‘A crime scene cleaner’ – Julian Nagelsmann arrived at Bayern Munich with a big reputation, showing up for training on a skateboard and motorbike, but the results piled up under the pressure and even his clothes stuck with it Thomas Tuchel bound

It takes a special person to be named the Bundesliga’s youngest manager at 28, but Julian Nagelsmann’s quirks are showing signs of ageing.

The Bayern Munich boss, now 35, has been on an upward trajectory since taking over the village of Hoffenheim which was seven points from safety, guiding them to the Champions League to stun the world of football. soccer.

The rise continued at an alarming rate as he progressed towards Leipzig, seeing the club challenge for league and cup titles for the first time, before reaching the Champions League semi-finals , knocking out Diego Simeone’s Atletico Madrid and Jose Mourinho’s Tottenham along the way.

But Nagelsmann may have reached the ceiling of his trajectory. At Bayern, where he has been since 2021, the only requirement is victory, and at the moment that is hard to come by.

Although it sounds ridiculous for almost every other professional football team, a four-game Bundesliga winless streak, their longest in 20 years, has been branded a “crisis”, despite losing just one game.

A European Cup quarter-final defeat at the hands of Villarreal last season was Nagelsmann’s first true nadir in football, claiming he received ‘450 death threats’ after the game, and now at the in the middle of another fight, the pressure increases.

German newspaper BILD claim ‘the name Thomas Tuchel hangs over him and Munich like a shadow’ as the former Chelsea boss searches for work, and with little on the pitch, previously insignificant matters are now escalating.

It’s not just Nagelsmann’s age that makes him different, but also his understanding of the game, starting with his early days studying racehorses.

“Horses are not judgmental creatures. Horses react to your aura,” he explained to Hoffenheim. “And if you walk into a paddock and all the horses run away, then obviously you’re a bit too dominant in your behavior.”

This trick has clearly worked training many players older than him, and another tool, a giant scaffold he sat on with a spotlight showing a bird’s eye view of the training ground, was a revelation for tactical analysis and understanding.

However, football only truly welcomes new ideas when they are successful, and with the players on international duty and the team struggling, a new one-way window in the manager’s office at the training ground allows him to observe his players without them knowing. it didn’t go well.

While that has strained relations, a loss to Augsburg before the recent international break seemed to show that all was not well when he had to follow tradition and attend Oktoberfest. However, the picture of Nagelsmann and his bosses shows just how bad things are.

Sitting alongside CEO Oliver Kahn and sporting director Hasan Salihamidzic draped in lederhosen, the mood around the table was clear save for one face.

Nagelsmann’s girlfriend, Lena Wurzenberger, was delighted to be sitting with two of the most powerful men in German football, and that’s no surprise given his job as a sports journalist.

Wurzenberger was a Bayern reporter at BILD until his relationship with the head coach became public three weeks after his divorce from his wife in June, seeing his role covering the Munich club end immediately.

Speaking of the most recent result, the 1-0 loss to Augsburg, Thomas Muller said: “After four games without a win, we are stunned. Like time, it gets darker and darker, and so does our emotional world. »

Dramatic perhaps, but the only thing that doesn’t cloud it is the fashion sense of Nagelsmann, who is even said to be boring players, at least according to Zeit, as well as his accusation that the defense has played as “a bunch of chickens”. ‘.

A white jacket last saw the BILD headline “Nagelsmann looks like a crime scene cleaner” and it’s far from the worst.

Bright red tracksuits and three-quarter skinny jeans were a regular feature at Leipzig before Bayern restricted their clothing choices, with Nagelsmann now only allowed to wear clothes from club sponsors adidas or Hugo Boss.

His mode of transport to work has also been questioned, showing up for training on a Triumph lowrider motorbike, and he even once arrived at Bayern on a skateboard.

All was well when Bayern were flying towards their 10th consecutive league title last season before the Champions League exit put a damper on things, and the situation is now much more serious.

Julian Nagelsmann arriving at Säbener Straße on his Harley-Davidson [📸 Bild] pic.twitter.com/wYTinC9bsV

— Bavaria and Germany (@iMiaSanMia) March 4, 2022

It cost 25 million euros [£22m] to get Nagelsmann off his contract at Leipzig in 2021, the highest fee ever paid for a football manager.

This makes a departure unlikely even with Tuchel’s availability, and the next one is the best possible opponent in the manager’s ‘anti-crisis plan’ – a meeting with Bayer Leverkusen spiraling out of control.

Despite his tactics giving off the vibe of a Pep Guardiola-level obsession, Nagelsmann was asked how he sleeps in the build-up to the next game.

“I sleep like the previous weeks,” he said. “Football is a very important part for me, it’s also one of my passions, but it doesn’t define me as a person or my happiness in life. That’s why I try to give myself the necessary distance compared to her.

The line finds a similar chord back when things were much easier at Hoffenheim in 2017, when he revealed his biggest secret: “You can only succeed if you have fun and don’t get too stressed out.”

Now stress is unavoidable in Munich and he can’t even take out his skateboard to let off steam.

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