Footballers of SC Freiburg II could say goodbye to their coach as champions.
The Bundesliga reserve of SC Freiburg is playing an outstanding season in the regional league. The team of trainer Christian Preuer is on the way up. For the 37-year-old football teacher, the championship title would be a farewell present. After five years, he leaves the SC in the summer.
Christian Preuer is not someone who just pulls out such pithy sentences. The balanced and well-considered analysis is much more the thing of the U-23 coach at SC Freiburg than the crisp headline. And so it is hardly surprising that when asked about the reasons for saying goodbye in the summer, he has a whole bunch of causes ready: “We had a great and successful time here, we both benefited from each other. But now it’s time for me to take a next step. “
Preuer’s next destination is still classified
After five years together, the 37-year-old will break up his tent in Freiburg this summer. It is already clear where it is going, but it is still classified. One can assume that Preuer has an offer that can hardly be rejected. Preuer’s predecessors got the equipment for higher tasks in Freiburg. Xaver Zembrod is currently assistant to Julian Nagelsmann at RB Leipzig, Iraklis Metaxas is assistant trainer in Augsburg at Heiko Herrlich. And anyway: why else do you leave a team with which you are about to move up to the third division? However, Preuer doesn’t see it as that simple. “The season is still long,” he emphasizes, and says: “We would do well to continue to tackle every game as a new task and not let ourselves be driven crazy by overarching goals.”
His young footballers will hardly get it completely out of the back of their minds: After 27 games, SC Freiburg II is in first place in the regional league and the club took part in the pre-licensing process for the third division. In addition to the reserve of FC Bayern Mnchen, the U23s of SC Freiburg would then be the best second team in Germany in the event of promotion.
Christian Preuer played a major role in this. Since joining the sports club half a decade ago, he has led the top league talents to the top of the regional league. And that although he made a special rejuvenation last summer and for the first time also pulled several U-19 players into the second team. The risk worked. The young guns of the sports club impress with great speed. 68 hits in 27 games is an impressive figure. No other team has scored nearly as often. Preuer has created an offensive machine. The SC reserve plays fast forward and always knows only one direction with vertical speed steps or passes: the direction to the opposing goal.
And that although the most important goalgetter of the first half of the season left the team in Marvin Pieringer during the winter break. He is now scoring goals for second division Wrzburg. Most recently, Nishan Burkart has taken his place. The 21-year-old has already scored 13 goals and shines offensively with his understanding of the game, shrewdness, technique and athleticism. He says: “We have an incredible dynamic up front this season, our 3-4-3 system suits me very well.”
Nishan Burkart is emblematic of the team
Burkart is emblematic of the philosophy of the Freiburg Reserve: In Breisgau they want to shape Bundesliga players. The Swiss moved from Manchester United’s youth academy to the Black Forest fringe two seasons ago. After an orientation year, this season he has developed into a top performer. “This year the mood is more positive, that’s good for all of us,” says Burkhart. In many ways he is a typical Preuer student. Under his wing, he has developed so quickly that you don’t have to be a clairvoyant to predict that you will soon see him in the Bundesliga. Just like currently more than 20 former Preuer protégés: The Schlotterbeck brothers, Chima Okoroji, who is now defending for Paderborn or, most recently, Pieringer: All of them made the leap into the Bundesliga after their time under Preuer.
The regional league season is still 15 games long. With only three points ahead of their first rival Steinbach, the Freiburg team still has a long way to go to actually move up to the third division for the first time. The Preuer kickers therefore still have 15 games to give their teacher a farewell present. Preuer himself, however, thinks little of such pathetic goals. He says: “We want to keep improving from week to week.” He will not lose his analytical and sober manner in his last few months in Freiburg.
–
