As the goalkeeper of the German national soccer team, he actually has a role model function. But both on and off the pitch, Jens Lehmann repeatedly causes scandals. The fact that he is now even unpacking the chainsaw fits into the picture perfectly.
The report sounds all too bizarre: Jens Lehmann attacks a garage with a chainsaw because it probably spoils his view of the lake. But even if the news initially seems like a B-movie variant of the horror film “Chainsaw Massacre” – in the case of the ex-soccer national goalkeeper, it is then part of a series of scandals.
We don’t even want to include the pods that the 52-year-old once bought on the pitch. Of course, even during his playing days at clubs like Schalke 04 (1988 – 1998), Borussia Dortmund (1999 – 2003), FC Arsenal (2003 – 2008) and VfB Stuttgart (2008 – 2010), Lehmann was not on the pitch child of sadness.
He kicks opponents badly, bullies his teammates or even a fan because he didn’t say “please” when asked for an autograph. What really happened in VfB’s Champions League game against Unirea Urziceni from Romania will probably remain a mystery forever. One thing is certain: the television pictures suggest that Lehmann peed behind a gang in the middle of the game.
Actually, Lehmann, who was also part of the German national team from 1998 to 2008, should be a role model. But he repeatedly doesn’t do justice to it either on or off the pitch. Little has changed since the end of his active career. Rather the opposite.
In 2014, for example, he produced an outcry of indignation when he spoke as a talk show guest about the coming out of his former national team colleague Thomas Hitzlsperger as homosexual. “Nobody gained anything from it. Football is a man’s business, you don’t have to think too much about it,” is Lehmann’s verdict on Hitzlsperger’s courageous admission.
But that’s not all. Had he known about Hitzlsperger’s homosexuality, he would have found it “funny,” Lehmann hints. “You shower together every day …” Finally, the ex-keeper comes up with a poisoned compliment: “Thomas Hitzlsperger is a player who, firstly, is very intelligent, and secondly, his style of play would not have given reason to have it think there is something.”
The following year, Lehmann followed up the homophobic statements with a statement that quite a few people labeled “everyday racism”. After the German national team won against Georgia, as a TV expert, he confirmed that Ilkay Gündogan, who was born in Gelsenkirchen, was intelligent and “speaks German very well”.
Lehmann’s arithmetic, on the other hand, may not work quite as well, although he rigorously denies reports that he has evaded taxes. On the other hand, his conviction for a total of 42,500 euros in fines for assisting in an escape from an accident in 2016 is on record.
Lehmann would not be Lehmann if he had not expressed his very idiosyncratic opinion on the situation in the corona pandemic. “No one has yet been able to answer my question as to why you can’t put 20,000 in a stadium like the Allianz Arena, which can accommodate 70,000 people,” he criticized the ghost games in a TV interview in April 2020.
Shortly thereafter, he downplays the corona dangers again: “As long as the symptoms aren’t that bad, I think players have to deal with it. That’s why I think it’s not so critical for young, healthy people with a strong immune system.” And in a Facebook post he explains again that everything is not so bad after all: “In 2017 we had to mourn 23,000 flu deaths in Germany. Nobody noticed it. Now we have to have exactly the same death rate within the population of 0.028 percent mourn,” he admits to the health experts.
Finally, in May 2021, Lehmann stirred up racist resentment again. Ex-soccer player Dennis Aogo made a message public in which Lehmann described him as a “quota black man”. After all: Lehmann then apologizes for the statement. However, that does not protect him from being kicked out of the Hertha BSC board of directors, resigning from several TV engagements and losing the post of ambassador at the Laureus World Sports Academy.
Jens Lehmann, on the other hand, may now be threatened with civil law consequences for his chainsaw action, even if the damage he allegedly caused is only a few hundred euros. In any case, he sawed up his image properly once again.
