Only Thomas Tuchel and Paris Saint-Germain stand in the way of Bayern. The German coach has led the newly rich French very close to their longing for the Champions League title - and reinvented themselves a bit in the process.
Lisbon (dpa) - Thomas Tuchel can live well with the little ridicule before his greatest hour as a coach.
"With one leg in the final," the Internet community sneered at the Paris Saint-Germain coach, whose broken left foot pretty much restricted him when he was cheering for the Champions League final against Bayern. "Imagine what I would have done if I had two legs," the coach of the French soccer series champions countered the jokes self-deprecatingly.
The final against the Munich team on Sunday (9 p.m. / ZDF, Sky and DAZN) will probably be spent again sitting on a cool box on the sidelines. It doesn't look comfortable, but the 46-year-old isn't a comfortable guy either. Since the Swabian stepped into the limelight of the Bundesliga eleven years ago as head coach of FSV Mainz 05, the reputation of the sometimes over-ambitious tactical perfectionist with a tendency to be angry has preceded him. Aloof, closed - that's how Tuchel often appeared in public in recent years.
There is no doubt about his technical expertise. Pep Guardiola praised Tuchel as "one of the best coaches in the world" and during his time in Munich he played tactical puzzles with salt shakers with his then Dortmund colleague in the restaurant. "He's doing a sensational job", praised Bayern coach Hansi Flick before the encounter in the ghost final in Lisbon.
Flick can also attest to the recent transformation of Tuchel, after he had stayed with his compatriot in Paris in 2018. Tuchel has become more relaxed, instead of constant tinkering, he has given his team a feel-good tactic in which the superstars Neymar and Kylian Mbappe can shine best. The team pays him back, now appears as a closed ensemble and thus made it into the premier class final for the first time after years of disappointments.
For Tuchel that must be satisfaction after he had to fear his quick replacement in the spring when he failed in the round of 16 against his ex-club Borussia Dortmund. Now he is on the verge of the summit and the fulfillment of the long unsatisfied longing of the Qatari PSG owners for the handle cup.
A steep path for the former youth coach of VfB Stuttgart, who had to give up his active career early due to an injury and then as a business administration student waited in a bar on the side. Influenced by his teacher Ralf Rangnick from Ulm, he draws attention to himself as a meticulous and impatient young trainer.
Due to his success in Mainz and his time in Dortmund, the comparison with Jürgen Klopp is tried again and again. But Tuchel is not a tribune of the people, not a captor, is more often considered a stubborn loner. At BVB, despite winning the cup, he had to leave early in 2017 because he fell out with the top of the club.
But his sporting successes and his signature have made him interesting for Europe's top clubs for a long time. Bayern have known what this Tuchel can do since 2009, after defeating Louis van Gaal's Munich team 2-1 with newly promoted Mainz in his third Bundesliga game as a coach.
In 2018, Tuchel was Bayern boss Karl-Heinz Rummenigge's dream coach to succeed Jupp Heynckes. But because club patron Uli Hoeneß believed for too long that he could still persuade Heynckes to stay, Tuchel finally agreed in Paris. "I love you, I don't love you", "Le Parisien" wrote before the final with a view to Bayern's former flirtation with Tuchel.
Typical football, that after Dortmund and Leipzig, Munich is the last hurdle for the German Tuchel on the way to the coaching coronation. "For me, that's not the international flair of the Champions League", Tuchel grumbled before the semi-finals against Leipzig at DAZN about the duels with the Bundesliga club. But if he triumphs on Sunday, he won't care.
© dpa-infocom, dpa: 200821-99-254758 / 2
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