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Christian Streich and SC Freiburg after the cup final: "I can't get angry"

2022-05-22T08:40:45.943Z


SC Freiburg came very close to winning their first title in the DFB Cup final. In the end, small inattentions ruined the dream. For the club it was still a next big step forward.


Enlarge image

SC trainer Christian Streich in a classic pose

Photo: FILIP SINGER / EPA

Christian Streich had a huge problem.

His sports club Freiburg had previously held all the trump cards against RB Leipzig, he had led 1-0 against the favorites, he was outnumbered from the 57th minute, the curve dipped in red whipped the team forward incessantly, the team was so close to his first major title and then lost it all on penalties.

What a frustration.

And what does Streich say?

"I just can't manage to get angry." Or, in the prank idiom: "I can't manage to get angry."

This Saturday was high mass for SC Freiburg, if the team had actually won the game against RB Leipzig, the application would probably have been made to declare May 21st a public holiday in Baden.

They had flooded the capital with an estimated 30,000 supporters, in Freiburg it would have been very easy for gangs of thieves to make rich loot in burglaries undisturbed on Saturday.

Unbridled ambition

"My wife told me what was going on here, on the special trains, that people met here for the first time in ten or twelve years," Streich told the press around midnight.

Ten, twelve years, that's the cycle in which Streich is allowed to think, after all he's been the absolute regent on the training ground for more than a decade.

After the game, after intensively cuddling all his players, he strolled into the curve, measured step, then he stopped and let his eyes rest on this red wall for a few minutes.

As if he wanted to let the past decade pass him by at this moment.

This sight of the tens of thousands shouting: "Christian Streich, you're the best man" felt like a crowning glory at the moment of defeat.

For this "brutal cohesion" he would "happily forgo the trophy," said the coach afterwards, and maybe that was a bit of a fib.

The irrepressible ambition of the 56-year-old likes to hide behind the rustic dialect, but can be seen live on the sidelines during every game.

It's an ambition that Streich has long since passed on to his players, and nobody was more able to marvel at that than Nico Schlotterbeck on Saturday.

The defender is the newcomer of the season in Germany, you can say that without hesitation.

He's the European Under-21 champion, made it into the national team and immediately impressed everyone there, and with the club he's progressed through the Europa League and into the cup final.

For the new season he is moving to Borussia Dortmund, where the goals are set a whole lot higher.

Schlotterbeck showed all his qualities

In his last game for SC Schlotterbeck obviously wanted to show everyone again what he has in terms of qualities.

He was like a berserker in a duel, his sliding tackle can be passed on straight away in the direction of the football museum.

In the first half he scraped a ball off the line for the already beaten goalkeeper Mark Flekken and then celebrated it with fervor as if he already had the trophy in his hand.

You can only congratulate BVB on this royal transfer.

Even a national player Matthias Ginter, already committed as a substitute for the coming season, will have a hard time filling this gap completely.

When Streich talks about his team's "incredibly great season," he must have had many of his players in mind.

The tireless Lucas Höler, the reliable Flekken, who now even guards the Oranje goal, the faithful Christian Günter, who will need a long time to find consolation after his missed penalty, the standard artist Vincenzo Grifo, the workers in the vineyard, Lukas Kübler and Manuel Gulde.

But he will think of Schlotterbeck first.

Lack of concentration in the majority

And yet the SC ended up empty-handed.

“Because we slowed down a little bit after being sent off,” says Streich.

Suddenly the team was aware of their chance, you could feel from the stands that this feeling was spreading in the team.

How the thought, no matter how small, lodged itself in the very back of your head: We're one man more, we're in the lead, just don't make any mistakes now, then we'll have the pot.

Streich thought that was "human", but he told his players after the game: "In the future" stay cooler in such situations.

You can understand that as a service instruction for the coming season.

What used to be structure was suddenly dissolved, what used to be positive aggressiveness turned into poison.

After the game, RB coach Domenico Tedesco complained about “pure hatred”, which had partly emanated from the SC bank.

However, he did not mention that he himself contributed to the hectic pace of the game on the sidelines with his activism and outrage at one or the other decision by referee Sascha Stegemann.

Used for branding

The season is over, the time for analyzing the season will start in the next few weeks, and you won't find much to complain about in Freiburg.

The club has moved into its beautiful new stadium, is financially on the safe side, there were sporting days like that first half in Mönchengladbach, when they were already 6-0 up at the break, in the coming season they will play internationally.

SC Freiburg also used this season intensively for branding.

At the ceremony after the game, Streich immediately took back the medal he had been awarded.

That seemed like someone who can then lose badly.

But if he is to be believed, there was a very different, simple reason for it.

“I just can't wear those things.

That makes my throat tight.”

It constricts his throat.

That's how it felt for many that Saturday who stuck with SC Freiburg.

The development of the club this season is breathtaking.

Source: spiegel

All sports articles on 2022-05-22

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