Welcome to Freiburg, Germany’s sunniest city
Home to a club where football means family, continuity and modesty…
Where success has traditionally not been that important.
We are not a big club. But in terms of the values, we stand for, we are a giant.
But success has come and with it, a brand new stadium.
This stadium offers financial possibilities that we've never had before.
So, can Freiburg stay ‘small’ while making it big?
Any other club in Germany can’t just copy, the SC Freiburg model.
When I was growing up in Germany in the 90s and 2000s, the club would get promoted and
relegated and never threatened to be part of elite.
When we first came to the Bundesliga in 1993, everybody expected it to be a one season event.
And that's it.
While SC Freiburg has been out of the Bundesliga just one season since 2009, the modesty of
early top flight years has remained within the club and among the fans.
So the supporters are big proponents of modesty and humility, values that are also embodied
by their captain and one-club man Christian Günter.
But three successive top 10 finishes, Europa League
football, the prospect of Champions League football, a cup final in 2022 and a new stadium
all paint a different picture.
We’ve often heard this idea of Freiburg being part of Germany’s top 20.
So, the 18 Bundesliga clubs plus the two best clubs in the second division.
What’s the goal now.
To be part of the top 20, top six or even higher?
I think 14 at least that's a realistic goal that you could go for.
It just means not to be relegated being a stable member of the Bundesliga.
And if we end up as number six in the table, great but nothing that you should expect.
So, is this club purposely holding back from its newfound glory?
Perhaps hiding behind false humility or even shying away from success?
While other clubs quickly develop an appetite for glory, it seems Freiburg won’t
get sucked in and would even be happy to give it all up if success affected their values…
After decades of focusing on surviving, the club is currently thriving
thanks to one man in particular!
I can see a certain development within the last, 10 years.
Christian Streich being our head coach.
The last three seasons always being among the top 10.
This tells me as well that we are not an underdog anymore.
That’s Christian Streich, the mastermind behind it all.
The longest serving coach in German football and the second longest in Europe.
He joined Freiburg in 1995 as a youth coach and never had eyes on the top job, until it
was his in 2011.
Since then, the club has gone from strength to strength and his antics have made him a
popular figure across fanbases!
In a very positive sense of the word, he is crazy, when it comes to football
Captain Christian Günter joined Freiburg as a 13-year-old.
And like many players here has known no other coach.
So he's a very well-rounded character and intellectual person as well.
And I mean, our club, we’re just fortunate to have him.
He's at the centre of this club. No doubt.
The case for continuity didn’t begin with Streich, the foundations for it were set a
long time ago…
There was Achim Stocker, He was head of the board, later he became president and he stayed
in this job for 37 years.
He stood for modesty. For turning around the penny before you spend it.
And for continuity.
I think having had him as President for 37 years, that just by itself made a difference.
Compared to many other clubs where continuity is never a principle they would adhere to.
They are looking for fast and quick success.
Although you have to add that Achim Stocker said to Volker Finke, who was team coach for 16 years
He said to Finke "never even think of getting to the first division."
The early success with continuity still serves Freiburg to this day.
In the squad, on the bench, in the stands and in management… across the club, patience
is practised as a central virtue.
That's the explanation, why Christian Streich and his teams were relegated twice and nobody
doubted him to stay on as head coach.
If we lose two or three games in a row here nobody gets nervous.
Everybody knows they will get back on track.
And football is just such a short-lived game in a way.
And it involves so much luck that he should not just put that in the centre of your attention.
All that continuity and modesty is well and good.
But Freiburg have changed and made the move to modernise.
A few months into the season in 2021, Freiburg left the iconic Dreisam-Stadion after almost 67 years.
Now they’re here at this modern arena, enjoying success but perhaps also some of the growing
pains that come with it.
Are the magic and modesty beginning to fade?
A stadium move is often controversial.
For some at the club, it was an unbearable experience.
There is a certain myth about that stadium because that's where we, you know, developed
as a club and many people still consider that to be our homebase in a way.
So there is a romantic notion.
Perhaps the magic of the Dreisamstadion has faded forever?
The step was deemed necessary, but it was taken with a heavy heart.
People at the club were unsure if things would ever be the same.
In the long run, we couldn't have survived in the
in the Bundesliga with the Black Forest stadium.
This stadium offers financial possibilities that we've never had before.
More money, less soul.
In football it’s a well known development.
So is Freiburg now just another big club?
We are not a big club. But in terms of the values we stand for, we are a giant.
And I think this expresses it wonderfully.
That the ethos we stand for, our values, that makes us a big club.
But in a metaphorical way, not in terms of its sheer size.
In the 90s, Freiburg had become trailblazers in Germany by creating the so-called
"Freiburg football school" and investing in youth, billing themselves a development club.
That’s where most of today’s management team still come from and their captain…
Freiburg is known for its excellent academy and emphasis on young players.
They also seem to produce genuinely good guys.
But how's that all possible?
Freiburg have continued to be more of a selling club, cashing in on homegrown players like
Nico Schlotterbeck, who moved to Dortmund.
And next selling Kevin Schade to Brentford.
So is anything changing?
But the decisive question is always have you got the money you spent or where does the money come from?
And that makes us special again because we absolutely adhere to the principle of sustainability.
We never spend a penny without having it earned first of all.
Things are slowly changing even if Freiburg aims to continue its modest approach for now.
Outsiders are already beginning to treat the club like a bigger fish.
For now, all seems well in Freiburg.
Modesty, continuity, youth work…
They still form the foundation of this club along with its new stadium.
In the end, the fans will know best whether their club has stayed true to itself.
Membership has more than doubled in the last 5 years…
In the last six months alone, 10,000 members joined, bringing the total up to 50,000.
Earlier we talked about being an underdog and no longer really being an underdog.
Do you miss that?
It's not a shame.
Thank God we are not an underdog anymore.
We wouldn't be the club we are without our history without that tradition without having
that modesty and and so on.
But today I mean there is some sort of romantic notion to be being an underdog.
We aren’t the underdog anymore.
No.
It seems this is no ordinary club.
Here, greatness means staying true to your values.
And getting bigger doesn't mean giving up the things that made you enjoy being small.