Ralf Fährmann is currently in the middle of preparing for the season in Portugal with FC Schalke 04. There he has now revealed a training camp story from the old days. In the spotlight: Fährmann himself and his former S04 colleague Manuel Neuer, now a goalkeeper at FC Bayern.
Training camp time is time for anecdotes, at least that’s what Schalke keeper Ralf Fährmann apparently thought and revealed a story that went back many years.
Asked by “WAZ” about his favorite memory of the training camps, he said with a smile: “Manuel Neuer and I once borrowed a golf cart without asking, we drove a bit across the hotel grounds, but we hit a pillar.”
Fährmann continued: “We just wanted to bring the golf cart back after our joyride, but on the way to the hotel we noticed that it was driving strangely. Then we realized that the axle was broken – and there was a rubber track from the pillar across the area, because the axle was transverse.” The duo then had to admit that they had “messed up,” the keeper revealed.
FC Schalke 04: Neuer takes responsibility
Fährmann did not say exactly when the crazy story took place, but the last joint training camp between Neuer and the now 35-year-old dates back to 2009, after which Fährmann moved to Frankfurt and finally returned in 2011 when Neuer went to FC Bayern.
Either way, Neuer suffered the consequences at the time. “I was the younger one, Manu took it all on himself. I was lucky,” said Fährmann, who still thinks highly of Neuer regardless of the adventure at the time.
It was “not an easy situation” for him at the time, Fährmann looked back on his role as new successor, “because he is by far the best goalkeeper in the world.”
Neuer “shaped the goalkeeper position and, in my opinion, still gets far too little recognition for what he has achieved. Back then I learned not to let the opinions of outsiders get to me too much – that also shaped me into the person who I am now.”
Fährmann is expected to be FC Schalke 04’s number one goalkeeper for the rest of the season.