“We advised him against it”
National coach criticizes Eisenbichler openly and harshly
December 18, 2023, 7:24 a.m
Markus Eisenbichler is a six-time world champion and former model athlete for German ski jumpers. But this season he is not getting going, and the results in the second-class Continental Cup are not right either. The national coach criticizes his protégé.
Ski jumping national coach Stefan Horngacher openly criticized long-time top performer Markus Eisenbichler. “It’s incomprehensible to me that he can’t bring anything together. I haven’t spoken to him. He often covers up a lot of things. We have to talk about where the journey is going. Performance counts, that’s just the way it is. It doesn’t matter how many Medals you have hanging at home,” said Horngacher, referring to the Four Hills Tournament, for which the 32-year-old Bavarian is not a candidate in his current form.
In four competitions in the second-class Continental Cup, Eisenbichler recently came 14th, 23rd, 16th and 26th. For Horngacher, this is the result of some difficulties. “He had a bit too many problems in the summer: with his knee, he was constantly injured, and also with his training. We also advised him against that, but that doesn’t necessarily have to be the case. He definitely wanted to go through with it.” Eisenbichler took a few liberties. “He probably made a few mistakes too,” noted Horngacher. It is still unclear whether Eisenbichler will take part in the Four Hills Tournament as part of the “national group”, an additional contingent that the DSV can nominate for the German competitions.
The German team got off to an impressive start to the season even without their former model jumper Eisenbichler, who became the individual world champion of the Großchance in 2019 and won Olympic silver in the team in 2022: After four World Cup stops, the German jumpers lead the nations rankings With victories from Karl Geiger (2) and Pius Paschke, the DSV Adler won three of the first eight competitions of the season. Behind the outstanding Austrian Stefan Kraft, Andreas Wellinger, Paschke and Geiger are in second to fourth place in the World Cup standings, Stephan Leyhe is tenth.
Last season, the DSV team had reached a low point: for the first time in 15 years, no German made it into the top ten in the overall ranking of the Four Hills Tournament, Karl Geiger finished the World Cup in seventh place, and Eisenbichler, who was second overall in the World Cup in 2020, made it it only ranks 15th.