Fabian Wohlgemuth has been sporting director at VfB Stuttgart for two months. He had previously held this office at SC Paderborn, which Stuttgart heartlessly threw out of the DFB Cup on Tuesday evening with very late goals in the 86th and 95th minutes. So does Wohlgemuth feel sorry for his old Paderborners? “I’m here as a Stuttgarter now,” said the 43-year-old in the cabin aisle of the Paderborn Arena, “and having compassion is difficult in football anyway.”
Of course he was right. Nobody wants pity in football, which they already know in Stuttgart. How often has it been said in the past few months: The people of Stuttgart played so nicely again! But lost again!
Even in the round of 16 in Paderborn, only a few minutes were missing from this conclusion – although the second division team had only shot on goal once against a clearly superior VfB. Paderborn didn’t have to contribute to their early 1-0 lead in the fourth minute, it was enough to stand around after a throw-in from Stuttgart and watch as VfB defender Konstantinos Mavropanos scored a historic no-look own goal. From a measured 48.1 meters he played back without making eye contact with goalkeeper Florian Müller, who, according to regulations, had taken up a position next to his goal in order to offer himself as a pass.
The year is still young, but the way Müller then dived after Mavropanos’ ball in a desperate choreography, almost confusing hands and feet, is already obvious for every annual review. After that, the Swabians stormed the Paderborn goal for almost an hour and a half before they scored the 1-1 four minutes before the end of regulation time thanks to Gil Dias, who had joined the game the day before. Five minutes after the end of regular time, center forward Serhou Guirassy then headed the 17th (!) corner kick into the Paderborn goal to make it 2-1.
The DFB has promised around 1.7 million euros for reaching the quarter-finals of the cup, which means that the Stuttgarters have almost recovered their expenses from the day before. On this cup evening at least the money felt well spent. Stuttgart increased the pressure in the second half, not least because of the substitution of the ball-savvy Japanese Genki Haraguchi, and the Portuguese Gil Dias only entered the pitch in the 82nd minute, but he managed to equalize four minutes later with a magnificent turning shot. Dias, 26, joined from Benfica for just over €1m; Haraguchi, already 31 by Stuttgart standards, came from Union Berlin for a little less than a million.
Ahamada is actually leaving the club too soon – he had just started to get good
“Fabian organized it well and got it right,” Labbadia praised sports director Wohlgemuth – knowing full well that these transfers were something of a minimum solution. Relatively powerless and not a bit amused, Labbadia had previously followed how the competitors in the relegation battle signed player after player, while his sports director was hardly granted any funds. VfB has to save so much that it is only able to act to a limited extent on the market – and can only fend off tempting offers for its own staff with difficulty. The Stuttgart team remained firm with left-back Borna Sosa, the approximately ten million offered from Leverkusen were clearly not enough for the lack of a suitable replacement. The Stuttgart team could no longer resist the €12m offered by English first division side Crystal Palace for 20-year-old midfield talent Naouirou Ahamada. Shortly before the deadline, the transfer took place on Tuesday evening.
“We would have preferred to keep the player,” said Labbadia after the game in Paderborn, “he made the breakthrough for us this season. But if the club says we need it, then we have to give in. It’s not against each other, but togetherness – and our only chance.”
Naouirou Ahamada has a lot of talent but also makes naïve mistakes – now at Crystal Palace.
(Photo: Uwe Anspach/dpa)
Two different worldviews are currently colliding in Stuttgart. Ahamada comes from the school of thought of ex-sports director Sven Mislintat, who should subsequently see his way confirmed: he had once borrowed the young Frenchman from Juventus Turin’s A-Youth and later committed it for 1.5 million euros – that the Not even Mislintat could have foreseen that the player’s market value would increase so quickly.
Basically, Ahamada is leaving the club too early – he has only just begun to flank his sometimes naïve mistakes with impressive runs and passes. But Stuttgart can no longer afford to wait for the player’s development. They need the money, so they’re trying the more traditional school of thought. For the time being, the plan is to strengthen the eleven’s stability with more experienced players – which is also risky because they have to rely on players like Gil Dias for financial reasons, who has been rather unlucky through Europe in recent years.
After all, the Portuguese showed in Paderborn what he is capable of at least for a moment – continuation urgently needed, from now on again in the Bundesliga relegation battle.