World champion “Icke” Häßler is keen on amateur football again

An unexplained illness left ex-national player Thomas Häßler (58) checkmated two and a half years ago. In Berlin’s eighth division, the 1990 world champion is looking forward to a new chapter in his vita.

The health problem took the former national soccer player out of everyday life without notice – two and a half years later, the 58-year-old is fit. “Everything is back on track. I felt like playing football again, that’s why I ended up in Spandau,” says the 1990 world champion, who has been leading the eight-class Spandau 06 to new glory at the venerable Ziegelhof since the summer.

In the summer of 2022, the 101-time national player was promoted to the sixth-tier Berlin League with BFC Preußen, but had to give up his position in the summer because an unexplained illness with memory loss gave Häßler no chance to carry out his duties. At the successor club to the legendary SBC 06, which mutated into FC Spandau 06 in 2003 after merging with 1. FC Spandau, “Icke” Häßler was given a few years to lead the club to new heights.

Has been playing in the lower Berlin leagues since 2016

This is not new territory for the 1996 European champion; he has been on the sidelines of lower-class Berlin clubs since 2016 because he had no other offers. “It was only important to me to have something to do again, to get away from home. “It got boring at some point,” says Häßler. “Football has dominated my life for 50 or 55 years. And it just doesn’t work without it. That’s why I’m happy to have an office again.” Based on the well-known motto that one of his coaches formulated: “Give Icke a ball and he’ll be happy.”

So Häßler’s new chapter began with two or three players who remained loyal to the club in the summer after Spandau’s relegation from the regional league. There are now “around 13 players” that the coach can train. With 22 points, his team is seventh in the table after the first half of the season, only nine points behind a promotion place. The 1992 Footballer of the Year is still hoping for something in the second half of the season.

Time for a rebuild

“A team slowly develops, which is really fun. The boys are up for it and do the things that are given to them. That takes time,” says Häßler and also gives a reason why he ended up in Spandau: “We were given two or three years to build something here. We are on the right track, even if it is a difficult, long road.”

More players will be added during the winter break to attack the promotion spots. Häßler would be happy to have reinforcements, even if the young people have to be managed differently than when he was active. “Today it’s a different generation, you have to caress them more than we used to. You didn’t have to tell us anything. We were already on the pitch two and a half hours before kick-off and really wanted to play. Today they are also late for the game,” says Häßler, who values ​​discipline and has been able to convey this over the last few months: “They are all good boys, but they have to be led.”

Not a big lifestyle change

The joy that the ex-national player enjoys working at Spandau becomes clear in the conversation. “I haven’t lost my will to live and I’m still the same, I think,” says Häßler, who “of course thought about it” after his illness, but won’t change his lifestyle so much “that you’ll now become even more cautious.” His illness was not life-threatening.

However, deaths of teammates such as Andreas Brehme or three players from Häßler’s time at AS Roma showed that things could happen “very quickly”. For the ex-professional, who ended his career at SV Austria Salzburg in 2004, it was also a sign to say thank you for being able to pick himself up again: “That’s why I’m trying to enjoy every day again as normal.”

− dpa/red