The Bundesliga Blueprint — How Germany became the Home of Football
by Lee Price
(Bennion Kearny, £9.99)

“WE DO not think fans are like cows who you milk, football has got to be for everybody. That’s the biggest difference between us and England.”

That was the famous statement from Bayern Munich’s former chairman Uli Hoenness as his side travelled to face Arsenal in the Uefa Champions League in 2014.

And that is why feels appropriate to be exploring the success of the German Bundesliga, a league hot on the heels of the Premier League, a league that has seen the back pages filled with praise for its recent impressive response to the refugee crisis, a league that puts fans first.

With The Bundesliga Blueprint, Lee Price joins a host of football writers who put pen to paper in the hope of unlocking the key to Germany’s success, charting their progress from the humiliation of a shock first round exit from Euro 2000 to the dominating presence they have in world football today — an all-German Champions League final in 2012-13 and a dramatic World Cup win in Brazil in 2014 being the pinnacle of that success.

Price argues that it is all the more important to analyse the country’s turnaround given the similarities with England’s abject failure at the 2014 World Cup which saw them crash out with one point — matching Germany’s tally in 2000.

But while England’s perennial failures seem to be increasingly accepted as par for the course by fans, the country’s footballing authorities and the media, their German counterparts were a lot less forgiving in 2000.

In fact, as Price charts, the response of the German Football Association was phenomenal. Inspired by France’s elite Clairefontaine academy — that on its 10-year anniversary saw a host of graduates lifting the prestigious trophy, including future leading goalscorer Thierry Henry — the Germans began to draft and lay down the foundations of their own 10-year plan.

Their plan wouldn’t see just one academy established but 18 — initially — as they announced the compulsory introduction of academies for all Bundesliga sides, which was extended to the second division a year later.

They ploughed resources into their new system, with Academies Committees formed and an “equal focus on education in the classroom and on the football pitch” a central mission as their community-focused outlook fed into their scheme.

Highlighting the extent of the initiative incoming president of the German FA in 2001 Gerhard Mayer-Vorfelder, on the 10th anniversary of the plan in 2011, said: “We managed to create 400 centres for the promotion of talent across the whole of Germany and, after the 2006 World Cup, built over 1,000 mini pitches.”

Alongside the extensive academy programme u19 and u17 leagues were established to increase competitiveness and 29 elite football schools set up to compliment the clubs’ academies. It was a country working in harmony, with the German FA and clubs working side by side with the recognition that there would be mutual benefits to the developments — with homegrown players making financial sense to clubs in the increasingly expensive transfer market.

By 2010 German football boasted 282 youth teams in the academies of professional clubs with almost 5,500 young talents being nurtured between the ages of 11 and 22 by 433 coaches.

With academies being the cornerstone of the German plan, they also put considerable research and time into the approach of these new facilities.

The US manager of FC Nurnberg’s Under-19 team Pellegrino Matarazzo put it succinctly saying: “German football has a very detailed approach to young players, and we have a detailed curriculum at this club. In Germany it is a holistic approach to coaching — in Spain it is very technical, in Italy it’s tactical, in the UK and US it is physical. But, in Germany, it is thought through, and has a very good balance across those things.

“The emphasis and direction of German youth coaching is individualisation. At elite schools, we produce strength and weakness profiles for each player, and the coaches can work according to these individual objectives, whether they’re athletic or tactical.”

Bundesliga clubs are rooted in their local communities and pride themselves on their links with their fans and their players drawn from those localities. Many clubs were born as generic sports clubs and run as not-for-profit public organisations for and by their members.

“Bayern Munich wasn’t set up to become a global brand and company, it was established for the health and fitness of the local community. Indeed German football teams were prohibited from being ‘businesses’ until as recently as 2000, and many still aren’t — Dortmund remain the only publicly listed company in the Bundesliga,” says Price. The 50+1 rule, which stipulates that clubs must retain at least 50 per cent of their shares, plus one share, ensures that clubs maintain their strong community links and emphasis.

This has seen Bundesliga clubs keep their prices low for maximum involvement. Their ticket prices are the envy of Premier League fans, Price even speaks to some who have found making the trip to Germany cheaper than supporting their team in Britain. While Premier League prices have rocketed and fans have become customers in the eyes of money-hungry boards, in Germany, the fan-led approach has fought against this philosophy.

Borussia Dortmund’s Marketing Director Carsten Cramer said: “Why are tickets cheap? Football is part of people’s lives and we want to open the doors for all of society. We need the people, they spend their hearts, their emotions with us — they are the clubs’ most important asset.

“What is the economic sense for the club to increase the price by 10 per cent? For the overall economic success of the club, it is not important to increase the price of the litre of beer. It is still money, but not a lot to the club — but it does affect our fans if they are spending their money match after match.

“We are a football club. If the football doesn’t run properly, the rest of the business would not work. The business is part of a train, but not the engine.”

And it is this approach alongside youth development that has put German clubs on sound financial footing. Bayern, the fourth most valuable club on the planet, has zero debt, as does Shalke, while Dortmund has 6 per cent debt. Contrast this to other global teams like Manchester United who have 20 per cent debt against their value, Arsenal who have 30 per cent and AC Milan who have 44 per cent.

Price’s explanation and detail offers an enticing picture of an exciting 10-year plan and thriving Bundesliga, yet he is sometimes flippant with his commentary. When discussing the more controversial comments of Mayer-Vorfelder, who said that within the elite academies German is spoken on the pitch to increase integration and went on to be critical of regular primary schools for being “almost exclusively female who have rather less to do with football,” he argues: “Could you imagine an English FA chief bold enough to annouce young players in the UK should only communicate in English? Within minutes they’d most likely find themselves linked with the latest far-right political party in vogue and their career in tatters.

“And would you not expect gasps if you heard a government minister for sport daring to suggest that the disproportionate number of female primary school teachers might be having an impact on how young British boys enjoy PE? Accusations of sexism would overwhelm the individual bold enough to pipe up.”

This naive and inflammatory commentary gives the impression that the author sees the 10-year plan uncritically. That all aspects have contributed to its success. There is no research into the impact of women teachers in primary school on sport participation and enthusiasm, or a look at any of the other factors that may have a bigger effect such as the huge cuts to hours dedicated for PE per week. It’s this lack of detail and analysis that lets an otherwise excellent book down.

Yet the overwhelming feeling on finishing this tidy little book is that no matter how much England and English clubs could learn from this set-up, while the rift between the FA and the Premier League exists and short-term profit rules, this long-term planning is impossible.

Beyond that, you can’t help but sense an element of socialist planning in the German’s 10-year plan. Where sustainable success and community is put at the heart of it to ensure its future. Imagine if the same approach was applied to education, healthcare, the environment and the rest?