He was a teammate, player and assistant coach of Franz Beckenbauer. In the starInterview, Klaus Augenthaler talks about Beckenbauer’s powers of persuasion on the phone, the 1990 World Cup triumph and the Schafskopf evenings together.
Mr. Augenthaler, you are something like a world champion despite yourself. Franz Beckenbauer had to persuade you in 1990 to come back to the national team, from which you had said goodbye three years earlier. How was the team boss able to change your mind?
There were two phone calls. In the first he said: “Klaus, I would like to have you with me in Italy. You are my head of defense. We want to really do something at the World Cup.” I said: “Franz, that’s not possible. I have groin problems, my Achilles tendons hurt, and I also have a newborn child at home. I can’t cope.” He replied: “We’ll manage that. If you’re in pain, take a break. Then someone else will play.”
That didn’t convince you?
Well, national team: all well and good. But FC Bayern paid my salary back then. I wanted to manage my strength and be fit for the next season.
The second call apparently turned things around. How did Beckenbauer do that? With pressure? With charm?
Franz could make you feel like you were the greatest. But not in such a flat way. He was friendly, sensitive, he distributed his compliments skillfully, and at the end of the phone call the mood was such that I said: “Ok, I’m in.” You couldn’t turn down a Beckenbauer. That just didn’t work.
When you returned to the national team: Did you have the feeling that this team would achieve great things at the World Cup – just as Beckenbauer had promised you?
Yes, there was a special spirit there. I had a direct comparison to the 1986 World Cup in Mexico. We had great footballers there, but we weren’t a real team. In 1990, on the other hand: Nobody envied anyone else. Not even people like Matthäus, Brehme, Völler or Klinsmann, who played for big clubs like Inter Milan or AS Roma. It was all about the matter. About the next game, about the next victory.
A team full of stars. Did Beckenbauer have anything to do as a coach at all?
Oh yes, definitely. Things always seemed so easy for Franz, as if he was just dancing through life. But that’s not true. He was a hard worker, obsessed with details. At the World Cup in Italy we knew everything about our opponents: strengths, weaknesses, shoe size, eye color. Franz wanted to eliminate chance. In 1986 in Mexico he really overdid it with his team meetings. We sometimes sat there for two hours at a time and listened to him. But actually after just 20 minutes we were no longer able to absorb anything. In Italy he did a better job of it.
You and Beckenbauer have a long history in common: in the 1976/77 season you trained as a young player with the Bavaria-Professionals with. Beckenbauer was already a star back then, world champion in 1974 and on his way to Cosmos New York. What memories do you have of the first meeting?
I was a young guy from FC Vilshofen and had a three-day trial training session with Bayern. And suddenly these legends are standing on the lawn with me. Beckenbauer, Müller, Maier, Hoeneß. I had seen them on TV a few weeks earlier, against Atletico Madrid, in the European Cup final for the national champions. I still remember it exactly. That was crazy for me.
How did Beckenbauer deal with a young player like you? Did he ever give you any advice?
No not that. He wasn’t the type for that. But as a player he was a role model. He really worked hard in every training session, you never had the feeling that the exercises were a nuisance for him, that everything was a few sizes too small for him. He had worked hard to achieve the lightness he exuded on the pitch.
When you made your Bundesliga debut in October 1977, Beckenbauer was already in New York. Do you regret never making a game together?
Stop, no, there is a game. It was a preparatory game in Zurich where I came on as a substitute with fifteen minutes to go. Then Franz waved him off, along the lines of: What kind of blind man is coming? We were 3-1 down and Franz wanted to win every game. Really: everyone. Gerd Müller was the same way.
What did you learn from Beckenbauer during your year together at Bayern?
How to deal with people. I watched Franz while he was writing autographs: he wrote out his entire name every time, very delicately, very accurately. Nothing was smeared there and then we quickly went into the cabin. That wasn’t the case with him. He treated his fellow human beings with respect. No matter who was standing in front of him.
You experienced Beckenbauer not only as a player, but also as his employee. You were his assistant coach at FC Bayern in the mid-1990s. What was Beckenbauer like as a boss?
He trusted his people and expected them to speak their minds. He had brought training plans with him from his time at Hamburger SV, I think Ernst Happel had written them. Franz showed it to me and asked what I thought of it. “Coach, if we go through with this, the team will be destroyed in six weeks,” I replied. That was the end of the matter.
And outside of work? Has a relationship developed between Beckenbauer and you?
Franz was a person you simply enjoyed having by your side. The best part of my time as his assistant coach were the Schafskopf evenings. If we had a game on Saturday afternoon, we sat together on Friday evening, Franz, Uli Hoeneß and Rudi Egerer (long-time bus driver for FC Bayern, editor’s note) and me. Then we drank a beer, it was wonderful.
And of course Beckenbauer always won at cards.
On the contrary. Rudi or I usually won. Franz was a terrible sheepshead player. He could do a lot in life, but fortunately not everything.
Source: Stern
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