Football is more than a business

The chief executive of Borussia Dortmund, who play Manchester City in the Champions League on Tuesday, has launched a passionate defence of German football principles and attacked English clubs' ownership by rich men from overseas.

Hans-Joachim Watzke described German football as "romantic" for retaining its "50% plus one" rule, which requires Bundesliga clubs to be owned by their members. He questioned the ethos and sustainability of Premier League clubs' ownership, including City being owned and funded by Sheikh Mansour of Abu Dhabi.

Of City, a club he visited for last month's 1-1 draw in the first match between the two, Watzke said: "I am a little bit romantic, and that is not romantic. In England people seem not to be interested in this – at Liverpool they are fine for the club to belong to an American. But the German is romantic: when there is a club, he wants to have the feeling it is my club, not the club of Qatar or Abu Dhabi."

Watzke was a prominent supporter of the 50% plus one rule when it was challenged last year by Martin Kind, the president of Hannover. Dortmund are floated on the stock market, but the members elect the president and four members of the club's supervisory board – and also vote to decide major issues of club policy.

"I was the biggest opponent of changing the rule," Watzke said in an interview with the Guardian at Dortmund's Signal Iduna stadium in the build-up to the City match. "Germans want to have that sense of belonging. When you give [the supporters] the feeling that they are your customers, you have lost. In Germany, we want everybody to feel it is their club, and that is really important."

All 36 Bundesliga clubs are owned or controlled by their members, except the historic exceptions of Wolfsburg, owned by Volkswagen, Bayer Leverkeusen, owned by the pharmacy giant Bayer, and Hoffenheim, which is now funded by a single very wealthy entrepreneur, Dietmar Hopp.

Apart from those three and Kind's Hannover, the remaining 32 voted to keep the 50% plus one rule, which was introduced in 2001 when the Bundesliga clubs broke away to run the league competition independently from the German Football Association, the DFB.

"In former times in England I think the relationship between the club and supporters was very strong," Watzke argued. "Our people come to the stadium like they are going to their family. Here, the supporters say: it's ours, it's my club."

Watzke, himself a lifelong supporter of Dortmund, who drew 1-1 with runaway Bundesliga leaders Bayern Munich on Saturday, linked the system of member-ownership and control to the maintenance of affordable tickets and standing areas at top flight German football.

At Dortmund, the 25,000 fans who form the famous "Yellow Wall" standing area in the Signal Iduna stadium's south stand pay just €190 (£154) for a season ticket for the 17 home Bundesliga matches. Season tickets that also include entry to the first three Champions League group games cost slightly more at €220, working out at exactly €11 for each match.

"Here, it is our way to have cheap tickets, so young people can come," Watzke said. "We would make €5m more a season if we had seats, but there was no question to do it, because it is our culture. In England it is a lot more expensive. Football is more than a business."

Watzke argued that Dortmund, who top the group of City, Real Madrid and Ajax while the English champions cannot qualify for the knockout stages, have been able to compete with such clubs thanks to sensible management, coaching and player recruitment, despite not having the resources of a rich individual such as Sheikh Mansour backing the club.

"Everybody told me you cannot play in the Champions League against clubs like Manchester, they have more money. But we are trying to do it ourselves, in our way.

"There are a lot of ways to Rome," he said. "Chelsea have won the Champions League. But Chelsea's question is: what happens after [Roman] Abramovich?"

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2...premier-league

Great article.

He knows his onion's does Hans-Joachim Watzke.

A suit who care's about his club.

Great article, spot on.

Very, very jealous of the German set up. That season ticket price and standing

They have fantastic links to local junior football clubs (one for you there SSG) We had a tie up with small club outside dortmund for reciprocal tour hosting etc. dortmund paid coaches all over the shop, it's no wonder they bring through so many talented kids. german football is a dreamland compared to our tacky commercial shite.

all well and good, but the smaller german team's fans still hate the bigger german team's fans, there's still vast amounts of cash involved, and Sky have the rights to both the Bundesliga and to the CL

so for example while bayern lord it over the allianz with a team of megarich superstars and huge crowds the team they share the ground with are on the verge of bankruptcy

Originally Posted by Tumescent Throb

all well and good, but the smaller german team's fans still hate the bigger german team's fans, there's still vast amounts of cash involved, and Sky have the rights to both the Bundesliga and to the CL

so for example while bayern lord it over the allianz with a team of megarich superstars and huge crowds the team they share the ground with are on the verge of bankruptcy

Ah yes, 1860 Munich - who claim that they are the "real" Munich club who most of the locals support. Sound familiar??

Originally Posted by red in cumbria

Ah yes, 1860 Munich - who claim that they are the "real" Munich club who most of the locals support. Sound familiar??

it is familiar. i used to live there.

It's not all been rosy for them though has it.

At the turn of the millennium, Borussia Dortmund became the first—and so far the only—publicly traded club on the German stock market.

The team still plays at Westfalenstadion, named after its home region of Westphalia. To reduce debts, the stadium was renamed "Signal Iduna Park", after a local insurance company, in 2006 under a sponsorship agreement that runs until 2016.

Originally Posted by Sandman

It's not all been rosy for them though has it.

wrong thread

this is the one where it's all brilliant

Originally Posted by Sandman

It's not all been rosy for them though has it.

But they still have cheap seats and standing, no #@&%! owner.

Premiership teams change the name of the stadium just to get extra dosh they don't really need.

It's a shame players don't play for teams for the prestige and camaraderie. Would solve half the problem.
Could you imagine Ronnie going to a utopian version of Real Madrid for 5 or 10 grand a week?

Boyhood dream.

Originally Posted by reem

But they still have cheap seats and standing, no #@&%! owner.

Premiership teams change the name of the stadium just to get extra dosh they don't really need.

It's a shame players don't play for teams for the prestige and camaraderie. Would solve half the problem.
Could you imagine Ronnie going to a utopian version of Real Madrid for 5 or 10 grand a week?

Boyhood dream.

I'm not saying they don't have the right idea, I'm just saying they've been as open to the idea of markets and corporate money as anyone.

Originally Posted by Sandman

I'm not saying they don't have the right idea, I'm just saying they've been as open to the idea of markets and corporate money as anyone.

But that particular decision must have been made with the backing of the fans, or it wouldn't have gone ahead.

By having the fans involved decisions get made that are best for the club, not the shareholders. That money helped to stabilise them and I'm sure the fans appreciate it.

In England the Glazers could change the name of our ground to whatever they want and keep the money. There's nothing we could do about it and it would be of no benefit to the club.

I like the way it's done there. Wish it was standard across Europe. But then I also wish for NFL-style revenue sharing and salary caps, which remove institutional barriers to competitiveness.

Originally Posted by Lok

But that particular decision must have been made with the backing of the fans, or it wouldn't have gone ahead.

By having the fans involved decisions get made that are best for the club, not the shareholders. That money helped to stabilise them and I'm sure the fans appreciate it.

In England the Glazers could change the name of our ground to whatever they want and keep the money. There's nothing we could do about it and it would be of no benefit to the club.

if doing that really had no consequence for the glazers they would've done it by now.

most of the financial decisions at dortmund over the past decade or so have been a disaster followed by desperate fire-fighting to repair the damage

don't see how them selling their ground to the finance industry is anything to hold up as an example of what United should be doing tbh

Originally Posted by Sandman

I'm not saying they don't have the right idea, I'm just saying they've been as open to the idea of markets and corporate money as anyone.

while dortmund - and german football - are far from perfect, i don't think you can say they're just the same/just as open to... as anyone. there is a big difference in how the club is run, who runs it and according to what principles, and there's an awful lot to admire about how they do it.

I don't see how people can even argue about german football clubs model.

Yeah, some of their clubs might be struggling financially, they may not be doing so well on the pitch. But at least their fans will be satisfied that they have done all they could to avoid it while in england a qatari, russian, a chicken @#%&! can do what they want without supporters having a say.

Only throb can argue against this