Jörg Schmadtke is considered one of the most dazzling figures in the Bundesliga. He is often successful, but time and again he provoked the premature end in the clubs he oversees.
The clear decision is closer to him than the compromise: the pugnacious manager Jörg Schmadtke.
A smile from Jörg Schmadtke? Such a picture is a rarity in the Bundesliga. Because Schmadtke, the sports director of VfL Wolfsburg, would have something to lose: the reputation of a grumbler who doesn’t say a word more than necessary.
He has worked hard to earn this reputation. And he takes care of it. No other manager is as enigmatic as the Rhinelander. His temperament is rarely clouded by the sporting boom. Based on this, it would be difficult to guess what phase the team Schmadtke is responsible for is in. And yet Schmadtke is considered one of the most dazzling figures in the league.
Glasner, van Bommel, Kohfeldt
Wolfsburg is currently in a crisis, and quite a few critics see the manager himself as the originator. At the end of last season, coach Oliver Glasner left the club for Frankfurt after a dispute with Schmadtke; Glasner had a successful season behind him. The engagement of the Dutchman Mark van Bommel, a undoubtedly original character, ended quickly. Now Florian Kohfeldt, who led Werder Bremen from the first to the second league, is supposed to stop the free fall of the Volkswagen Group’s prestige object.
Jörg Schmadtke’s managerial biography is characterized by two constants: conflict and success. Wherever Schmadtke shows up, success follows quickly. But he has a penchant for spectacular separation: At Alemannia from Aachen, which Schmadtke once led to the Bundesliga, he provoked his expulsion by duping the board: Schmadtke had communicated the termination of his contract without having discussed it with the club management . In Hanover and Cologne, too, the separations were anything but silent. And it always seemed like it didn’t have to get that far in the first place.
Its qualities, however, are undisputed. “It may come as a surprise, but I worked very well with Jörg Schmadtke.” That’s what Mirko Slomka says, whom Schmadtke brought to Hannover 96 when the team was in dire need. The descent seemed almost inevitable. But what followed were the most successful years Hanover had ever experienced. It is not true that there was constant crunching between the two, says Slomka: “We were said to have conflicts that we both knew nothing about.”
But why did it break out then? Slomka is reminiscent of an episode that is unique in the Bundesliga. The coach had wanted a tall player who was 1m 90 tall and strong in the air. Schmadtke found what he was looking for in the Brazilian Franca, the club issued a message in which Slomka was quoted as saying: “I’m looking forward to Franca.” When Franca arrived in Hanover, the coach was amazed. The player was a few centimeters away from the targeted guard measure; Slomka, a stately figure, didn’t even need to measure. Slomka also revealed his surprise about the transfer failure at a media conference. From that point on, according to Slomka, things would have taken a course which could no longer be corrected.
Already as a footballer open to opinions
“Different from others” – this is what the Berlin “TAZ” once called the manager. It was by no means meant in the sense of the clichés that want to recognize one of the rare originals in the league in the passionately bad-tempered man. Rather, it was also aimed at Schmadtke’s tendency to understand conflicts as part of the work. In constant harmony, he is convinced, one cannot work successfully.
But can this surprise? One look at footballer Schmadtke’s career is enough to see that he follows his principles. Even then, in the early 1990s, Schmadtke was considered a special character. The goalkeeper knew how to stage his special position well – in brightly colored gear and with flowing hair. In Düsseldorf, the professional was occasionally spotted at games in the leisure league, but as a field player. He is not someone who always says yes and amen, Schmadtke explained to WDR at the time after he clashed with his trainer in Düsseldorf: “The opinion I represent is not always right, I know that too. But I’m a person who likes to enter into discussions and, through the discussion, I try to open up new perspectives for myself and others.”
Volker Finke, who was preparing to revolutionize German football at the time, guided him to SC Freiburg, who had just been promoted. The coach appreciated the goalie’s inclination. In Freiburg, Schmadtke was not an eccentric with opinions. But he was an outsider after all: the one who didn’t belong to the group of students who had found their way into the Bundesliga. Schmadtke’s view of the situation in Freiburg was not clouded by this wildly romantic success story – that was also his value for the team, says Finke: “There are times when things don’t get better on their own – and it’s good when a player is critical and sometimes opens his mouth in front of the team. »
Hard tit-for-tat
Open your mouth: The clear decision is closer to Schmadtke than the compromise. When things got tricky with Slomka in Hanover, he asked for his contract to be terminated. It was no different in Cologne, where the conflict over the popular coach Peter Stöger still seems difficult to understand for many observers. Because the relationship between the two makers was long considered good. But in autumn 2017, the manager believed that Stöger could not save the team from relegation. Since Stöger was held in high esteem in Cologne and the Cologne board of directors backed the Austrian, Schmadtke himself gave up. In Cologne, too, he had not shown himself to be a supporter of high-level football diplomacy. When French striker Anthony Modeste forced his move to China, Schmadtke accused him of greed.
Jörg Schmadtke left Cologne in autumn 2017 because he wanted to replace the then FC coach Peter Stöger (pictured).
Modeste has since returned to Cologne. In December he scored twice in the 3-2 win against Wolfsburg. His Greetings to the former boss was unmistakable: “We won against Wolfsburg, Schmadtke’s team. You always meet twice in life. It’s nice to win here and send Wolfsburg into the crisis.” The Wolfsburg crisis, which Anthony Modeste enjoyed so much, is no more and no less than the essential test for the manager.