Bolzplatz-Atik bewitches Magdeburg
Spurned by Nagelsmann, without a club – now an all-time record
By David Needy
04/10/2022, 4:25 p.m
Baris Atik has a crazy year and a half behind him – after a period of unemployment he now leads his FC Magdeburg as a difference player in the 2nd Bundesliga. While Julian Nagelsmann once did not rely on him, he now breaks a league record by the way.
What Baris Atik was thinking about when he sprinted across the entire field is not transmitted. But the 1. FC Magdeburg attacking man has plenty of time to think as he sprints towards the all-time record. In the 71st minute, the league leaders cleared a high-moving Viktoria Köln with an arc lamp. Sirlord Conteh wins the header against Cologne’s last man in the center circle and the racing Atik runs alone towards the goalkeeper over the entire opposing half – and in the direction of the record. Maybe that’s why the Magdeburg’s first attempt failed, maybe that’s why he doesn’t play on the next man suspected of being offside. What the heck, the 27-year-old made it 4-1 in the margin and became the record scorer in the third division.
With 37 goals involved, Atik replaces the previous top scorer Sven Michel, who had 36 goals in one season in the 2017/18 season. 18 hits and 19 assists are now on the account of the man from the Palatinate, who is not even 170 centimeters tall. “He rewarded himself and the team – I’m happy for him,” praised coach Christian Titz after the win.
Against Cologne (final score 4:2) Atik drew level with Michel in his inimitable way before his record goal. In the 35th minute, the offensive man danced on the right corner of the penalty area, a nimble body deception allowed his Cologne opponent to step out. Technically he is actually too good for the third division. A short sprint with the ball towards the base line follows and a precisely timed, hard and precise pass into the middle, where Connor Krempicki only has to push in at the six-yard box to make it 3-0. A goal, an assist – that’s Baris Atik, the man of this season, in which he will most likely be promoted to the 2nd Bundesliga with FCM.
Half a year without a club
The third division leaders have ended their short dry spell (four games without a win), still lead the tableau with 66 points in front of FC Kaiserslautern, six points behind them, and are still heading towards promotion to the second division. The main person responsible for this is the record man, who rejected offers from the 2nd division last summer and extended them at Magdeburg. In the previous season, FCM played against relegation – until Atik moved to Saxony-Anhalt in the second half of the season and scored seven goals and provided eight assists in 15 games. “I’m not done here yet,” says the attacking artist after his fantastic first six months. “This is an affair of the heart for me.”
Atik brought experience back then: three Bundesliga games for TSG Hoffenheim, 66 second division appearances in the jersey of Dynamo Dresden, 1. FC Kaiserslautern and SV Darmstadt 98. But he has been without a club since summer 2020. A difficult time for the former Turkish junior international. And probably a reason why he already appreciated the situation in the Elbstadt team last season. Well, Atik’s decision paid off.
After his strong second half of the season, the 27-year-old gets almost all freedom from coach Titz this year. Atik is the clear difference player at FCM. Although his coach often uses him in the center of attack, he likes to drop back into midfield, sneak into the gaps by cleverly breaking away from opponents, or dribble through the wing like his 19th assist of the season.
“Concrete blocks were our gates”
Atik as a central player in a team – that wasn’t always the case even before he was without a club for six months. However, few doubted that he had the talent for it. Agile, technically strong, a dribbling artist and instinctive footballer: Atik learned to play on the soccer field in Frankenthal in the Palatinate. “It was just a concrete square with a square like that,” he once said about his beginnings, “there were two concrete blocks on it: Those were our goals.”
Via Waldhof Mannheim it then goes to TSG Hoffenheim, where a certain Julian Nagelsmann only builds on him for a short time. After all, the coach gets Atik to his first Bundesliga games. But then he lends it several times, mostly the offensive artist does not hit it. Nagelsmann, but the Atik still today grateful for the advancement to a striker is, then no longer builds on the Palatinate. In 2018 the sale to Dresden followed, then unemployment.
This is one of the reasons why the exceptional player is careful to always praise his team and put it in the foreground now that things are going well. “More and more together!” is his latest post on Instagram. “I think I learned a lot from that time,” Baris Atik says of the time without a club. “Now I’ve matured and I know exactly what I want.” Promotion to the 2nd league. With Magdeburg.
Whether he then makes the second highest German league his personal football field – or whether the Bundesliga knocks again: the all-time record holder in the 3rd division will now be relaxed about all of this. After all, those who have fallen deeply know how to appreciate the good times.