The 43rd minute of the Bayern Munich game against Dynamo Kiev is running, with two minutes left until half-time when sports presenter Alex Schlueter rises from his commentary position and turns his back on the action. Sometimes spectators get up here in the Munich Allianz Arena before the final whistle because they want to be the first to reach the toilets. But Schlueter wants to go to the field. From there he will talk about the highlights of the game as the half-time break begins.
Schlueter does not work. He runs. Behind the rows of seats, down the stairs. Through the catacombs. Miss as little as possible. Especially not a goal, now in the 45th minute. Schlüter is lucky when he arrives on the pitch, it stayed at 2-0 for Bayern, nothing missed. Take a deep breath, final whistle, position, camera, microphone, let’s go.
Most of the Champions League games have only been played on Dazn since this season
After this sprint through the stadium catacombs, you know that Alex Schlueter, 36 years old, 1.96 meters tall, is in good shape. Above all, you got an idea of how serious he is about his job as a moderator on the streaming portal Besides takes. His sprint gives an idea of what the success of the channel could be in: an obsessive and exuberant enthusiasm for football that sometimes drifts off into shop talk.
At least that is what Schlüter stands for as a man from the very beginning of the streaming portal Dazn, which offers most of the live broadcasts in Germany. Most of the Champions League games – with a few exceptions – have only been played by Dazn since this season. Sky, the top dog until last season, has lost all rights to the Champions League and only the Saturday games in Bundesliga football.
With this, the broadcaster and the youngest crew of commentators and moderators have taken control of the Germans’ favorite game. The voices that now set the tone of the broadcasts are no longer Bela Rethy (ZDF) or Wolff-Christoph Fuss (Sky), but Marco Hagemann, Uwe Morawe, Jan Platte, to name a few Dazn commentators. Not to forget: the new presenter Laura Wontorra.
During the interviews, the stars should forget their position
Front man Schlueter says about his job: “It’s about combining my passion for football, which has always been there, with some of the things that make up this job, with a certain rhetoric, maybe with a touch of humor a sovereignty in front of the camera – with all that basic handicrafts in the big case. ” Such neatly built sentences are typical of him.
Schlueter comes from a village near Wolfsburg, his father was a forester but an enthusiastic athlete, and since he was five, the lanky, tall boy’s youth consisted of a cycle between the sports field and the sports hall, between football and tennis. Homework was done on the bus on the way to school. When studying sports science in Göttingen, he opted for the journalistic branch. In the first station, local radio, he realizes that he would like to conduct interviews in which the stars forget their high position, which also has a protective function. Schlueter says that digressing about football details is more important to him than asking for spectacular quotes. Before he started at Dazn in 2016, he worked for three years as a data editor for the statistics service Opta, where Dazn uses numbers and data for his transmissions.
“Ramp acidity should never be the main driver,” says Schlueter of his job
On this evening at the game between Bayern and Kiev, Ralf Rangnick appears for the first time in the role of the expert, who analyzes the most important game scenes with Schlüter on the sidelines and speaks to Kahn and Nagelsmann. Rangnick, the former sports director of RB Leipzig, who was even discussed as national coach, arrives two hours before the game. He speaks little and looks around attentively. Will Schlueter manage to put the quiet, serious Rangnick, who is often given the title “football professor” because of his meticulous working method, in a good mood? This is all the more important because he is watching the football show with him Decoded will deny where in the first episode of FC Bayern will be decoded. On the way to the OB van, Schlüter Rangnick introduces each employee individually, trying to keep the tones quiet.
“Ramp acidity should never be the main driver,” says Schlüter later about his job. “The main reason for me will always be my passion for football. A friend once said that you can look at colleagues, whether they are doing it for the game or just for the camera.” He calls his interviews “games”, for him it is important “to sensitively bring people closer to the fact that I also have a certain idea, although it must always be clear that the expert is in a different league”.
Next to the arena there are two outside broadcast vans, in one of which the worldview is produced. These are the images that are cut by the streaming service for broadcasters around the world. The German live broadcast is put together in the second truck. Commentator Jan Platte and Daniel Herzog are already crouching in the break room next to the editing suites and the monitors, who will conduct the exclusive interviews with the Bayern players on the sidelines after the game. The two wait with technicians and the head of the program for the start of the broadcast, including preliminary reporting, Schlüter and Rangnick join them. The Champions League games are playing on the monitors, it’s like being in a sports bar with a sofa, rolls and soft drinks.
Schlueter picks up the phone. “Congratulations, Per!” He calls out to Rangnick with a sidelong glance. All heads go up. Schlueter hands the phone to Rangnick, “here is the one who replaces you today!” The 2014 world champion was Dazn’s first Champions League expert. Rangnick into the cell phone: “Here’s the one who almost destroyed your career when he put you on right-back.” Rangnick trained Per Mertesacker when he played his first Bundesliga season at Hannover 96 and later made a career as a central defender. Everyone in this break room knows that. Schlueter did it. The cool football professor Rangnick has now arrived in a small cosmos where football is the most important main thing in the world.
At home on the pitch: Alex Schlueter (right) in conversation with Oliver Kahn (center) and Ralf Rangnick.
(Photo: Harald Hordych)
During the Bayern game, before the catacomb sprint, the Dazn team of experts then sits four in a row, each behind his monitor. The commentator’s table looks like the desk of a writer who has laid out his entire concept, notes on each player. Rangnick sits next to it and stares mesmerized at the playing field, as if he wants to memorize every patch of the lawn, then Schlüter and a specialist come to create the striking scenes that are analyzed during the break and after the game.
Schlüter selects the scenes. Suddenly Rangnick taps him on the shoulder and points out a scene that he didn’t notice and that Rangnick really wants to talk about in order to explain the determination of the Bayern game. For Schlüter, this is proof that “his” expert has arrived in the team and that the principle of eye level will also work at Rangnick. Even if he becomes the interim coach of Manchester United a few weeks later and lets his involvement there rest for the rest of the season: You know each other now.