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Joachim Löw has the situation under control again. After the 6-0 draw against Spain, there was much speculation about whether the national coach could lose his job. Now it is clear: he will remain in office. The 2014 world champion coach will retire to his hometown of Freiburg in the coming months and calmly prepare for the appearance of the national team at the European championship next June.
For another Freiburg resident, however, the next few weeks will be uncomfortable. You have to ask Fritz Keller, president of the German Football Association (DFB), if he really is suitable for the position.
On Monday there was a violent dispute between the Breisgau winemaker and Löw. The two men had agreed to meet at the DFB headquarters in Frankfurt for a summit meeting. In the presence of the DFB presidential committee, Keller and Löw discussed the question of how the troubled national team should continue. Löw is said to have massively attacked Keller in the course of the debate. According to observers, SPIEGEL reported that the national coach had reproached the head of the association, feeling that he had betrayed him.
Löw felt he was being guided
The reason: Keller had apparently promised Löw after the 6-0 draw against Spain that he would support him despite the embarrassment. In a press release the day after the gossip in Seville, the president in fact made it known that he was totally behind the national team players and that the path he had taken with the young players was exactly the right one. The name of the national coach is not mentioned in the statement.
The statement, which apparently had not been discussed with other members of the DFB Presidium, was emailed to the media and hit like a bomb. There was immediate speculation about a possible dismissal of Löw or a resignation of the national coach. When it was said that Löw had to present an analysis of the Seville blackout to the DFB presidium at a regular meeting on December 4, it seemed that it had been taken seriously.
The world looked different: National coach Löw and President Keller in late November 2019
Photo: Simon Hoffmann / UEFA via Getty Images
Löw felt that they were leading him. Plus, insiders say, he was angry that he even had to explain himself. To end speculation in the media and among the fans, the national coach urged a quick clarification of the situation. So the premature meeting with Keller and other DFB officials came on Monday.
Löw was very excited but also confident during the interview in the DFB headquarters library, experts reported. “Many things happened”. Keller was surprised by the vehemence of the national coach. According to the “Bild” newspaper, the president is said to have tried to take away the angry coach’s consent to resign after MS. Löw, whose contract runs through 2022, is said to have refused.
Following the exchange of blows between Löw and Keller, the members of the DFB Presidium flared up. Another press release was written at the end of the meeting. This time a better coordinated one. In it, Löw’s work was enthusiastically praised. The DFB leadership is sure, it was now said, that the 2014 world champion coach will play an “exciting European Championship” with his team. Hipp Hipp Hurray.
Löw had spoken to Keller Tacheles and prevailed. Also the director of the DFB, Oliver Bierhoff, who had indirectly put Löw to argue with an interview before the 6-0 draw against Spain (He said: “The path that the national coach has taken, I will go to the MS included.” Löws runs Contract until 2022), is said to have been criticized by Löw. It is said that he apologized to Löw.
The eternal national coach, who according to polls, the majority of fans no longer consider the right person in the position, emerges stronger from the cause. He keeps going. And the basement?
Another strange appearance
At noon on Wednesday, the president gave a big press conference in Frankfurt. Many representatives of the media had joined. Everyone wanted to know something about the discussion with Löw. However, a spokeswoman announced that the president would not comment. Instead, Keller lectured on the important work of club volunteers in Corona’s time. He didn’t want to talk about Sevilla’s 6-0 draw, “although that would be attractive to one or the other,” Keller said. Rather, he wants to talk about the “heroines and heroes” of volunteer work to give them the platform they deserve. It still looked like someone was standing in the stormy rain, but pretending that the sun was shining.
It was another strange appearance of a man who slowly nobody knows what he represents. Keller, president of the DFB for more than a year, replaced Reinhard Grindel, who had to leave after various business. Keller, long-time president of SC Freiburg, seemed to be exactly the right person to get the DFB, damaged by the summer fairy tale scandal, back on track. The 63-year-old is a successful entrepreneur. In his cellar near Freiburg, he hears, he appears as the sole ruler. What the boss says is done.
In the sprawling DFB empire, where many alpha animals want to rule, Keller sometimes seems lost, without guidance. For months, the president has been fighting for power with Secretary General Friedrich Curtius. Keller recently cleared Franz Beckenbauer of responsibility in the summer fairy tale affair for no reason. There was criticism from all sides.
Great failed maneuver
Keller’s approach to Personnel Loew is also causing some DFB officials to shake their heads. Observers report that after the embarrassment in Seville, the president never really followed the plan to force Löw out of office on short notice. The fact that Keller did not want to publicly endorse the national coach, rather than fueling speculation with an airy press release, appears to stem from the fact that the DFB chief does not want to link his fate to the Löws. This is how connoisseurs of the association interpret it. At a distance from the controversial coach, Keller wants to avoid being held jointly and severally liable in the event of an MS failure.
If that was really the plan, the maneuver has failed terribly. The Presidium of the DFB meets on Friday. Then Löw will no longer be a problem, but the errant president will be.
