The Kaiser is dead. This news has, let’s put it bluntly, deeply affected Germany even in these times. The question becomes unnecessary: which emperor? There is only one person who has been worthy of this lofty title without a sneer for the Germans over the last five or six decades: Franz Beckenbauer (1945-2024).
Now, at the age of 78, he has completed the course of every earthly life and died. The whole of Germany is mourning him, also because people feel that with Franz Beckenbauer’s death, a great era of success and uniqueness is over.
His sporting record is magnificent: As a player with FC Bayern Munich, he was German champion four times, DFB Cup winner four times, European Cup Winners’ Cup winner three times (forerunner of the Champions League), European Cup Winners’ Cup Winners’ Cup winner and World Cup winner once each. He became US champion three times with Cosmos New York and German champion once with HSV. With the national team, libero Beckenbauer came second in the 1966 World Cup, third in the 1970 World Cup and 1974 World Champion.
As a coach, he won the German championship with FC Bayern in 1994, the UEFA Cup victory in 1996 and, as coach of the national team, the World Cup in 1990.
Where Franz was was upstairs. At the very top of the football horizon, where the other immortal legends like Pelé (1940-2022) or Johan Cruyff (1947-2016) had their thrones. His incomparably elegant playing style made him the “Emperor”, that’s one version. The other was explained by the author Franziskasperr, a Munich native like Franz Beckenbauer, as follows: “From the kicker from the broken glass district to the grand seigneur. He is now relaxed and wearing the golf jacket, the stylish silk pocket square and the matching tie. He is standing next to the bust of Emperor Franz Joseph . At eye level, of course. It is said that this photo, which shows him next to the Austrian monarch, is where he got his nickname: the Emperor.”
The emperor’s journalistic entourage, his “Bild” house newspaper, television presenters and interviewers – many humbly contributed to the Munich synthesis of the arts, to which the Austrian Post dedicated a stamp with the portrait of Beckenbauer, painted by Andy Warhol, in 2006: 75 cents to Franz’ Honor, with Emperor Joseph I it was only ten crowns…
Most of his life traits also had this playful, elegant Beckenbauer character. Where others sweated, toiled and tormented themselves, he celebrated. With a smile and an inimitable nonchalance. When he uttered his simple sayings garnished with Confucius quotes and thus invented “Franzeln,” even intellectuals hung on his every word.
Even his tax affair in the 1970s was overlooked. Franz had said, astonished: “The tax – my problem too. It’s true that you have to pay part of your income to the state. But how much?” He had to pay 1.8 million marks. Of course, there were no criminal proceedings.
He was also forgiven for his affairs with women like a rascal. Three marriages, a long-term relationship, numerous adventures (including at the FC Bayern Christmas party) – but what the heck. Germany smiled when Beckenbauer said: “I once had a family tree made: The Beckenbauers’ roots are in Franconia. They were funny families, all illegitimate children. We stuck with it.”
His sayings weren’t screamers, but were funny and somehow understandable:
“In one year I played for 15 months.”
“Yes well, there is only one possibility: win, draw or lose.”
“Back then, half the nation was behind the television.”
“The Swedes are not Dutch, you could see that very clearly.”
“The Dutchman is not Brazilian.”
His concept for winning the 1990 World Cup was also legendary. Where other coaches perform a St. Vitus dance on the sidelines and often give enigmatic tactical instructions, Beckerbauer gave his men just four words: “Go out, play football!” Then he said to himself: “Let’s take a look!” And lo and behold: It was a triumph – and “Let’s see!” became a cult.
He was never a barker like other kickers. He was charming and generous to his ex-wives and life companions. He donated and donated, much more in secret than in public. He founded the Franz Beckenbauer Foundation to support disabled and needy people and became an ambassador for the children’s social project Football for Friendship.
The awarding of the 2006 World Cup to Germany seemed to be another highlight in Franz B.’s professional life. “He is probably so powerful that he could even overthrow governments,” said the Viennese artist André Heller (76), the artistic advisor to the 2006 World Cup. That was the time when he himself believed: “All Sundays in the world are in united with me.”
Then the “father of the German summer fairy tale 2006” fell into the shadows. In the fall of 2015, dubious payments relating to the 2006 World Cup were uncovered. He never fully recovered from the accusations, although Die Zeit observed: “The emperor suffers, the emperor falters, but the emperor does not fall.”
The worst thing happened to him in 2015: his eldest son Stephan died of a brain tumor at the age of 46. At his funeral one saw a broken father, a face frozen in grief. No longer an emperor, but a suffering person.
His health has also been getting worse in recent years. He had two heart operations, groin surgery, an artificial hip joint, and an eye attack that left him unable to see in his right eye. He was last seen at a Bayern game in the Allianz Arena in 2022.
There sat an emaciated older gentleman with a white Menjou beard. His smile was just as friendly as before, only his hair was a little thinner, his facial skin a little paler. He seemed more delicate, more vulnerable. And his voice had become more fragile, a little higher, the way older gentlemen speak when they inevitably get older.
Most recently, his biggest fan Lothar Matthäus (62) and former coach Christoph Daum (70), himself suffering from lung cancer, were very worried about the emperor. Daum gave him the greeting: “Your watch hasn’t expired yet. We still need you.”
The fact that this spectacular life ended so quietly also has something to do with the gracefully aged light figure who recognized how human a life in the shadows can be. He now prays regularly, he told “Bild” in 2020 on the occasion of his 75th birthday: “I would like to thank you for the beautiful life that I was able to lead. It’s appropriate to say thank you every day.”
Age made him “a little thoughtful” for the first time in my life, he revealed to the FC Bayern Munich member magazine. He thinks it’s part of life, “that you inevitably come to the point where you think about the fact that life is finite: When will it be time for you to disappear? And into which spheres? The universe is out there Big enough, there would be plenty of options where you could end up.”
We will see? And once again he saw it.
