Creating World Champions (eBook)

How German Soccer Went from Shambles to Champions

Stephan Schmidt, Tim Stegmann (Autoren)

eBook Download: PDF

2016 | 1. Auflage
184 Seiten
Meyer & Meyer (Verlag)
978-1-78255-761-6 (ISBN)

Infos

Soccer players and coaches alike admire the German national team for their combination of individual qualities and teamwork, leading to some of the most creative soccer being played during the 2014 World Championship. The roots for the German team's success can be found in the youth training practiced in German soccer clubs. Most professional soccer clubs in Germany have their own youth academy where the next Bundesliga stars are formed. Of the 2014 World Cup squad, only Miroslav Klose was not trained in one of these academies. In this book, the system used for German soccer youth development is explained with particular emphasis on the different paths that young players can take on the road to success. World Champions and rising star players present their individual stories and some of the exercises that improve their strengths and remove their weaknesses. This book contains many interviews with former Bundesliga stars, soccer experts, and youth and professional coaches as well as an overview of the youth development program of an ambitious amateur club. Some of the star players interviewed include Marco Reus, Manuel Neuer, and Shkodran Mustafi as well as rising stars Sebastian Rode and Maximilian Arnold. This book is for everyone who's interested in the German Soccer Association's talent nurturing and different perspectives on the preparation of young players for a professional soccer career.

Stephan Schmidt currently works in the youth academy of FC Schalke 04, holds courses for advanced training for soccer coaches, and is DFB-certified soccer coach and sports manager. During his playing career, he played for Hertha BSC, Preußen Münster, Babelsberg 03, and Tennis Borussia. When he ended his career, he became a lecturer at the elite school of soccer in Berlin, youth coach at Hertha BSC, and won the Northern German Championship and the German Championship with the U19 of VFL Wolfsburg. He was also head coach in the second Bundesliga at SC Paderborn and Energie Cottbus. Stephan Schmidt is also freelance author for the DFB magazine fußballtraining. Tim Stegmann has been honored for his social commitment by the Olympic base in Hamburg. He holds the DFB A-License and has been working in the youth academy of VfL Wolfsburg since finishing university. Currently, he is coach and assistant manager of the youth academy. Tim Stegmann has many years' youth coaching experience in Germany and abroad and has published articles in the DFB magazine fußballtraining junior.

Inhalt

Cover 1
Table of Contents 7
Preface 10
Introduction 13
PART 1: LOOKING BACK 17
1 The dancing refrigerators – From the depression of the turn of the millennium to the fourth title 17
1.1 The first step – An extensive network of DFB centers 19
1.2 Talent development at youth performance centers 24
1.3 Star wars – Ensuring quality at youth performance centers 25
1.4 Reformation 2.0 25
1.5 Visible progress 26
1.6 German in-house production: The local player 28
1.7 To the top of the world 28
2 A word from Germany’s top coach – Interview with Frank Wormuth 33
PART 2: YOUTH DEVELOPMENT 39
3 The wellspring of the future – Youth performance centers 39
3.1 Introduction 39
3.2 Training at VfB Stuttgart – Tradition obliges 48
3.2.1 The newly constructed youth performance center – An important foundation for the future 49
3.2.2 A conversation with Rainer Adrion, athletic director at the youth performance center 51
3.3 The Kroos family – A down-home success story 54
3.3.1 Interview with Roland Kroos 55
3.4 The Berlin way – Training top talent for pro soccer 59
3.4.1 Introduction 59
3.4.2 Frank Vogel talks 60
3.5 School, Chelsea, and the fight for the dream – Maurice Neubauer of U19 of FC Schalke 04 67
3.6 VfL Wolfsburg – Holistic thinking as the key to youth development 71
3.7 Interview with Werner Mickler, DFB psychologist 78
3.8 BVB – Practiced consistency 86
3.8.1 Insights into BVB’s approach by U19 coach, Hannes Wolf 88
3.8.2 Youth soccer coach as a full-time job 90
3.9 Diligence, international flair, and blood, sweat, and tears – Schalke 04’s youth division builds pros 93
3.9.1 Interview with Schalke’s director of youth development, Oliver Ruhnert 93
3.10 At the threshold to pro soccer – Life after the youth performance center 100
PART 3: EXAMPLES 107
4 Many roads lead to the top 107
4.1 Manuel Neuer – The boy from Buer starts the goalkeeper revolution 108
4.2 No name – European vagabond – world champion – The crazy tale of Shkodran Mustafi 114
4.3 Sebastian Rode – From a parking lot to FC Bayern 120
4.4 Debuting with a club record – Maximilian Arnold 123
4.5 Back to his roots – The path of Marco Reus 126
5 Individual training units of star players 131
5.1 Ralf Fährmann 132
5.2 Shkodran Mustafi 136
5.3 Sebastian Rode 139
5.4 Marco Reus 142
PART 4: AMATEUR SOCCER 147
6 Recreational sports form the base of the path to the Top – Amateur soccer 147
6.1 Started small, made it big – Some national team players and their beginnings 151
6.2 Project TuS Haltern – A different kind of amateur club 154
7 Between Bernabeu, Arena Berlin, and Stauseekampfbahn Stadium – Interview with vice world champion, Christoph Metzelder 163
8 A look ahead 171
8.1 “Germany will dominate European soccer in the next 10 years” 172
8.2 More investment to stay on top 175
References 180
Photo credits 185

Textauszug

3.2 TRAINING AT VFB STUTTGART– TRADITION OBLIGES

VfB Stuttgart has a tradition of successful youth work. Currently more than 100 players who trained three or more years on youth teams are under contract nationally and internationally. Transfer proceeds from homegrown players are also significant. For instance, Mario Gomez transferred to FC Bayern Munich for the then record sum of over 30 million Euros, and the star midfielders Sami Khedira and Aleksandr Hleb also fetched huge sums, 14 million and 15 million Euros, respectively. Even the at the time of his transfer, inexperienced 20-year-old Bernd Leno brought the considerable sum of 8 million Euros.

From the VfB Stuttgart youth program: Sami Khedira
© picture-alliance.com/dpa

When VfB Stuttgart won the German national championship in 2007, they had more than seven home-trained players as part of their permanent personnel, including goalkeeper Timo Hildebrand; defenders Andreas Beck and Serdar Tasci; midfielders Christian Gentner and Sami Khedira; and forward Mario Gomez.

The term young savages made the rounds again and defined a generation that originated during the 2002/2003 season, when the VfB could celebrate a sensational second-place finish. Back then, players like Kevin Kuranyi, Christian Tiffert, Ioannis Amanatidis, and Andreas Hinkel, who played alongside experienced players like Zvonimir Soldo and Krassimir Balakov, drew attention with strong performances. The brand “young savages” became a seal of quality for the successful Stuttgart youth development program, which now is held in great esteem all over Europe. Sami Khedira played for Real Madrid in Spain and currently is under contract with the prestigious top Italian club Juventus Torino; Mario Gomez hunts goals for Besiktas Istanbul, Turkey, and Serdar Tasci plays at Spartak Moscow, Russia.

During the 2014/2014 season, Timo Baumgartl was the next player to step into the footsteps of the young savages around Timo Werner and company and continued the successful tradition on the professional team.

Physical therapy and weight room at the VfB Stuttgart
© VfB Stuttgart

The successes of the junior A and B teams are further evidence of the long-term good and successful youth development work performed at VfB Stuttgart. With 10 junior A and 6 junior B championship titles, the VfB holds the record in youth titles, which shows that team successes in youth development do not play a minor part.

3.2.1 The newly constructed youth performance center–An important foundation for the future

The opening of the newly constructed youth performance center in November 2014 marked an investment in additional building blocks toward a continued leading role in youth development in the future. Here existing empirical evidence regarding infrastructure use and practicability in past years was used during the preliminary stages to push the infrastructural parameters and thereby the content quality of the Stuttgart youth performance center to a higher level yet again.

The youth complex is located right next to the professional wing, which results in close ties and interlocking through proximity and crossing paths. The features of the new structure even exceed the high licensing requirements for youth performance centers specified by the DFL. The new youth performance center offers VfB talent from U11 to U23 more than 250,000 square feet of floor space.

Next to locker rooms for each team it also contains fitness, weight, and recovery rooms and an office complex for the athletic director, coaches, scouts, psychologists, and the administration, thus creating a manpower conglomerate.

A photo gallery of players who grew up at VfB graces the walls and serves as a daily reminder to all players that the transition to pro soccer is deeply anchored in the club’s philosophy.

Photo gallery of VfB Stuttgart players
© VfB Stuttgart

In doing so, the club reacts to the constantly growing youth performance center structures at other professional clubs and meets the competition at the highest level.

“Youth development will remain a very important part of our strategy in the future. We have created an optimal infrastructure for our talent.”

VfB Stuttgart president, Bernd Wahler

3.2.2 A conversation with Rainer Adrion, sports director at the youth performance center

© picture-alliance.com/dpa

Rainer Adrion has been the new sports director (U17 to U23) at the youth performance center since July 2014. He has lots of coaching experience in professional soccer, including working as assistant coach under Jogi Löw at VfB (1996-1998) and in the DFB’s U21 youth soccer program, U23 coach at VfB, and worked with subsequent star players like Sami Khedira, Andreas Beck, Andreas Hinkel, Serdar Tasci, Mario Gomez, and others. He provides our readers with a general outline of the VfB’s philosophy.

The most essential characteristics young players need to make it in the pro soccer business:

“Talent is, of course, requisite and fundamental. The player should possess exceptional skills in a certain area. This can be, for instance, speed or coordination and technique. The more highly developed, the better. Coaches nurture, improve, and stabilize these skills and work specifically on weak points. A player’s ongoing self-motivation to work on his weak areas and his strengths, his willingness to prevail against every type of obstacle, that is what matters in the end.”

“ONE OF THE BUILDING BLOCKS IN OUR TRAINING IS CALLED WINNING MENTALITY”

Championship record holder as a training seal of approval:

VfB Stuttgart’s new youth performance center
© VfB Stuttgart

“We want to prepare players for professional soccer as best we can. One of the building blocks of this training is to develop the winning mentality that we demand from and nurture in every player, but also the team, every day. Of course, the training is more important than a title, but ideally the two should be combined. Titles are an affirmation of the work accomplished over the course of a year and a quality product of the club.”

The new youth performance center as a foundation for the future

“The new infrastructure allows us to improve the general conditions of our level of training, but the people who give life to these improved structures are what make the difference. The compactness of this new complex facilitates the principle of short distances and intensive communication.

The offices where coaches, scouts, administrative staff, and athletic directors work together every day on improvements and optimization are located on one level.

Experts from the individual areas ensure a comprehensive education:

Physical therapists for prophylactic improvement and individual guidance and care of talent, and with respect to regeneration.

The psychologist as constant contact person and advisor to players, coaches, and individual teams.

The athletic trainers who work with the players on the field or in the new weight room.

The physicians who care for injured or sick players.

The coaching teams for the performance teams consist of a full-time head coach, a part-time assistant coach, a full-time goalkeeping coach, and the previously mentioned athletic trainers, who are also full-time staff members.

The close interlocking of the individual areas and the principle of short distances create additional free time within the players’ busy daily schedule.

Our close cooperation with elite soccer schools has allowed us to considerably improve the volume and frequency and, thereby, the quality of training units.

We would like our players not to take our new infrastructure for granted, but rather consider it a privilege. This requires a good measure of humility and respect toward all staff, from the laundress to the own team members. That is also an important part of our players’ personal development. To highlight this, we have established a behavior ABC that is mandatory for every player.

Many of the day-to-day details are also governed in this ABC (e.g., choosing a physician, and also the use of social media and cell phones), which can be considered a kind of code of behavior for VfB players. Next to certain values (e.g., greeting all staff and teammates, punctuality, orderliness, respectful interaction), outward appearance is also regulated.”

Youth academy at the stadium:

“The view into the stadium from the rooms is meant to inspire additional motivation to pursue one’s goal of becoming a pro soccer players at VfB.”

Gym:

“The view from the weight room onto the training grounds at the youth performance center was also deliberately chosen to internalize training goals and reinforce personal goals.”

Levels of communication

“We consider the newly constructed dining hall another building block of cooperative life at our club. Pro players, coaches, youth players, and club staff meet for lunch in a separate area, eat sport-appropriate meals together, and swap ideas. This contributes to team spirit within our club and further identification.

We see the soccer tennis field that was built between the professional wing and the youth locker room wing as an additional meeting place for all players, where young and old meets and plays and has fun together in a casual...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 26.12.2016
• Verlagsort: Aachen
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Sachbuch/Ratgeber ► Sport ► Ballsport
• Schlagworte: 2014 • Bundesliga • Coaching • DFB • Germany • Manuel Neuer • Marco Reus • Soccer • Training • World Cup • Youth development
• ISBN-10: 1-78255-761-X / 178255761X
• ISBN-13: 978-1-78255-761-6 / 9781782557616