The turmoil surrounding Christoph Daum’s cocaine scandal had also severely damaged the relationship between Reiner Calmund and Uli Hoeneß. But the two Bundesliga alpha animals found each other again – at dinner. At Christmas twenty years ago, the two enjoyed themselves with meat and cookies.
Bayern manager Uli Hoeneß had just ordered another round of “plate meat and pretzels for everyone” when the reporter from a major German sports magazine finally gave up. “Now have a little fight!” he asked the two heavyweight alphas of the Bundesliga. But after the past turbulent years, Hoeneß and Calmund were happy to finally have found each other again. Because only two years earlier the tablecloth had actually been cut forever. Hoeneß: “I no longer use the name Calmund, it no longer exists for me. I will not speak to him again. His will to destroy surprised me.”
The deep fall of Christoph Daum, which tore an entire football nation into the abyss in autumn 2000, also severely damaged the relationship between Calmund and Hoeneß. It almost seemed like a Christmas miracle when the two “big friends” sat down at a table again just a few weeks after the huge scandal, mediated by former national coach Berti Vogts. Before Bayer Leverkusen’s away game in early December 2000, everyone got together at Uli Hoeneß’s house – and talked. Because the Bayern manager found it difficult to deal with the tense situation – despite all the resolute toughness that he demonstrated to the outside world – as he admitted shortly after meeting Calmund: “For the first time in my life, I didn’t know how to deal with a situation…!”
After two hours both were glad that they had jumped over their own shadow. Calmund said visibly satisfied: “We sat down for more than two hours. I think now everything has been discussed, all problems solved.” And Uli Hoeneß was also relieved when they then drove together to eat at Feinkost-Käfer, where Franz Beckenbauer, delighted at the reconciliation, immediately had a bottle of champagne opened. Bayern Vice President Karl-Heinz Rummenigge said afterwards: “During the meal there was a relaxed and really great atmosphere.” Calmund once again: “Hoeneß and I, we can now start all over again. The wounds will heal. After a while we will surely sit down again and have a beer.” And that’s exactly what Rummenigge finally suggested: “We should do this more often now”.
Exactly two years later, Calmund and Hoeneß had become much closer again. And so, shortly before Christmas twenty years ago, they sat together in Munich with a wheat beer and a lavishly set table and presented themselves in the best of harmony. What the journalists intended as a “debate” turned into a lavish “celebration of love”. When Hoeneß finally launched frontal attacks on the competition and praised Leverkusen for having the “right people”, the reporters were amazed: “Calmund is going down like oil, but he’s silent because cookies are being served.”
The ice age between the two heavyweights of the Bundesliga was now – clearly audible and visible to everyone – over. Uli Hoeneß finally had his old Calli back, whom he had taken to heart so much because of his special nature: “Calmund has something to say about everything. If two players bump their heads in the Czech Republic, he knows that it was the same in Leverkusen in 1934 has happened.”
Well, when they finally sat together at a table again at Christmas twenty years ago, they revealed to each other the reason for their great hunger for the first time. Calmund: “I’m a frustration eater!” The Bayer manager had never said it in public like that. And Hoeneß, who had brought 40 sausages from his own factory for this special meeting, naturally didn’t want to hold back either and immediately admitted: “Me too!”
And with that, almost everything was said on that harmonious afternoon in December twenty years ago. Because the two had also spoken about the reason for their interim rift, which should have caused a few kilos of frustration. But at the time, both Uli Hoeneß and Reiner Calmund were “not yet ready for internal reconciliation with Christoph Daum”. Now that has changed too. Because the manager of FC Bayern Munich said twenty years ago: “I’m not one who always complains.” Good this way! And (hopefully) not just at Christmas.