Star shrinkage as a great opportunity?
The Bundesliga loses its attractions
06/23/2023, 8:07 p.m
Jude Bellingham and Christopher Nkunku, before that Erling Haaland and Robert Lewandowski: The Bundesliga is once again losing its big stars. This is a problem, but it can also be an opportunity. And anyway: a new phenomenon is not the star fading.
103 million for Jude Bellingham, 60 million for Christopher Nkunku: Again a lot of money ends up in the Bundesliga, again its attractions end up abroad – like Erling Haaland and Robert Lewandowski a year earlier. The exodus of the (future) top stars, especially in the direction of England and Spain, threatens – according to the superficial opinion – the already declining status of the favorite German sports child.
“Unfortunately, we have to say that the quality of the Bundesliga has deteriorated in recent years,” said former international Paul Breitner via “Merkur/tz”. And Lothar Matthäus almost pleaded in his Sky column: “Every star is welcome. Every big name makes our league more attractive for fans and foreign marketing.”
Star selection looks manageable
In fact, the potential star selection for the coming Bundesliga season is quite manageable: the top talents Jamal Musiala (Bayern) and Florian Wirtz (Leverkusen) of course, plus Frankfurt’s Randal Kolo Muani (if he stays), Bayern’s Sadio Mané (if he remembers his Liverpool skills and does not change), perhaps his badly fickle club colleagues Leroy Sané and Serge Gnabry.
According to transfermarkt.de, only 13 of the 100 most valuable footballers in the world will play in the Bundesliga in 2023/24, several of them (Joško Gvardiol, Dominik Szoboszlai, Muani) could still say goodbye. The international flirting factor is therefore manageable, the fact that the promoters are called Heidenheim and Darmstadt does not help the notorious DFL concern area of foreign marketing either.
FC Bayern often have no chance with desired players
In international competition, the effect of the supposedly lavish transfer income also fizzles out. Since 2015/16, well over a billion euros have flowed into the Bundesliga from England’s Premier League alone. Sounds huge, but puts it into perspective given the two billion that Manchester City owner Sheik Mansour has pumped into his club since 2008. It follows that even FC Bayern now sometimes has no chance with desired players like Haaland last year.
However, the number of Bundesliga players, who are sorely missed by clubs and fans alike, was very limited. The departures of Dortmund’s Jadon Sancho (85 million / ManUnited) and Ousmane Dembele (135 million / Barca), for example, were bearable for clubs and leagues – it may be different with Haaland or Lewandowski. But just after their departure, the 2022/23 Bundesliga season was the most exciting in years.
Complete world stars rarely made it into the Bundesliga
And anyway: The Bundesliga has always regularly lost its most popular players. Whether it was in the 70s (e.g. Netzer, Beckenbauer), 80s (Rummenigge, Matthäus), 90s (Häßler, Sforza), 00s (Ballack, van der Vaart) or 10s (Dzeko, De Bruyne, Kroos) – stars were always unstoppable. The tale of decline was always circulating, and the clubs always found solutions. And they weren’t in a ruinous rat race with apparently overpowering rivals like Italy’s Serie A (or today’s Premier League) once were. But in skillful, creative scouting.
Because: Complete world stars rarely if ever changed to Germany’s elite class. Influential players – from Makaay to Diego, Micoud, Toni, Ribery, Robben to De Bruyne and Bellingham – came to the Bundesliga when they were either not (yet) interesting for the biggest world clubs or were in a small career slump.