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1.11.2024Bayer 04

Match of the month: 40 years ago – The shortest team meeting of my career

In the 1984/85 season there is a clash between Bayer 04, lying tenth in the table, and the leaders Bayern Munich. After five games without a win, Bayer 04 coach Dettmar Cramer is under fire and already sacked according to the media. After a communal walk on 17 November 1984, without the coach, the squad go to the meeting room for a pre-match team meeting and we players sit down but the coach is still not there. But on the flip chart there is the line-up and the words: "SWALLOW IT!"

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We look at each other slightly disconcerted, wait ten minutes, and go to our rooms with this ‘preparation’. It is the only meeting in my career that took place without the coach and spoken words.

When we go onto the pitch at the Ulrich Haberland Stadium in the afternoon with a below capacity 14,000 crowd, the team knows exactly that it's not just about the job of our coach but also our own crisis. The press were very tough with us in the previous week and the pressure is really evident. Eight minutes into the game, our left back Anders Giske opens the scoring. We are able to hold on to that surprise lead to the break. When a low cross from Helmut Winklhofer is headed home by midfielder Jürgen Röber to make it 2-0 then our players up front begin to play decent football and to believe in themselves. Herbert Waas seals it on 76 minutes at 3-0. Not only is Dettmar Cramer relieved but also the whole stadium. And stadium announcer Günter Maczkowiak plays the song 'Hurra, wir leben noch' (Hooray, we are still alive).

At the end of the season we are only thirteenth in the table and the contract with Dettmar Cramer is not extended after a disappointing season for everybody involved. But that match against FC Bayern was the highlight of the 1984/85 campaign.

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