The drunkard is silent
In the end, all efforts at persuasion proved unsuccessful. Once again, the kitzingen bavarians had made an attempt to prevent what they had so far only perceived from hearsay: their defender mathias brunsch, it was rumored, had long been considering leaving the club for state league rival TSV abtswind. The uncertainty over this had arisen after brunsch had not shown his face to the team for months.
Shortly after the season began in july, the 23-year-old fell ill with typhus fever, a virus that made him lose his strength at the slightest exertion. Weeks ago, the kitzinger once again followed a game of his team – but not on the sidelines. By that time, brunsch had already distanced himself from the club he had played for since the age of five. From a safe distance, he looked on from the main bridge at the goings-on at his feet.
"I had wished he had been open about his intention to transfer," says kitzingen coach wolfgang schneider.
The bottom line is that the club's most recent contact with its rogue player was negative. Last week, brunsch and the abtswinder created facts and sealed the change officially. Just a few days before the two teams meet this saturday, this is a clear statement that may have cost the bavarians their last spark of hope for the preserved central defender's retention. However, the undoubtedly explosive personnel affair is only explosive in the context of the derby and not on the pitch. Because the transfer statutes of the fubball association allow brunsch to play for his new club after the winter break at the earliest.
In abtswind, the 23-year-old is a welcome newcomer to strengthen the sometimes shaky defense. "Mathias is a bench player," said abtswind's coach jochen seuling, not just when brunsch was given a trial by former kitzinger jorg otto a few weeks ago and was quickly found to be worthy of a contract. The bavarians, on the other hand, can't quite make sense of the abrupt departure of their own youngster, who was one of the pillars of the team. "Nothing happened that made a transfer absolutely necessary," says kitzingen's sports director burkhard strabberger. "There were no disputes with the coaches, the players or the officials."
Strabberger can only make vague assumptions as to why brunsch decided to take this step: "maybe he imagined things differently, but then he has to be willing to talk and be available to us," says the sports director, who has known the youngster from the kitzingen talent pool since the beginning. Strabberger, who once laid the foundation for the successful youth work with the bavarians as a long-time youth director, already coached bruns with the F-juniors. "If a player suddenly has no more desire, we cannot prevent the change at the end of the day," says strabberger, after the conclusion of amateur contracts with the players – in addition to the salary, taxes and social security contributions are to be paid – was not possible for financial reasons.
In a recent interview with this newspaper, brunsch explained in detail his motives for leaving his hometown club during the current season. Two days later, the 23-year-old withdrew his consent to the publication of his statements. "I don't want to go after and not leave the bayern in a quarrel," said brunsch.
Before the derby at bayernplatz, abtswind's coach talks up the opponent
Coach jochen seuling sees the personnel situation of his abtswind team as a "minor catastrophe. After sebastian otto, sandro wolf (each with torn cruciate ligaments) and oliver doring (broken bone in his face), przemyslaw szuszkiewicz has now also been injured. The rookie from poland will be out for months with a torn inner ligament, according to seuling. The complaints about the worsening situation do not quite fit the sporting reality. TSV abtswind still leads the state league by seven points.
Some could therefore interpret the lament – and the not absent reference to the strength of the competition – as a protective mechanism. Seuling provides himself with an alibi – in case his club is hit by a series of failures at the beginning of the second half of the season, as was the case last season, and loses its chance of promotion. This impression is all the more pronounced when seuling points out that "as a trainer, results are expected of me.
At least the predilection to talk up the next opponent of his team is seen through by people like burkhard strabberg. "That's what he generally does," notes bayern kitzingen's sports director after seuling expressed "gross respect" for bayern before this saturday's derby. Measured in terms of playing ability and personnel, the kitzingen team is among the top five in its class. Unfortunately, such parameters are not included in the table calculation, which is why bayern kitzingen remains in ninth place, twenty numbers behind abtswind.
The fact that it was abtswind that robbed the bavarians of all chances of promotion to the bavarian league in the last game of the previous round by a 1-0 score is supposedly no longer an issue at bayernplatz. "We have already beaten abtswind this season," says strabberger. Not in the league – they lost the first leg 1:2 – but in the cup. 3:0 for the kitzinger, at a time of the year when the abtswind squad had by far not yet reached its desired strength. Strabberger says: "compared to the others, abtswind has the huge advantage of having a very rough squad with very good players, in which there are equal replacements in every position."Seuling may not like to hear this at the moment, but it is the reality. The bavarians, by the way, can make full use of their not-so-great squad.
