Disgraceful posters, game interruptions, kicking around: After the incident at the Bayern game in Hoffenheim, the chairman of Bayernfreunde Tegernseer Tal takes a clear position.
Gmund / Hoffenheim - There was no longer any question of a football game during the final quarter of an away game of FC Bayern in Hoffenheim. There were still 22 players and the referee on the pitch, but instead of trying to score, the teams moved the ball back and forth as in training. After Hoffenheim patron Dietmar Hopp had been insulted several times by Bayern fans and the game had been interrupted twice, the participants decided to stop playing football. Sebastian Lechner, chairman of Bayernfreunde Tegernseer Tal, makes the right decision.
"I think it's good how they did it," says the 21-year-old. "The teams have sent a clear signal against the fans who insulted Dietmar Hopp." He can't do anything with the fans, who have held up revile posters several times. “I can't identify with that, and neither does our club. We want to go to the stadium and watch football together. ”
The chairman of the Dägansäa, as the fan club calls itself, is, according to its own statements, more often in the south curve of the Allianz Arena. That is why he believes that only a fraction of Bayern supporters in Sinsheim knew about the campaign: "It is often the case that you raise a banner and do not even see what is written on it." whether Bayern's CEO Karl-Heinz Rummenigge is realizing the threat of withdrawing membership status from the fan clubs involved. It could ultimately punish innocent people.
Racism: "Lifelong stadium ban"
Sebastian Lechner (M.)
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What Lechner does not understand at all: Why almost all fan scenes concentrated their displeasure on the Hoffenheim patron last weekend. "I believe that the fans who attack Dietmar Hopp are not concerned with what he did for the sport and the region there." Ultimately, all fans in the past years would have liked the league to be more exciting than them was and is back this season. "But nobody understands that there has to be money in football for this," says Lechner. Many fans would be stuck in the old traditional thinking.
Although there is now “quite a lot of fire” in football and the fan scenes. This was not only shown last weekend, but in the weeks and months before. For example, through racist statements in the stadiums. "We have 2020. I think such statements are no longer appropriate," he says. If the perpetrators can be identified, there can only be one consequence: "A lifelong ban on the stadium."
Teams should leave the pitch closed
Lechner also believes that a collective reaction by the teams, as shown by Bayern and Hoffenheim over the weekend, can be a solution to the problem. "I think it would be good if the teams left the field together and sent a clear signal of solidarity," says the 21-year-old. On the other hand, he is skeptical that the game will be abandoned as the new three-stage plan of the German Football Association (DFB) provides in an emergency. "I don't know if you can do that," he says. Ultimately, tens of thousands of fans would be punished for a few incorrigible people.
The hope remains that German football fans will once again focus on what they actually want and should do: support their team. If this does not work, the players will probably push a calm ball more often in the future - as on Saturday in Sinsheim.