The Bundesliga’s 25th matches, the German football championship, look set to be under stress again this weekend. Like last week, the ultra supporters threaten to continue their protest movement, even if it means interrupting the meetings.
"We will assume new interruptions of matches", warned Friday the group of ultras "Fanszenen Deutschland", in reference to the temporary stops of the Hoffenheim-Bayern and Union Berlin-Wolfsburg meetings last weekend. These had led the players of the Hoffenheim-Bayern Munich match to end the match with a ten-assist in the midfield.
(📺 VIDEO) 🇩🇪 #Bundesliga 😱😱 Completely INCREDIBLE scene! 💥 After the match was stopped because of the anti-H banners… https://t.co/yYcoubW0hx
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What are the ultras protesting against?
The spark that set fire to the powder is a disciplinary decision affecting Dortmund fans, banned from traveling to Hoffenheim for the next two years, for having insulted and threatened with death to the rich owner of Hoffenheim, Dietmar Hopp .
Wind standing for years against “Collective sanctions”, ultras from all over Germany have joined forces with those from the "Yellow Wall". And the insults against Hopp, the League and the Federation have multiplied in the stands of the Bundesliga.
By pronouncing "Collective sanctions to protect a billionaire, the DFB (German football league) show his real face, accuse the ultras. It is no more and no less than an attack on our Fankultur and on our values ".
What do the ultras blame Dietmar Hopp for?
Dietmar Hopp, co-founder of the IT company SAP, has enabled Hoffenheim to climb from the 8th to the first division in two decades. He has become the bane of some of the supporters because he symbolizes football business in their eyes, just like Red Bull in Leipzig.
The ultra "traditionalists" refuse the arrival of all-powerful investors in Bundesliga clubs, on the model of Paris SG or Manchester City. "If someone with unlimited financial resources buys a club in the Bundesliga, some people find it OK. But fans don’t find it OK, that’s the bottom line. These clubs do not play with the same means as the others ”sums up Holger Keye, an ultras representative of Union Berlin, a club fiercely attached to its associative roots.
Isn't the weight of a shareholder limited?
The German League introduced the so-called rule in 1998 "50 + 1", which prohibits anyone from holding an absolute majority of the shares in a club. But, concerned about her income, she also showed pragmatism.
An exemption clause has been added, which allows an investor to be in the majority if he has financed the club continuously for at least 20 years. This was the case, for example, in Wolfsburg and Leverkusen, originally owned by Volkswagen and the chemist Bayer. And today that is also the case for Dietmar Hopp.
Can we speak of a fracture of the German model?
Proponents of tradition see the Hoffenheim model as an attack on the sacrosanct German "Fankultur", the "fan culture". "In Hoffenheim and RB Leipzig, fans have no co-management power", notes Michael Gabriel, head of a national supporters organization,
Football in Germany is a social and civic activity. It is the fan associations that animate the stadiums and make the Bundesliga a popular championship.
"The fundamental problem is that the authorities see the fans only as spectators, and do not recognize that they are involved in the life of football and also want to be involved in the decisions", deplores Sig Zelt, also active at Union Berlin.
"Interruptions of matches and collective sanctions cannot be a solution", pleads Stefan Reuter, executive director of FC Augsburg, "We need a dialogue of equals, in which all the parties are responsible".
In the meantime, this weekend the banners should still be out.
