Chinese players in Europe

Chapter 65 Hoffenheim
Before 1989, Hoffenheim had always been a small club for self-entertainment. The team was not strong, there were no stars, not even good players, let alone ambition.In this year, Hoffenheim, who was mixed in the seventh tier of the German league, was relegated miserably. Dietmar, one of the founders of the famous European software company SAP, who was trained in the Hoffenheim youth team.Hope began to invest in the club's football career.Since then, Hoffenheim has completed seven consecutive jumps in less than 20 years, and even in the Bundesliga in 08/09, it radiated the light of enthusiasm and rumors.

Hoffenheim is just a small village in Sinsheim, with only over 3000 residents. On the map of Germany, not to mention Hoffenheim, even Sinsheim is hard to find. This city is located in Between Mannheim and Heidelberg.The transportation here is inconvenient, there is only one railway station, but the trains passing here are only old and old rural special lines.But no one cares. This village is like a paradise. Few tourists set foot here, and the villagers rarely go out.

In 1991, the team returned to the regional league in Sinsheim. In 1992, Hoffenheim was promoted to another level and entered the Rhine-Neckar Regional League. In the following eight years, the Hoffenheim club's participation level gradually improved.Due to the steady improvement of the team's performance, it is getting closer and closer to the professional league, but Hoffenheim does not have its own home court, which is inconsistent with the identity of a team that aspires to become a professional team.The Dietmar-Hope Stadium invested and built by Hope and named after him has been put into use.The stadium has a small capacity and can only accommodate about 1999 fans, but it is enough for a small village with a population of just over 5000.The stadium was full, and it was with the crazy support of the fans that in the 3000/00 season, the Hoffenheim football team was promoted to the Southern German Regional League, one step away from the professional Bundesliga.

However, after entering the Southern Regional League, Hoffenheim's promotion pace began to slow down.Although in the "2002-05" years, the club won the Baden Regional Cup successively, and reached the quarter-finals of the "German Cup" in the 03-04 season-although it lost 0 to 1 to the "Lu Baker Club", but the team has already had a lot of upsets by defeating the Bundesliga powerhouse Leverkusen 3-2 in one-eighth, but the team has never been able to go further and enter the Bundesliga.

In 2005, Hope began to plan to bring the wonderful events of professional football to the Rhine-Neckar region. For this purpose, Hope initially suggested that Hoffenheim, Walldorf and Sandhausen should merge to form a club. "Heidelberg 06 Club", and funded by him, built a modern stadium in Heidelberg.However, during the merger process, the plan was ultimately aborted because Walldorf and Sandhausen clubs could not agree on the location of the new stadium.

This is also thanks to the miscarriage of this plan, otherwise maybe Hoffenheim would not have achieved what it is today. As for the "Miracle of Huo Village", it will always be an unattainable fantasy.

The failure of the merger plan did not deal a blow to Hope, who fired Flick, the current assistant coach of the German men's national team and then the head coach of Hoffenheim.Flick took over the team's coach in 2000, but the team's record has not been ideal. During the six years of coaching, the team has never been able to let the team enter the professional league stage. In the 05-06 season, Hoffenheim's plan to score in the Bundesliga was frustrated again. Hope lost his patience and terminated the contract with Flick originally signed in 2010, and Flick dismissed get out of class sadly.

Later, Hope realized that the team not only needed good players, but also an excellent management team, so he recruited Lahr, who was once the head coach of the Bundesliga powerhouse Schalke 04 and known as the "football professor" for the team. husband.Rangnick, and former national hockey coach Bernhard.Peters invited him to serve as the sports director of his foundation, and Hans, the German national psychologist.Dieter.Hermann was also brought in to work part-time at the club.In addition, Rothaus, who was the general manager of Stuttgart, and Jan, the manager with outstanding business ability.Schindelmaiser, a luxurious management team set up completed.Under the leadership of Rangnick, Hoffenheim was successfully promoted to the Bundesliga Bundesliga in the 06-07 season. In the following season, Hope invested nearly 1900 million euros in signings. With the strength greatly strengthened, the team will make great efforts in the future. , entered the Bundesliga in one fell swoop.And in their first Bundesliga season, they have made remarkable achievements.

At the same time, Hope, who was eager to create a Bundesliga team, built a new modern stadium in Sinsheim under the suggestion of his team by the Hope Foundation under his command. The home field after A's success.The new stadium is named "Rhine-Neckar Stadium", with a standard capacity of 30500 people. Construction began after the team was promoted to the Bundesliga in 07 and is planned to be put into use in January 09.After the team was promoted to the Bundesliga, the Dietmar-Hopp Stadium has not met the rigid regulations for the home venue of the First Division. Before the new stadium is completed, it can only be rented for the "Mannheim Stadium". It was here that Hoffenheim won the winter championship, waved goodbye to the past with a miracle, and waved to the future.

There is also a little story here. The first official match of the "Rhine-Neckar Stadium" was against Cottbus, where the Chinese player Shao Jiayi played. The team messed up Hoffenheim's feast, and Shao Jiayi also said firmly in an interview that he would lead the team to victory.However, the final result was that Cottbus was dropped cleanly by his opponents. As for "Huaxia Shao", who was talking loudly before the game, he didn't even make the 18-man squad.

Could it be that he already knows all the information about Hoffenheim by heart? He has done a lot of hard work before. After all, he will stay here for many years. Without a clear understanding, he can't justify it.Hoffenheim's starting from scratch really touched him a lot. He couldn't help but marvel at this small team that has created miracles, and he is also full of interest in the future here.

Although Hoffenheim has a long history but a blank background, the reason for its success is that there is a club owner who is extremely fanatical about football behind him. It is precisely because of his love for Hoffenheim for 20 years , Tirelessly investing funds to improve hardware facilities for the team, build venues, improve youth training camps for the team, and build the best high-tech clinic in Germany, which made Hoffenheim achieve what it is today.Of course, the excellent management team headed by Lannick is the best lubricant for these two trains to success.

A boss who loves football, and an excellent and ambitious management team, the team under his command must also be full of ambitions.For the future, Mo Fei is full of expectations. He believes that he and the team he is about to join will make great achievements.

But now is not the time to express emotion, he straightened his clothes and knocked on the door in front of him.The red wooden door gives people a feeling of passion. On it, there is a small wooden sign with several golden letters on it:
Head coach's office.

"Please come in."

There was a voice in the room, not loud, but full of air.

Could it be that he took a deep breath, then raised his legs and walked in.In fact, he is still a little nervous. As a Chinese, it is very important to make a good impression on the other party when they meet for the first time, not to mention that he is about to meet his immediate boss, that is, the helm of the team. He will work under him for at least three years, which is not a short period of time. He naturally wants the other party to give him enough attention.

Hoffenheim coach Ralf.Lannick is a refined middle-aged man with a rather handsome appearance. He has a high nose bridge unique to Westerners and a pair of gold-rimmed glasses on it, which makes him look more like a well-learned university professor than a Professional sportsman.Could it be that the name of the head coach in front of him as "Professor" is largely due to his handsome appearance? Of course, Lannick's coaching level is indeed very high, and he can single-handedly turn an amateur team into a professional league team , The level is not enough, I really can't play it.

"Welcome, Mo." After seeing Mo Fei, Mei Li and Liu Yang who pushed the door and entered, Lannick had a warm smile like the morning sun on his face.Lannick spoke German, and he held out his hand to shake hands with Murphy and Merri.

Mo Fei stretched out his hand to shake each other.He felt pretty good, and Lannick's easy-going made him feel like an old friend, which relieved his nervousness a lot.He began to feel that the other party was not a difficult person to get along with, and maybe playing under him would be a pleasant experience.

"What do you think of Hoffenheim?" After greeting, Rangnick asked with a smile.

Could it be that he turned his face to Liu Yang, he couldn't understand what the other party was saying.Although he carries a German daily terminology handbook, he can understand some simple conversations, but now, he still has to rely on Liu Yang's help.

Seeing Mo Fei's expression, Lannick felt dazed, patted his forehead, and said to Liu Yang with a smile, "I forgot that Mo can't speak German, so I have to trouble Mr. Liu now." over again.He knew Liu Yang. It was he who suggested that the club hire Liu Yang, who had worked for Hoffenheim, as Murphy's translator and German teacher. The two had a lot of contacts.

Liu Yang smiled, nodded to Lannick, and started his own work.

"Very nice, I like it here." With Liu Yang's translation, although there was a person sandwiched between the questions and the answers, it seemed a bit funny, but there was no problem in communication.Could it be that after listening to Liu Yang's report, he opened his mouth to answer.This is not a word for him to deal with, he really has a good impression of this place.Although it is the first time to come to Huo Village today, he enjoys the beautiful rural scenery here, and he also likes the quiet life, and the simple and enthusiastic villagers also make him remember deeply.

"Well, I hope you have a good time here." Lannick nodded, and after the greetings, he began to get down to business, "We watched some of your training and game videos, and I think your performance is very good. Especially In the game against Shanghai Hua, I still have a deep memory and performed really well. I don’t know how your league level is, but I can see that the level of your two teams is not much different. Yours Showing up is the key to tipping that balance. I think you're way too much above them, so we're bringing you here."

(End of this chapter)