1. FC Cologne
This is how the FC stars celebrate Christmas
December 23, 2025 – 8:00 a.mReading time: 2 minutes
After a turbulent year, 1. FC Köln is taking a short winter break. While some FC professionals stay in Cologne, others move to Spain, Poland or England.
It’s going to be an exciting year for him 1. FC Cologne over. Bundesliga promotion, coaching and sports director changes, election campaign for the presidency and German U19 championship title: a lot has happened in the last twelve months. And there is little time left to relax over the Christmas period. The FC will continue on January 2nd.
After the last home game of the year against Union Berlin on Saturday, the billy goats will take a short break before the entourage around head coach Lukas Kwasniok sets off for the training camp in La Nucia/Spain. Nine days in which peace returns to the Geißbockheim and no activity can be observed in the green belt.
Instead, many players and those responsible travel to their families and spend the days without stress with their loved ones. This is also the case for coach Lukas Kwasniok: The 44-year-old will first travel to his parents near Karlsruhe and celebrate Christmas before going on a short vacation to the Canary Islands on Christmas Day.
Dominique Heintz does a similar thing. The central defender comes from the Palatinate, and there they traditionally celebrate Christmas and just as traditionally pack their bags to fly to Calpe. The Heintz family has had a home on the Spanish Mediterranean coast for years, where the defender and his family will relax.
Other players like Luca Waldschmidt don’t travel, but celebrate Christmas with the family at home in Cologne before heading off to training camp nine days later. Foreign players like Jakub Kaminski travel to their homeland: The Pole comes from near Katowice and will be in Poland with his family over Christmas and New Year’s Eve.
Rav van den Berg, on the other hand, will spend a slightly different Christmas. The Dutchman moved to FC from England in the summer and it is an open secret that the central defender would like to move back to the island in the future. His brother Sepp is already playing there for Brentford FC, and the entire van den Berg family is going to visit them.
Sepp van den Berg’s Brentford team face Bournemouth in the Premier League on December 27th, so the family gathers in west London, celebrates Christmas and then visits Brentford Community Stadium the day after Christmas.
There are also different travel plans among the FC bosses. Sports director Thomas Kessler is celebrating in Cologne and knows: When the winter transfer window opens on January 1st, there will be enough for him to do. Meanwhile, Finance Managing Director Philipp Türoff will relax in the Caribbean, while President Jörn Stobbe will celebrate the New Year in Spain. Good for the FC boss: He won’t have far to go to the training camp after New Year’s Eve when the billy goats get going again on January 2nd.