He will not forget the support of Barcelona fans while his wife struggled between life and death for a few days
He was Pichichi de la Liga in his first season with 29 goals and scored a goal in the final of the Recopa de Basel
Although his time at Barça was brief, the Austrian Hansi Krankl remained forever in the hearts of Barça fans for everything that happened in May 1979.
The previous summer he had arrived at the Camp Nou with the enormous responsibility of inheriting the ‘9’ from Johan Cruyff. The then president, Josep Lluís Núñez, was looking for a scorer and opted for who had just been the best European scorer with 41 goals. Valencia was a tough competition to sign the Austrian, who had also stood out in the World Cup in Argentina scoring four goals, but they won the 70 million pesetas that Núñez offered to Rapid Vienna.
In his first season at the Camp Nou, his performance did not disappoint. He was the Pichichi of the championship with 29 goals and his competition was decisive for Barça to win the Basel Cup Winners’ Cup. His was one of the goals that gave the Barça victory in extra time against Fortuna Düsseldorf. That game was about not to play it. Eleven days earlier, when he was returning home after a derby, the Mini in which he was traveling with his wife and a couple of friends had a serious accident on Diagonal. His wife Inge hovered between life and death for a few days and when she regained consciousness she asked him to play. Krankl thus thanked the Barça fans for all the love he had received. He still remembers the lines of people outside the hospital to donate blood.
IT WAS NOT UNDERSTOOD WITH RIFÉ
That idyll with the fans did not last long, because in the following year he did not understand the coach, Rifé, and he left on loan. He came back to play with Quini, but the arrival of Schuster meant his final goodbye, since there could only be two foreigners and Helenio Herrera chose the German and Simonsen.