Four days after the World Cup in Qatar
Four days after the elimination of the national (Site notre bureau spécialisé) team from the preliminary round of the World Cup in Qatar, Oliver Bierhoff suffered the consequences. The 54-year-old is leaving the German (Site notre blog d’information) Association after 18 years, the two sides agreed on Monday to terminate the contract, which runs until 2024.
« I’m paving the way for new course settings, » Bierhoff said in a statement late Monday: « Some decisions we were convinced of didn’t turn out to be the right ones. No one regrets that more than me. I takes responsibility. »
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The senior official thus revised the attitude he expressed immediately after the end of the World Cup on Thursday that he wanted to head for the 2024 European Championships on home soil as his next big goal. “I wish the DFB, its many committed employees, all the associations and clubs, institutions and initiatives gathered under its roof and our national teams every success in their important missions,” said the former professional.
Bierhoff quits as DFB director responsible for national teams and academy ahead of crisis talks with DFB president Bernd Neuendorf and DFL supervisory board chairman Hans-Joachim Watzke announced for the midfielder the week. The DFB committees will discuss the succession plan. At first, it was unclear what consequences Hansi Flick’s resignation would have for the future as national coach.
Bierhoff arrived at the DFB in 2004, in a role the association had never seen before. As a team manager, he played a key role in the summer fairy tale at the home World Cup two years later, alongside national coach Jürgen Klinsmann. With great success, he created a spirit of optimism for the DFB-Elf, which ultimately resulted in the 2014 World Cup triumph in Brazil with Joachim Löw as national coach.
World champion 2014: The German team according to the market values of the time
For Bierhoff, alongside the sporting decline, a continued loss of acceptance among fans followed at the latest after EM-Aus 2016. His marketing concepts were interpreted negatively. The term ‘The Team’ which he introduced as a brand message for the national team didn’t catch on at all. The completion of the DFB Academy in Frankfurt as the association’s new headquarters was a counterpoint to the critical mood and an affair of the heart for the 1996 European champion.
Even with the tournament planning, things didn’t go well for the former centre-forward. His anthem-acclaimed shack village Campo Bahia in Brazil was the team’s latest stroke of luck as a neighborhood. The hotel in Vatutinki near Moscow came under heavy criticism in 2018, especially after the World Cup. The Zulal Wellnes Resort in Al-Ruwais in northern Qatar has also become the symbol of an overly sheltered and isolated national team. After failing the preliminary round again, Bierhoff was even more of a concern for disappointed (Site notre bureau spécialisé) fans than Flick.
Olivier Bierhoff and the #DFB today agreed to prematurely terminate their contract, which runs until 2024.
We wish Olivier #Bierhoff All the best for his future work.
— DFB (Federation) (@DFB) December 5, 2022
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