Just prior to his sacking at Bayern Munich, Julian Nagelsmann had given an interview to Welt Am Sonntag detailing how hard he was working to be a better leader to his men. Take a read through what the former boss had to say…
Being the coach at one of the biggest football clubs in the world is one of the most stressful jobs there is. From tactics to man management and everything in between, it’s simply a huge task. In the case of former Bayern Munich coach Julian Nagelsmann, it didn’t affect him too much, but it did prompt him to look at his leadership style.
Speaking to Welt Am Sonntag (as captured by Twitter account @iMiaSanMia), the 35-year-old detailed how the job changed him. “I have many friends who have nothing to do with football,” Nagelsmann recalled. “Luckily, I didn’t get feedback from them that I had changed as a person. As a coach: Involving the leading players is a bigger factor at Bayern than at my previous clubs.”
Integration of players in the coaching job is something unusual from a coach, but Nagelsmann wanted them to have some sort of contribution to the team. “It’s a community, our players here have won a lot and have a lot of experience. But no player ever came up to me and said: I don’t want to play a back three.”
“The players express their wishes where they want to play,” Nagelsmann continued. “They can and should have a say, that’s very important to me, and support the decisions. But I’m the one who has to make the decisions. I tell the team how we want to play. Players want to hear arguments. I’ll give it to them — and then everyone can say what they think.”
As for his footballing philosophy, he has one sentence to sum it all up. “That was also a question in my thesis,” the former RB Leipzig coach said. “This is what I said back then: ‘Controlling the game through possession and changes of pace.’ That still applies today.”
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