For football, too, the way out of the pandemic is fragile, it crunches and cracks at all ends. Some clubs are threatened with financial collapse. In the midst of the crisis, professional sport is increasingly discovering its social responsibility. This is not only shown by the example of Borussia Dortmund.
Even during the summer break, Jakob Scholz did not let go of vaccinations and football. The chairman of the Dortmund fan department has set up vaccination centers full-time for the Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians Westphalia-Lippe (KVWL) over the past few months. He now wanted to make this expertise available to the Bundesliga club. At the beginning of the pandemic, BVB had set up a test center on short notice in the stadium, now the vaccine should be brought to the people. In close cooperation with the city of Dortmund, the idea became reality within a week.
Four vaccination lanes with a capacity of 25 people per hour and vaccination lane, seven hours a day for a total of ten days. Maximum of 7000 vaccinations. By appointment or as a spontaneous vaccination. Biontech and Johnson & Johnson are offered. “There is of course the advantage that only one vaccination is required,” says Scholz. “The question of the specific vaccine, however, stood at the end of the consideration. The starting point was the idea of how we as a club can help raise the vaccination quota a little. A football club is predestined for this.”
For Borussia Dortmund, setting up a vaccination center in its own stadium is of course associated with costs. “The club first made an advance payment,” says Scholz. “That is remarkable.” Well connected in football and politics, he reports of the powerlessness of some. “There is currently some perplexity in politics as to what else they can do to vaccinate people quickly enough. It is of course extremely important to create low-threshold offers from regional companies with positive charisma, like football clubs.” A view that runs through the association, which is often noticed by the public through the rumbling statements of the chairman of the board, Hans-Joachim Watzke. This attracts attention, the work in the background is less registered. But it is precisely this that is a clear and elementary component for everyone to return to “living with the coronavirus”.
Does the BVB only allow vaccinated people?
BVB thinks little of coercion, but there could still be pressure for non-vaccinated Borussia supporters. “I am of the opinion that there should be no compulsory vaccination because everyone has to decide for themselves,” said BVB boss Hans-Joachim Watzke in an interview with Sportschau: “On the other hand, the organizers of major events, including football, the right to say that only vaccinated people come in. I think that’s legitimate because we are in a difficult fight. ” But Watzke’s whip is only a means.
“We are primarily concerned with the social responsibility that we have as a football club. Not just for our fans, but for the entire community,” says Björn Hegemann, head of the fan affairs department at BVB. “With the photo with the trophy, we can offer a special incentive and maybe even reach a few people who have not yet been vaccinated for various reasons.” Current forecasts assume around 1700 vaccinations over the entire period. “That can all change upwards,” says Hegemann. “But we are also a little proud that as a football club we have succeeded in vaccinating over 1,000 people at such short notice.”
“Should be a model for vaccination campaigns in cinemas”
Borussia Dortmund is not alone in these small-scale steps. At the game of the second division club SV Sandhausen there was a standing ticket for the upcoming home game against Karlsruher SC for every person who was vaccinated against Fortuna Düsseldorf as part of the league opener. It is the approach of German football and German professional sport. The German Football League (DFL), the Basketball Bundesliga (BBL), the Handball Bundesliga (HBL) and the German Ice Hockey League (DEL) want to open up additional opportunities with their respective clubs (in some cases also the 2nd division) to increase the willingness to vaccinate in Germany. This is intended to additionally support the fight against the pandemic. “This initiative should serve as a model for further vaccination campaigns, for example in shopping centers or in front of cinemas,” said Helmut Dedy, managing director of the German Association of Cities, about the campaigns.
The offers of the clubs burst into an excited discussion about social life in the coming weeks. Which rights will vaccinated and convalescent people regain, which rights will apply to those who have been tested? Will these continue to be made the same despite the general availability of the vaccines? Do we need more and better incentives than the football approaches outlined above, do we need a vaccination bonus? What about those who persistently refuse to be vaccinated? How does the vaccine get to the vaccinees? Will the incidence value continue to play a major role in the future or not? When Federal Health Minister Jens Spahn warned the population last week not to neglect protective measures in view of the rising corona numbers, he also said with a view to the increasing vaccination rate and the incidence: “200 is the new 50.”
“This is no longer a sustainable way”
What’s next for football? A controversial debate about the number of spectators at Eintracht Frankfurt calls for clear rules for the up to 400,000 fans who visit the league’s stadiums on a premier league weekend alone. In Frankfurt there were disagreements between the city and the country as to whether vaccinated persons and genesis count when calculating the upper capacity limit. In the end, the Frankfurt health department prevailed: 10,000 spectators admitted and not just 5,000, in the city that has long since torn the 35 incidence, the previously valid limit for more than 5,000 spectators. “It is unclear and not conclusively justifiable why the 35 was chosen. That is no longer a sustainable path,” said Eintracht’s legal advisor, Philipp Reschke. He called on politicians to rethink immediately. “That is, if you will, pandemic 2020. But pandemic 2021 has to work differently. The omens have changed.”
Everyone is interested in clarity and a way to live with the pandemic. Nobody in the league wants to proclaim a “Freedom Day” modeled on Boris Johnson. Most likely one would still trust Union Berlin boss Dirk Zingler. But he also recently said in a media round: “We want people to vaccinate so that they can get their rights back. If we threaten to withdraw their rights again in autumn, we will counteract the process that we are now promoting. That is so contradicting. ”
The pity for football is limited
In addition to social responsibility when it comes to vaccination, the associations are of course also concerned with the legitimate endeavor of “surviving in the pandemic”. Professional football, which has completely submitted to sports capitalism in recent years, sees its continued existence threatened. Horrible salaries for top players, exorbitant transfer fees and imaginative contract drafting for player agents has drawn a lot of money from one of the last global entertainment machines in recent years. But that was not a problem as long as there were better and better TV contracts and always financially strong investors and states that incorporated clubs and associations. The pandemic and the exclusion of viewers have hit football hard, also in Germany. However, public pity was limited.
“If we don’t get a significant number of viewers again this season, and that is well over 50 percent capacity for me, then it will be very gloomy for some clubs,” said Watzke of the Sportschau. He didn’t necessarily only speak for BVB there, a club that, like Bayern Munich, would be more likely to be one of the last clubs.
Often, very often in the past few months the public’s displeasure has been directed against the special role played by football. He was allowed to plan the return of the Bundesliga in the first lockdown in April 2020 and when the virus then reached the players, it seemed that other standards were applied to them when determining possible contact persons. Some clubs, such as Zingler’s Union Berlin, were not very sensitive in their communication about the Corona crisis and also in their dealings with the fans who keep gathering in front of the stadium. Some excitement was more justified than others in these leaden times, but the path currently being taken by football is a sensible one, one that, as the example of Borussia Dortmund shows, is aware of its social responsibility and is also ready to participate in other, less prominent sports and to use for culture. Because impatience grows. Not just in football.
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