Bundesliga: That's what Marcel Reif says about Gross and Schalke

VIEW: Mr. Reif, let’s talk about Schalke …
Marcel Reif: At Schalke I don’t know anything anymore. Nothing is certain there, except chaos.

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And next week, the fourth coach in four months will join the chaos …
In several conversations I said: You bring this to me, the madman, with such a “longing for death” that does this to himself …

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The maniac is called Christian Gross. Is he the right one?
I do not know that. I just know that he must obviously have recharged a lot during his break. And Schalke needs someone who has nothing to lose and have to prove. And someone who, if it just doesn’t work, packs his suitcase and says: Children, I’ve tried it, but I wish you all the best for the future.

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How would you explain the Schalke drama?
Well … defeat after defeat. It’s just a mental problem. They can all play football, sometimes even well. But they cannot do it if they are not asked to play good football, but to play against Bielefeld. Bielefeld is like Vaduz in Switzerland. And then they win at Schalke. That’s not normal. And that’s not because the individual Schalke is worse than the individual Bielefeld. Rather, the Schalke guys should organize a kind of sport that they can’t even do.

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What do you mean?
There are players there who can’t fight relegation, they don’t have that in their DNA. If this squad were currently in eighth place, then I would say they would have to slowly move up a bit. But now they are in 18th place and I say they can’t do that. They stand on the pitch and say to themselves: what kind of sport is it? Why can’t I I could do it once …

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Where do you see the origin of this misery?
Problems have been piled up like a pyramid over many years. There was always a new coach or a new sports director and everyone has let off steam with the squad and lived notoriously about Schalke’s conditions. This is because they have been betting everything on the Champions League for years and have not expected that it will not go on forever. Millions were spent on players who weren’t good enough for the premier class. And that’s going to get you wrong. And today you have an orchestra that should play rock ‘n’ roll, and it’s not even a fire brigade band.

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So is leadership the scapegoat?
Also, but I don’t want to let the players off their responsibilities. There are also players there who are “bastards”. Those who earn a lot of money and would have had what it takes to open their mouths and say: “Folks, we should do something, otherwise we will go down the drain.”

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Here comes a big one, of the dictator type, so just in time?
His predecessor Manuel Baum is a communicator, a good tactician and a calm, friendly person. And that went really wrong. The team didn’t believe him anymore. So believe yes. I raised three sons and at some point you have to say: “Take care of boys, up to here and no further.”

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What chances do you give Christian Gross?
Zero chances and he has to use them. This is open heart surgery. What the team has played until the end has nothing to do with the sport that I know and love. So he has to get the players to believe him, right now. And those who he has the impression that they won’t have to go. And when he plays with a youth team. It doesn’t get any worse.

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How does it all have to be for the Schalke fans?
Once you’ve experienced the atmosphere in the Veltins-Arena, you know how crazy, in a positive sense, the Schalke fans are. They carry their crew and they shout them into some nirvana. But when things don’t go well, there are 60,000 vultures sitting there. So maybe it is just right for the players that no spectators are allowed at the moment. If they had done this misery in front of this “sect” it would have been terrible.

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Bundesliga: That’s what Marcel Reif says about Gross and Schalke

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