Nine years after leaving the Bundesliga, Jürgen Klopp returned to the Borussia Dortmund coaching bench on Saturday. At the farewell match of the two former BVB professionals Jakub “Kuba” Blaszczykowski and Lukasz Piszczek, the 57-year-old once again appeared as coach of the Black and Yellows, with whom he won the German championship in 2011 and 2012 and also the DFB Cup in 2012.
Suntanned, casually dressed in short sports shorts and with a broad grin under the black cult cap with the inscription “Pöhler”, Klopp was celebrated by the more than 80,000 fans in the Dortmund stadium. “It’s like coming home, there are so many great memories. It’s nice to see you all again,” he called out to the fans, who had greeted him with ovations and chants. The euphoria surrounding Mats Hummels was just as great.
Just a few days after his move to AS Roma, the 35-year-old also paid a visit to Borussia Dortmund, where his expiring contract had not been renewed in the summer. Before the farewell match for Piszczek and Kuba kicked off, there was the official farewell for Hummels, who had played 508 competitive matches as a professional for Dortmund in his career spanning more than 13 years.
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Black and yellow “class reunion”
Klopp, who has not taken on a new role in football since leaving Liverpool FC in the summer, and Hummels let the actual reason for the black and yellow “class reunion” fade into the background. Many former companions came to Dortmund to say goodbye to Blaszczykowski and Piszczek, who has been assistant coach at BVB since the start of the season.
Roman Weidenfeller, Dede, Patrick Owomoyela, Nelson Valdez, Lucas Barrios, Henrikh Mkhitaryan and the current BVB coach Nuri Sahin laced up their football boots. Klopp commented in his usual moody manner that most of them are clearly getting on in years: “Today we had quite a lot of excess weight in defence, midfield and attack…”