Beckenbauer Has Opinion, Would Like You To Hear It

By: chris | January 31st, 2008

Franz Beckenbauer has decided to use this week to give us all his opinion on two of the biggest names/stories in German fußball which have plagued the presses in recent months. The first was his take on new Bayern Munich gaffer, Jurgen Klinsmann, who will be afforded the opportunity to make his club coaching debut with little to no expectations and a huge cushion should things not start out well. (Right.) Klinsy’s coming in for titles. End of. Problem is, Beckenbauer, who is chairman of the board with Bayern, wants him to know club football is not national football. And it doesn’t appear his hopes are very high.

“I can only hope he can last out for the full two years,” said Beckenbauer at a function in Hanover on Sunday.

“He has not tried this yet. He has got to know that coaching a club is different to coaching the national team.”

Yes, coaching a club is very different than coaching the national team, even if it was for a World Cup in your homeland. Instead of getting months to prepare for games, you have days, maybe hours, which can burn you out real quick. And of course, Franz would know, as he spent 6 glorious years steering Die Mannschaft to glory before settling into club football, where he only spent one year in Marseille and parts of two seasons with Bayern. Where he, of course, won a title. (Come on - he’s Franz Beckenbauer. What else did you expect?)

So maybe, instead of having negative thoughts, Franz just sees a little bit of himself in Jurgen……

And speaking of the German national team, Franz would also like you to know he thinks Jens Lehmann is rubbish. Alright, maybe he didn’t say that, but I’d like to believe he was at least thinking it.

“If Lehmann makes a mistake everyone will be saying ‘why was he allowed to play?’” he said while at a Uefa summit in Zagreb. “It’s not a nice situation and it carries a certain amount of risk.”

We’ll just assume that if Beckz was still at the national helm, Jens wouldn’t be in his starting XI.