“Do I even want this?”
Ralf Rangnick makes clear demands on FC Bayern
April 24, 2024, 3:30 p.m
The dream coaches have turned down FC Bayern. Now the Bundesliga record champions have to look for alternatives, Ralf Rangnick is apparently at the top of the list. He confirms discussions – but also says clearly what kind of accommodation he expects from the people of Munich.
Ralf Rangnick ordered tea, then poured pure wine for the desperately wooing FC Bayern. A possible engagement with the German football record champions, said Munich’s latest preferred candidate, would certainly not fail because of the money. “For me it’s about other things: Can I make a difference? Can I make a difference? Is there a chance of developing a team and being successful? That’s what drives me.” In plain language: I’m happy to come – but only as “Ralf almighty”.
In a long-arranged interview with the portal 90minuten.at that was conducted on Tuesday and published the next day, Rangnick confirmed that Bayern had “made contact” – and clearly stated under what conditions he could imagine a move from the Austrian association. Currently, the 65-year-old emphasized, his “focus” is on the European Championships with Austria in the summer – “completely” because: “I feel comfortable here.”
Rangnick had made himself comfortable in a black long-sleeved shirt with a cup of tea in a “feudal armchair” in a posh hotel in Vienna, as it was said. He asserted there that he sees “no reason at the moment” to deal “intensively and specifically” with the Bavarian advances. He would only change his attitude “at the moment when Bayern would say: We want you,” he said with amazing openness. “And then I have to ask myself: Do I even want this?”
It’s about the final word on player transfers
Not so much because of the flower that means: The renewed exchange with the Munich bosses last weekend has not yet convinced Rangnick that they want to grant him the power he had hoped for. After the “no” from dream coach Xabi Alonso (Bayer Leverkusen) and the failed return campaign by national coach Julian Nagelsmann, Bayern are almost forced to put everything on the Rangnick card.
But does that even fit? Doubts remain. “I trust Rangnick,” said Lothar Matthäus to “Sport Bild”. The “developer” could “also provide good impulses on campus” with his old companion Christoph Freund, Bayern’s sports director. But for that to happen, the record national player pointed out, “the chemistry with everyone involved has to be right.” Skepticism is warranted.
Rangnick has long since settled the dispute with Munich’s honorary president Uli Hoeneß. However, it is unlikely that the bosses will give him the final say on player transfers that he allegedly demanded. Rangnick was always strongest when he was able to initiate something new with the greatest possible decision-making power – like in Hoffenheim or Leipzig. In Munich, however, where coaches are traditionally brought in solely as football teachers, a power tussle with sports director Max Eberl and Freund would be unavoidable.
Rangnick would meet many old acquaintances
For Matthäus it is clear that Rangnick would start with a penalty. “Every coach who comes now is no longer first or second choice.” Not to mention the question of whether Rangnick is a good fit in terms of football. His idea of a ball-chasing pressing machine would be new for Bayern, who wanted to take a different approach with Alonso. Would Rangnick, for whom a million-dollar fee would be due, have to deviate from pure doctrine? And when should he manage the squad change when he has to prepare Austria for the European Championship “group of death” with France, the Netherlands and Poland? Similar considerations made Nagelsmann shy away.
On the other hand: At Bayern, Rangnick would meet some old acquaintances with a past in the RB cosmos. In addition to Eberl and Freund, this applies to campus boss Jochen Sauer, Richard Kitzbichler, who acts at the interface between the professional and youth departments, and Rene Maric, the “team leader for coach development and game ideas”.
Nevertheless: Rangnick’s “yes” is not a sure-fire success. And so speculation continues about Arne Slot (Feyenoord Rotterdam), Julen Lopetegui (formerly of Spain and Real Madrid) and the inevitable Roberto De Zerbi (Brighton & Hove Albion).