Hertha Berlin’s goalkeeping coach Zsolt Petry took some shots at Jonathan Klinsmann on Wednesday, and now his bosses are unhappy about it.
“First thing is that I will have a talk with our goalkeeper coach about internal and external communication,” said Michael Preetz, the club’s sporting director.
He then spoke about where Klinsmann’s development stands.
“There are things that he has to work on, no doubt about it,” Preetz said. “But we are in a constant exchange with him. And when we dealt with what happen over the last couple of days, we will continue to go on this road with him.”
The club’s head coach Pal Dardai also chimed in on the drama, saying that his coach’s comments were “too negative.”
“I don’t think Zsolt is such an extremely negative man,” he said. “He has a very good relationship with his goalkeepers. I think this story has been written a notch too negative.”
Preetz admitted that Klinsmann is far and away the third choice keeper at the club for right now, but he also preached patience in his development, feeling they still have something in the 20-year-old son of Jurgen Klinsmann.
“We always knew that we needed time and patience with Jonathan Klinsmann. We are in a situation where we are thinking about the new season in the coming weeks and months, “said Preetz. “With Rune Jarstein and Thomas Kraft, we have two goalkeepers who are rightfully number one and two. There’s a battery of young boys behind us.”
“Ulrich has a huge stick up his arse”… no he’s just too German…
The comment was incredibly stupid and indefensible. A similar comment by an American about any person from another country would be considered racist. F Hertha and their management.
Actually Hertha’s management responded pretty well. This was a one man thing, coming only from the GK coach. No need to blame the management and the rest of the club as they defended Jonathon. I’m surprised that he isn’t considered more of a prospect to the GK coach. Did he really think he would be more developed than he is? He needs a lot of maturing as a person and perhaps the GK coach has no patience for that. Shame really.
“he’s all too American.” actually, over the years, i recall many times that coaches were so happy to get a hard-working American on their roster. they would describe the player as hard-working, never quitting, having the right attitude, etc. actually, i have no idea what this gk coach is talking about.
in Europe, i mean
Sounds like they don’t disagree with the coach, they just don’t want him saying it to the press.
Oh, and 2-0
Speculate all you want — and the response seems like more a mixed bag than a similar rip — but the way I took it was in the nature of two wrongs don’t make a right. You focus on the kid but way I read this while suggesting the kid needs work and perhaps more professionalism, they were reminding the GK coach of their own PR doctrines which sounds like a slight professionalism slap there, too.
Not saying keepers don’t train hard but it’s in bursts and usually not more than 1-2 at a time, and it’s like high intensity, and then that rep is over and someone else is up, and then you wait; or it’s some sort of scrimmage or x v y drill, and you only use so many keepers at a time again. My impression was always it’s like kickers on a football team, they work through their drills and then they wait on the team for scrimmage drills. Half the reason they can last past 40 is they don’t pull full 2 hour practices a few times a week for their career…….
Something worth mentioning is Dad, though he played for West Germany/unified Germany, played maybe 2 pro seasons in Germany after the age of 25. Inter, Monaco, Spurs, Sampdoria. Dad then moved to the USA with his family and his American wife. Setting aside the kid being American, the Dad bounced around the world as well.
Looks like papa klinsmann made some calls thought his connections to get the GK coach back on the reservation… I mean, those comments seemed pretty harsh, unless the kid is just clowning around all the time