In some moments, Miroslav Klose’s handwriting was clearly recognizable. Since the end of June he has been training the small SCR Altach, a club from a village with 7000 inhabitants, which has not had much to do with world champions in its history, let alone with World Cup record scorers.
But now Klose, who still lifts a trophy in the Maracana into the night sky before the inner eye of the football world, is standing in the Cashpoint Arena in front of a little more than 3800 spectators and is trying to convey profitable football to his Altachers in the Ländle – partly with success .
In the twelfth minute of the second game of the season against Wolfsberger AC, Manuel Thurnwald hit a wonderful cross from the half field, in the middle the 33-year-old striker Atdhe Nuhiu was ready and headed into the near corner to make it 1-0. Wide flank, precise header: a goal that from Blaubach in the Palatinate to Rome would be associated with Miroslav Klose and which, despite the final result of 2:2, gives some reason to believe that it could work with the world champion in the mountainous province.
“The boys believe in themselves more and more,” observed Klose
So far, Klose has proven to be an extremely pragmatic trainer at the Vorarlberg location. When he was surprisingly unveiled in June, it was to be expected that he would make some kind of radical break as a modern coach. But Klose relies on a 33-year-old up front, has a similar line-up in midfield as last season and is not above choosing a very defensive orientation for certain phases of the game. “The boys believe in themselves more and more,” said Klose after the game: “The positive things are getting more and more.”
Altach, so far in his nine years in the Austrian Bundesliga almost always concerned with not being relegated, started the season with just one point from the first two games, but could have wrested a win from Wolfsberg: Robin Dutt’s team – After all, they are eligible to start in the Europa Conference League – they only equalized in the 88th minute, before that the game was balanced. “It’s nice to see Miro here,” said Dutt after the game.
And that’s exactly what’s going on in Vorarlberg at the moment: The incredulity of having a world champion on the sidelines is still there, but it should subside at some point in the coming weeks and months. Then the young coach Klose, who for the first time is responsible for a professional team, will have to be judged on whether he can get more out of the team than just staying in the class.
In any case, striker Nuhiu sees potential, even if he hasn’t learned everything from his trainer in a few weeks: “With the somersault, that won’t work out,” he said, shaking his head when asked whether he wanted to copy Klose’s well-known goal celebration: ” But I don’t have to copy everything he does. A header is enough for now.”