German FA to speak with Flick about national team job

BERLIN: Germany’s football association (DFB) said on Tuesday it planned to hold talks with outgoing Bayern Munich coach Hansi Flick about becoming the replacement for national team boss Joachim Loew ater Euro 2020.

Flick will leave the reigning German champions at the end of the season ater he asked Bayern to be released from his contract, with RB Leipzig coach Julian Nagelsmann named as his successor.

“It’s well known that Hansi Flick is held in high regard by the federation. We can confirm that, in this context, we will now also have discussions with him and Bayern officials,” a DFB spokesperson said.

“At this time, we will not be making any more comment on the rest of the procedure, which we will coordinate internally first with all the parties concerned, with all the necessary care and calm,” the spokesperson added.

Flick won the Bundesliga and German Cup last season and added the Champions League and his side could wrap up the German title again early next month, but his relationship with Bayern’s powerful sporting director Hasan Salihamidzic has deteriorated over transfer policy. The 56-year-old is considered the German FA’S primary choice to take over from Loew, who is set to step down ater the European Championship following 15 years in charge.

The DFB had repeatedly said in recent weeks it would not approach a coach still under contract, and ruled out paying any compensation to a club.

Flick served an assistant to Loew between 2006 and 2014, helping Germany win the World Cup in Brazil. He later worked as the DFB’S sporting director.

Meanwhile, German Football Association (DFB) president Fritz Keller apologised on Monday ater comparing his deputy to a Nazi judge.

Keller said during a meeting last Friday that vice-president of the DFB Rainer Koch was like Roland Freisler, the head of the Nazi party’s court during the 1940s.

Freisler was also a participant at 1942’s Wannsee Conference, where it was decided that 11 million Jews should be sent to death camps.

“Sometimes during controversies words are used that shouldn’t be,” Keller said in a statement.

“I apologised in person and in writing to Rainer Koch, who had the goodness to accept it, my comparison was totally inappropriate, notably towards the victims of Nazism, which I deeply regret,” he added.

The situation was worsened as Koch works as a magistrate outside of his responsibilities with the DFB.

According to German media the DFB’S general secretary Friedric Curtius has taken the incident to the organisation’s ethical commitee.