Günter Netzer in an interview: Thank God I was egoist

The west wind whistles aggressively over the island, the water waves, nine degrees, but the most beautiful sunshine and blue sky. Günter Netzer is enthusiastic about the current weather on Sylt, where he stays three times a year; currently again. He is a regular in the Sylt ferry house.

Mr. Netzer, 50 years ago the national team won in Wembley for the first time, 3–1 on April 29, 1972. Seven weeks later she became European champion. Did you initiate the victory in Wembley last Friday?

There was no reason for that. The joy that people think of it is enough. It would be stupid not to understand it as a big award that you remember it after 50 years.

This game in Wembley was born out of nowhere.

If they stormed forward with long steps and gewing hair at the time, the 96,800 spectators whispered. How do you personally relate to this game?

I was and am my biggest critic to this day and have always been looking for people from whom I could learn; And if it was a single sentence with an evening entertainment. Football was our life. We didn’t know the real life at all.

What are you more addressed today: on Wembley or on your self-change plus 2: 1-defined gate in the cup final against Cologne?

Clearly on the final. There was never anything like that and will no longer exist in the next 100 years that a player behaves as outrageously as I did at the time. But I have implanted that to my thinking: everything in life is determination.

How did this game shape your career and life in Wembley?

It was the highest that I had reached until then. With Gladbach we had some such games, in October 1971 the 7–1 against Inter Milan, which did not come on TV because manager Helmut Grashoff had requested 7000 marks. This game would have made Mönchengladbach world famous. We were all big heroes. With Borussia we played a football that you hardly saw in the world.

And where was the Wembley victory?

The Wembley at the time was a myth that today’s only from this past. It was unique with a lawn that was otherwise not in the world. Franz Beckenbauer said that he envies today’s generation not because of the many money, but because of the places where she can play. Today every lawn is like a billiard table, Wembley was the only one with this quality at the time. If you couldn’t play football there, you couldn’t do it anywhere. The underground was a bit mossy, deep, then there was drizzle. We experienced the original football there.

What effects did this game have on German football?

N1. We lived from our actors, of great players with the right trainers over the decades. The Brazilians had the best footballers, but not the discipline and the fighting spirit. They learned these skills abroad. But the Wembley victory has not changed our football.

Do you still feel something from the Wembley myth today?

I didn’t feel it back then because I saw what we could do in the Bundesliga: Uwe Seeler and the Hamburgers; Wolfgang Overath with Cologne, Jürgen Grabowski with the Frankfurters. Then Bayern, we Gladbacher.

Günter Netzer towered over in Wembley in 1972. imago images

Were the victory and play art of that eleven the logical highlight of a latent development or a sudden collective performance explosion of exceptional individual queen?

But on the contrary. We weren’t even a team, but a pile of thrown together who had problems with his scaffolding. And I don’t think anyone can explain why this game happened. There is no explanation that I could accept. We just played on it and noticed how well it could be. Everyone felt that he succeeded. That’s how it developed. This game in Wembley was born out of nowhere. Three minutes before we left the cabin, I knocked Franz on the knee and said: If we collect less than five goals, we have a great result. At Bavaria there was a mess, I only played because overath failed. We were there to pick up a disaster. Helmut Schön said afterwards that during training in the morning he felt that something had happened. I hadn’t felt anything.

They scored in the 84th minute, it was 1–1, the 2–1 by penalty. It was her only penalty in the DFB jersey. Did you know that everything would work for you that day?

It was nice to see it right: a player who had succeeded so much was predestined to take responsibility in this phase. Gerd Müller, otherwise Sagittarius, felt that he didn’t have the best day. Suddenly nicely pointed to me, ran along the line, then moved — to watch everything — backwards to the bank, sat down, but the bank was not there, so that it fell on the floor in three stages. The bankers broke together with laughter.

Banks had a plaster arm one and a half years after the 911.

Were you nervous in the execution?

I wasn’t nervous. And what the referees allow themselves today — before the Sagittarius is allowed to carry out, they do not do it with their instructions for three to five minutes — was not the case.

The ball just went in.

I was always raised that the ball only stayed short of the goal line. I replied that the ball was damn hard. Then the counter question came: Why? My answer: I met England’s keeper Gordon Banks a year and a half in a benefit game for Eusebio in Lisbon and wanted to greet him when he was still wearing a plaster arm. I asked him: what did you do? He said: I still have to suffer from your penalty _ (laughs on) _. I invented this story, nobody could check it.

were they aware of the force of the historical moment at the time?

Not at all. Not a second. It was a penalty, just do it in! Other thoughts would be detrimental. But, unlike usual, I cheered because it was very scarce.

You and Beckenbauer formed the congenial “Ramba-Zamba” duo with the alternating switch on the libero position. Did this idea come from both or from the national coach?

Since I had always specialists like overath or Peter Grosser, who looked at us one more than two meters, what we did and permanently pursued to us, our Gladbacher Libero Jürgen Wittkamp was free. He could always turn on. For Franz, this variant had to be paradise. He invented this libero. While we were always in mortal signs in midfield, he marked the emperor in the back of the no man’s land. Without resistance that we always felt ten, he could run forward. This worked against the tactically not good English.

In the association rival, for the national team a brilliant duo: Franz Beckenbauer (left) and Günter Netzer. Imago/Werek

What services were beautiful?

Nice would have been completely unable to train a Bundesliga team. He was far too human, far too soft. He was ideal for the national team. A clever and humorous person. He had an intellectual humor with which he amused us with very spontaneous sayings. Grandiose. His leadership was exceptional. Before the EM final, he drew the eleven of the USSR on the board. We won 4: 1 against the Soviet Union three weeks before in Munich. He must have remembered when he suddenly turned and said: Do what you want! It was the biggest compliment of a trainer to his team because he was totally familiar with us after the games before. We should just continue it.

At the time, they came “from the depth of the room”, as Karl-Heinz Bohrer, feature clayist of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , formulated. He wrote: “The Netzer, who was suddenly moving from the depth of the room, had Thrill. Thrill, that is the result, the not expected maneuver; this is the transformation of geometry into energy, the explosion in the penalty area, thrill, that is The enforcement par excellence, the beginning and the end. Thrill is Wembley. “ Did you feel this thrill?

Oh, fantastic. No one understands that in this description. In her connection with Wembley, she met because this stadium had something special that made certain things possible. But it had no direct influence on the fact that we did something special. It was just a perfect evening and a perfect football game. Some philosophical has now been incorporated here in addition to the technical comments. I like bonds from other genres that I find very daring. Nothing was planned before and in this game, there was no match plan, everything developed in every phase. If he made me a protagonist, it was right in some sentences.

was it ultimately simply the spontaneity of the individual queues?

Yes. The unique makes it clear that something has never been possible and was achieved from the skills and the spontaneous of the individual.

Is this Wembley team for the beginning of a modern football?

I don’t know and wouldn’t want to say so fundamental things either. It was a football that the Germans not trusted, near the perfection at that time and with aspects that make football valuable. I find it adventurous to say that individual players caused complete changes; Incentives yes.

Measurements of the speed speed showed that the DFB team played much faster. Was it a new high -speed football?

It was due to the weather and on the square. It was paradise to play football. We didn’t want to run. Anyone who did not run the ball did not understand football.

l ‘ Equipe from France wrote about “dream football from 2000”. What qualities did it distinguish him?

It was the overall performance of the team. Beckenbauer looked creative, and we had outstanding personalities who — the central concept — took responsibility.

Herbert Wimmer became much more famous in connection with me. I was more happy about that than about my own success.

So you and Beckenbauer?

We were the initiators and were accepted by the others. Of course I was an egoist, thank God I was an egoist. Otherwise such a service would not have been possible. I called positive selfishness, included the team and let them live. I made them better players. Herbert Wimmer, a great footballer, became much better and more famous in connection with me. I was more happy about that than about my own success. Positive selfishness is necessary for a super player. Real Madrid’s President Florentino Perez told me years ago that I had changed my way of playing. What a compliment!

Was football more intuition at the time?

I think so. The coaches weren’t as good as today and couldn’t make so many guidelines because they didn’t even know.

Does football say something about the zeitgeist?

Yes, but it was sometimes exaggerated by interpreting things that did not affect him in football. It was still a game without parallel conditions for the normal life of a nation. The Italians were defensive artists with the necessary creativity; The Brazilians transferred their pure joie de vivre to football, were playful, but were not successful before they imported experiences home from abroad. The character and mentality of a people are already beating. While the Brazilians laughed where there was nothing to laugh, we took everything very serious and used our original skills.

Intellectuals saw the spirit of freedom and rebellion in the new German play aesthetics. Willy Brandt’s motto “More democracy dare” was related to the “playful offensive football”. How do you feel such interpretations today?

They were very daring. We soccer players were totally apolitical; Almost every1. We had no thought for political changes, so football could not be influenced by it, not even from the way of life. I don’t know what the changed way of living in football could have changed. Football was still the hardest work plus talent, but not to explain with a changed and more democratized world. Such conclusions are brought too far for me.

The book “Rebell am Ball” was published in 1971. Were their long hair fashion or an expression of a freelance attitude to life or protest?

My long hair didn’t improve my football. I was wearing her because my girlfriend said that short hair looks stupid with me. The requirements remained the same on the square. Because of the hippies and a freer zeitgeist, I did not play lively.

Disco owner Günter Netzer. Imago/Werek

Didn’t you feel like the wearer of a zeitgeist who revived the dreams of a free future?

Absolutely not. I would be ashamed if there was somewhere that I would have done something. I did not see myself as a prominent pioneer and did not feel called to serve the desert of freedom of that time. That would be too much of honor. I was a footballer; And because I looked so crazy, they would have hunted me to hell if I hadn’t hit the ball. But so you accepted my Ferrari in Mönchengladbach and my discotheque. We were judged as a footballer, not as representatives of the zeitgeist.

There are photos of you in Ferrari, cool in your disco, with a hairbrush. What do these recordings say?

You express my attitude to life. I wanted such a car for a lifetime, but I never thought I could ever afford it. And the special thing was that such a crazy player could play football so well. As a result, people were interested in football who had nothing to do with football, for example artists. It was said that there is someone who has different things alongside football.

They set themselves under strong pressure on the square.

Our Gladbach trainer Hennes Weisweiler would have reacted first if the services had suffered. He placed the highest demands on me, but allowed me freedom like no other. It was a counter -business, performance against generosity. The many arguments had a positive effect for me, he was never satisfied with me. But I never forgot my priority anyway and always got myself under control if something got too much. I always said: everything results from football. Football made it possible for me to live that I couldn’t imagine. And football was a good school for me.

For Green politicians Daniel Cohn -Bendit, a 68er, they are — positively — a provocateur against the former local worldview. Can you live with it?

I find that today with the time distance as a compliment. I know that Cohn-Bendit is a big football fan. It was clear to me that I was moved near the 68. They also articulated that without exaggerating it. They saw the long hair as a criticism of the establishment, but I wasted no thought. I read as they saw me and liked a lot, but it couldn’t become the center of my life. My life was football. I was none of the 68s or others who said that I was in the part -time job and would mainly oppose the world. In dealing with Weisweiler, it was not against the authority of the trainer and the establishment, but about the cause, about football.

Two days before the game in England in 1972, a constructive vote of no confidence against Chancellor Brandt failed. It was the time of the RAF terror and the Vietnam War. Were such events subject to the national players?

We have dealt with acute global political, also regional questions. The footballers weren’t that stupid. It was not only talked about the list. But I don’t know anyone except very few who has primarily dealt with politics.

My long hair didn’t improve my football.

Paul Breitner?

He also knew that football was the most important thing. It was also an opinion that it was outstanding.

In the team there was at the start of this series: “Netzer, the Playboy with the blond mane, grew to the symbol of the new, modern and inspired German football.” Agreed?

I actually reject glorification afterwards. I never wanted my life to serve as a prime example, even if today’s interpretations are beautifully read.

You were just the special figure.

I don’t defend myself against these stories, they totally flatter to me. But my development was not programmed. I just lived out my joy in football. We celebrated a football that rarely existed. I had an incredible fulfilling life in football.

Berti Vogts shaped the word “The Star is the team” in 1996. Does a successful team need stars?

No team has become worse by a star. I didn’t meet a trainer who rejected a star who was in the interests of the team.

The EM 1972 ran in three phases for over seven weeks. Was she just a minor matter?

Of course not for us players. We wanted the title.

And in public awareness? The semi-finals against Belgium was kicked off at 8 p.m., but the ARD-TageSchau did not move so that the transmission started later.

The Tagesschau was a sacred cow for a long time before director saw that football was quota. After the European Championship final, a friend drove me back to Mönchengladbach for the two and a half hours. I went to my discotheque, there was no one anymore, I was sitting there and relaxed. Then the thing was d1. The next day we were European champions and were celebrated everywhere. We didn’t know it any other way. Everything was very modest, there were still 10,000 marks bonus.

They said in 1972: “I look at a Bundesliga club like a company”, after work you go home, “like other employees”. Was your professional thinking compatible with the concept of the association? Were you ahead of your time?

It was just my view of football at the time. But there was no reaction to it. But the businessmakers quickly recognized the possibilities with the football product.

What was the way of dealing with a footballer who drove a Ferrari 77,000 mark? Envy? Admiration?

My first cost 34,000. People had got used to it: I was the Ferrari driver, after work. I had my call away.

What meant money in the special time in which the youth was too good at the youth?

I earn 100,000 marks as a professional. Beckenbauer, Müller, Overath enjoyed themselves delighted when they heard about it. So I went to Grashoff and said: That doesn’t work, these players earn four and five times in their clubs and laugh at me. He referred to our small stadium. Then I asked him to give me the chance to make money myself, and founded an insurance company, an advertising publisher and made the stadium newspaper. One day I said to the coach: Mr. Weisweiler, I open a discotheque the next tomorrow and you are cordially invited.

How did he react?

That is the end, he said _ (laughs) _. He saw me in thought every evening with the guests at vodka and champagne. He never came, Sepp Herberger was there. While I was running the discotheque, I had my best time and became footballer of the year twice. I couldn’t remain completely underpaid compared to the other greats of German football.

After the EM final, the l ‘ Equipe wrote: “Netzer is the symbol for this complete, young team. He is the best player of our part of our earth.” **

This writer really had a clue _ (laughs on) _. This is a wonderful assessment, even if I would never go that far. This wonderful compliment is happy to accept.

Do you accept it? And relativize it?

Yes, that’s exactly how I mean it.

Her English opponent Alan Ball insulted her as “German Miss”. They said they had never been kicked like this. Was it so bad?

Yes. In a bar in Berlin we treated ourselves to a bottle of whiskey after the second leg and spoke out. We didn’t get the best friends, but he showed that he was completely wrong in the assessment of my person.

Racy duels: Alan Ball against Günter Netzer in the second leg. Imago sports photo service

You reject comparisons over generations, but please the question: Was the 3–1 in Wembley the greatest international match of a German national team or the 7–1 in Brazil in the 2014 World Cup?

This is really the point where I say: stop, end, that doesn’t have to be now. Outstanding in the 7–1 of the German team was not this incredibly great performance, but that it stopped scoring goals. Otherwise, the German players would have sent the Brazilians into the abyss until the end of their life. For the Brazilians, the shame of the century would have been two digits.

They were an individualist, but, as they said, they needed their Gladbach environment. How does that fit?

Overath was a completely different player than me, even though we are compared one to 1. I used vital Herbert Wimmer, Jupp Heynckes, Bernd Rupp, Herbert Laumen. There was not always peace, joy, pancakes. I asked her to perform, took care of the structure and had a big impact on Borussia Mönchengladbach. Weisweiler gave me a lot of trust. If you play 20 bad passes, play the 21st! You have full backing with me, he said. That was a knighthood.

Why did it not go on as far as the EM? until the 1974 World Cup?

After the 1973/74 season in Madrid, a break of four or six weeks, I had agreed 40, 50 autograph sessions. In the last international match in front of Sweden, I had played very badly, it was said that the new networker is Hoeneß. The autograph sessions banned me nicely and prescribed a conditioner for 14 days. I made loyal and good. I got stronger in the World Cup training camp, in training before the final I had to simulate Johan Cruyff and was so fit that I had to calm Vogts afterwards: Berti, Cruyff cannot play as well tomorrow as I do today. I should have put up nice, but he couldn’t change the team before a final. And I wouldn’t have asked for it. I accepted the rules.

We played perfect football for a year.

Why do you defend yourself to be world champion?

My contribution was 20 minutes against the GDR. At that time I got warm on the opposite side, assistant Jupp Derwall couldn’t find me. The groundsman in Hamburg came and said: stop running! You break the whole ash. The spectators asked me, they thought it was like in the cup final. I only sat in the stands on it so that I was no longer challenged by the audience.

This EM era called “dream months”.

We played perfect football for a year.

What was the Günter Netzer in 1972 and that phase: football professional and star, individualist, businessman, pop star, cult figure, playboy? A man on whom many projected their lives and who stood for freedom? An outsider who stood against the crusted norms of the post -war period as a footballer? Or something completely different?

The first four names.

pop star?

People did that. I found a fun comparison.

Cult figure?

This is higher, a large, very valuable compliment. This not only means football, but my whole way of presenting and living and also conveying something.

Playboy?

_ (grins, laughs) _ that was attached to me, which unfortunately did not correspond to the truth. I was attached to affairs that I unfortunately did not have with the greatest women. Unfortunately it didn’t happen that way. When I came to the HSV as a manager, it was said that he was still missing, he gives us the rest. I smiled at it.

And how do you like the assessment that they were wearing the lives of many?

That is also beautiful. I was able to live with that very well. Even if it was scary to me because everyone should make their own life themselves and should not implement it 1: 1 based on role models. Of course I stood for freedom. I didn’t have the crusted structures in my head. We had enough to do with playing football reasonably. There was no space for things outside of football.

_ How did the team accompanies the quarter-final games against England and the European Championship finals? Read now for free! _

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