Jörgen Pettersson on the fatal accident that changed his career

Jörgen Pettersson on the event that changed his career

Of: Erik niva

Published: 02 September 2020 kl. 00.04

• Each person has their story, each season has their story, and each soccer jersey can take you to a different time and place.

• From Manchester to Manila, from Seattle to Simferopol, through the 90s, through the turn of the millennium and up to the present.

• These are the stories about the Swedes who moved into the world of football, the places they ended up, and the jerseys they wore.

COMES? Jörgen Pettersson

WHERE? FC Kaiserslautern

WHEN? 2001/02

/ PETTERSSON SAYS HIMSELF /

“In total, I played three seasons in Kaiserslautern, I got there in 1999. Then we had gone with Mönchengladbach, and the following year it would be the European Championships in Belgium and Holland. Staying and playing in the 2. Bundesliga was not an option.

Despite the fact that we had left, I personally had done well, so there were a few different options. But Kaiserslautern were really a superior team at this point, they had won the Bundesliga and played in the Champions League, so when Otto Rehhagel called, it was an attractive offer.

In many ways, it was a great year. I enjoyed it very much. Kaiserslautern is quite small and I lived a bit outside myself. In practice, it was in the mountains, or at least in a forest. It suited me well, it was a beautiful setting; I have always enjoyed the woods.

At home at Fritz-Walter-Stadion, we had packed almost every game. The team was really good, we went to the semi-finals of the Uefacup in 2001, and also a good group of guys.

Youri Djorkaeff was there. Robust, one of the best I have played with. Taribo West too, but it was mostly weird. Suddenly, he could only ignore showing up at a match drive, because he had decided to go to a church in Italy. Good player, but very strange person.

After all, I was really focused on leaving the club in the summer of 2001. I had been cut off a bit by the decision-makers at the club, and for some reason they decided that some of us would not even be allowed to train any more with the first. equipment. There were three or four of us who came to train on the wing, and I remember I was crazy.

But I also remember that he trained like an animal, that it really was this: “Now fuck it, I’ll show you!” So after a period, I had to start training with the first team again, and then the next step was to go back to the starting eleven.

I also remember training like an animal, which was really this: “Now fuck it, I’ll show you!”

He had played at the top with Miroslav Klose, but during the previous season they had chosen Czech Vratislav Lokvenc as their new forward. I spoke to Andreas Brehme, who was the coach, and he explained that they didn’t think I was a good enough leading player. Instead, they said they would make me … well, a midfielder. If I was interested in staying, then I was in a new position.

And I did it. We were having twins, so I didn’t want to take the whole family out on short notice. And after all, I also felt that it might be a bit interesting to play as a number 10 guy.

I was never the type of forward to score 20-25 goals per season, a boxer, but it was more this dribbling forward. In that way, it was fun to have a lot of ball and to be more involved in the structure of the game. I really enjoyed it.

We play football very well. Often 3-5-2 and a lot of play down the middle, and it was fun when I was ten, but sometimes it meant I had to take on the role of winger. And that was fine … not exactly my position. But I still have good skin.

Once the season started, we got off to a very good start. At the premiere, we won big against 1860 Munich, I scored immediately, and then we kept winning. Two months into the season, we still hadn’t lost a single point. We had seven wins in a row, of course topping the table.

It had done very well for me too, but in the fifth game against Werder Bremen I injured a small knee and had to leave.

In the 10th round, we face FC Bayern Munich in an early league final. They were reigning Champions League champions, but we were still leading the series. It was the first game I came back after the injury, so I started on the bench, and when I was replaced during the break, it was already over. Bayern had already scored three goals in the first half hour, and with that, of course, the match was over.

It was a sporting disappointment, but absolutely nothing compared to what happened to me a few days later. It is a dark, dark part of both my life and my football career.

He was on his way home from the Autobahn at night, he had been shopping in Mannheim. It was night, dark and very rainy, and I was driving at about 100 or 110 kilometers per hour. Suddenly, there was only a small car crossing the lane in front of me, and much more than that I did not have time to perceive … Pang! Then it turned into a fucking explosion.

In hindsight, I have understood that the car I was driving had first touched another car, turned around, and then stayed in my file.

After the accident, I got out of my car and crawled to the other car, which ended up quite a distance. I saw an arm sticking out, so I went there to feel for a pulse. But I immediately realized that … this was not good. He has died. I think I was 20 years old.

The luck for me was that I was driving a fairly large Mercedes, while the other car was quite small. Otherwise it probably would have ended for me too. My partner was also about to give birth to twins, so she had taken our oldest son and left for Sweden early. It was also a fucking twist, because otherwise I would hardly dare to think about what might have happened. But still it was those thoughts that ran through my head for a long time.

Experiencing something like this, sitting in a car that costs someone else his life … It’s nothing you want, not even your worst enemy. Neither myself nor any of my loved ones died in that accident, but a little bit of … well, what should I call it … probably still died? My spark.

Soccer was no longer so important. Soccer wasn’t so much fun anymore. It greatly affected his career. They don’t talk about it, but that was it. Soccer was never the same again.

It greatly affected his career. They don’t talk about it, but that was it. Soccer was never the same again.

If this had happened today, you probably would have been in direct contact with professional specialists; sat in conversation and spoke and got help getting back on track. But that was not the case at this time. Unfortunately. Kaiserslautern asked, “How are you?” – but then he was pretty good with it. Then it was time to start looking forward to the next game.

I’ve always been a person who likes to keep things inside of me, I don’t talk much, and that probably contributed to all of this taking me so long to let go. Everything stayed with me for a long time, for many years.

Sometimes it was difficult for me to fall asleep, the whole accident kept playing in my head like a nasty movie. In fact, it can still happen today, even if it feels completely different now.

Very soon I felt that I definitely wanted to leave Germany. Despite the fact that the police immediately came out and said that they had absolutely no fault for what had happened, that they could not have done anything differently, there were still people who thought differently. The journalists chased me and I really felt the need to get away. But still, it continued to torment me, somehow.

One thought was this: “Imagine if I had a couple of beers for dinner that night.” Then I would have been branded a murderer for the rest of my life and I would have to live with myself.

Now he knew he had done nothing wrong, but despite that, he was still sitting in a car and driving over someone who had died. And it’s one thing to know something in your brain, it’s another thing to forgive yourself in your heart. Somehow I felt guilty even though I wasn’t. It was a mess in my head.

All this spring, the thoughts were definitely elsewhere. Not only am I to blame for my underperformance in what happened, it was extremely difficult for me to find focus. In the middle of a game, thoughts can disappear, and then you’re bad as a soccer player. On a professional level, you have to go out and feel number 1, that’s it.

In the past, I was always motivated by the fact that I loved the sport of soccer. It would never have been important with fame or money, but the only thing that mattered was that it was so much fun to play soccer. But now it was no longer like that. When I felt like it wouldn’t even be fun to go to training, when I woke up and football felt uncomfortable, it was something that had died away and disappeared inside of me.

I was a bit in and out of the starting eleven. He scored a few goals, remember one against Mönchengladbach and another against Dortmund, but the flashes of light were quite few. I received some minor injuries and consequential injuries, and I think it was definitely possible to connect that I was not in my place mentally. It wasn’t the real me. It was not the real Jörgen Pettersson who was on the field and playing, his soul was elsewhere.

When the season finally ended, I had high hopes of starting over somewhere else. I had a couple of offers from Spain and Italy, Atalanta was one of the clubs, and it had really always been my dream to play in Serie A. But by now my wife had given birth to our twins and somewhere the whole situation made us want to get closer. Home. We wanted to go home, and Hasse Backe was at FC Copenhagen at the time.

It felt like a natural choice, but it still didn’t work out. Half the time in Copenhagen was probably fine, but the rest was shit. It was not enough to get out of Germany, the thoughts continued anyway.

It was not enough to get out of Germany, the thoughts continued anyway.

Today, I don’t think so much about how my career could have been different, but if I had received professional help at the right time, the story could have ended differently. I had just turned 26 when the car accident happened, so I really should have had my best years ahead of me. That did not happen. I always felt like I had so much more in me, that I didn’t get as much as I could, but I never managed to get that sparkle and sparkle back.

It’s a bit bitter, of course, but it’s not something that makes me bitter today. Soccer is not everything. There are other things that are more important. Today I live and I feel good. It’s enough to make me thankful anyway.

Published: 02 September 2020 kl. 00.04

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