 2022 World Cup, it took four days for Oliver Bierhoff to hand over responsibility for the national team after 18 years. However, it should not have been as voluntary as it sounds in the statement from the German Football Association (DFB). Also because someone was present at the talks about the termination of the contract who is not mentioned in the DFB announcement: Hans-Joachim Watzke.
String pullers are people who arrange things in a way that suits them best, but allows them to remain in the background.
Important decisions are pending
In the week that is important for German football, a decision will be announced in which Watzke has been pulling the strings for weeks, as intimate connoisseurs of German football say. Donata Hopfen will have to give up the leadership of the German Football League (DFL) again after less than a year.
The top division in German football will be reorganized in the next few months, in which the European Championships in their own country are fast approaching. The basic contract is renegotiated, with which the distribution of money between amateurs and professionals is newly regulated. And the tender for the media rights, through the sale of which the industry is mainly financed, is not that far away either.
Bayern Munich leaves BVB boss the field
In this matter, everything is somehow connected to everything else, and it is therefore surprising that the industry giant is largely reticent in public. FC Bayern lets do it, namely the boss of competitor Borussia Dortmund. That was completely different in the even bigger crisis of German football. When the corona pandemic broke out in spring 2020 and the DFL complained that the existence of 13 of its 36 clubs could quickly be endangered because billions in losses were imminent, a triumvirate swept through the country to ask politicians for help.
FC Bayern was prominently represented with Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, DFL with Christian Seifert, BVB with Watzke.
Watzke encounters a power vacuum
From this triumvirate only Dortmund remained. Donata Hopfen was never able to improve her profile because she made serious mistakes right from the start, for example when she didn’t rule out a German Supercup in Saudi Arabia in her first major interview. Oliver Kahn, the CEO of FC Bayern, does not seem to have much interest in looking beyond the Munich record champions.
This created a power vacuum away from Watzke, which naturally increased Hans-Joachim Watzke’s power. The 63-year-old from Sauerland has been the managing director of the listed football company in Dortmund since 2005. For a long time he observed the affair-tested DFB critically, pointed remarks and taunts against the string puller and multifunctional Rainer Koch could be heard again and again.
Watzke and Neuendorf on the same wavelength
But Watzke now has to live with the designations, because the chairman of his home club SV Rot-Weiss Erlinghausen and BVB boss has been the head of the DFL supervisory board since spring and is therefore automatically the first vice-president of the DFB. Since March, its president has been Bernd Neuendorf, a social democrat who took office with the aim of improving the relationship between the football association and politics. With that he ran into open doors at the Christian Democrat Watzke.
A DFB without scandals and affairs is important to Watzke and the DFL, because a damaged product brings in less money. A well-disposed DFL is important to the DFB, so Neuendorf and Watzke quickly sought proximity. They emphasize a harmonious relationship.
Does BVB boss decide on Flick’s future?
In Qatar it was at least put to a hard test, because the affair about the “One Love” captain’s armband and a communicative confusion both in the sport-politically explosive matter and in the departure after the preliminary round damaged the reputation of the new DFB president. This gives the impression that Hans-Joachim Watzke could play the decisive role when deciding on the future of national coach Hansi Flick after he has decided to continue. The intimate connoisseurs of German football say that no further storm is to be expected and Flick is staying.
However, some discussions disguised as analyzes can develop dynamics and tilt any forecast. Marco Rose experienced something like this in the summer, in a conversation in which Hans-Joachim Watzke was also involved. Instead of a plan for the coming season, the separation from the coach was then announced.