Tournament director Philipp Lahm is hoping for a return of unity between fans and the national team before the 2024 home European Championship. For this he holds the German Football Association (DFB) as responsible as the professionals.
“We need a mood again in which mass sport and professional football are part of a common whole,” said Lahm in an interview with the “Süddeutsche Zeitung”.
Visible identification is important in this context. “Everyone in the national team has to understand that, especially every player: that it can no longer be about earning more and more bonuses,” said Lahm. “The players in their clubs get more than enough money.”
Lahm himself, world champion captain in 2014, “negotiated for bonuses, but never hard. There must be another reason for players to go to the national team.” The DFB-Elf must evade “the logic of eternal growth” that has dictated club football for years.
Lahm: DFB team must be “cool”.
“The players have to have the feeling that they are part of something really cool with the national team,” said Lahm: “Something that the whole country thinks is great and supports.”
This has been lost in recent years, but football is “only a reflection of society” in this regard. It’s now “more about self-realization and not so much about togetherness. You can tell that from the national team.”
Changing this is a management task. The players are just “children of their generation, just like I was a child of my generation. It’s not about changing someone. It’s about clear leadership and clear communication.”