Otto Rehhagel is a German football player and coach,who has already completed his professional career and retired from football. This year, he has turned 78 years old, so the decision looks quite logical. Otto Rehhagel played in four different German clubs in the position of right-back, and also coached ten German clubs and the Greek national team.
Отто Рехагель родился 9 августа 1938 года в Germany. World War II did not allow him to start playing football from an early age, but at the age of ten he entered the academy at the tiny Helen Altenessen club, where he spent his entire youth, until in 1956 he signed a professional contract with him. Until 1960, Rehhagel played for his native club, and only when he turned 22, he was noticed by the Rot-Weiss Essen, who was in the Regional League. So Otto Rehhagel entered professional football at a higher level.
Otto Rehhagel, whose biography asfootball player is not too bright, spent in the new club for three years, playing 90 matches and scoring three goals. Gradually his class grew, so more powerful clubs from the Second and even from the First Burdesliga began to look closely to him. And in 1963, when Otto was already 25 years old, he moved to the Berlin “Gert”, which, however, did not stay long. Otto Rehhagel, whose photographs gradually appeared in local sports publications, was not a star - he was just a reliable footballer who was capable of performing his tasks efficiently on the right flank of the defense.
In the new club, Otto Rehhagel, a German football player,he was inferior in class to many compatriots, was able to gain a foothold in the first team, and in two years he played 53 matches, having noted six goals in them. The growth of a football player did not stop there - in 1965 Kaiserslautern called him to him, with whom Otto tied up the rest of his career, spending as much time in the new club as he had not spent in any previous one.
It was in Kaiserslautern that Rehhagel couldto gain a foothold for a long time, and no longer left the club until the end of his professional career. For seven years, he played for the club, going on the field 148 times and scoring 17 goals. Naturally, at the very beginning he played much more often, but the years made themselves felt, and in his last season Otto practically did not appear on the field - the club gave way to younger, stronger and promising newcomers. And in 1972, at the age of 34, Rehhagel announced that he was hanging shoes on a nail and was completing his football career. But he did not plan to part with football.
As mentioned earlier, Rehhagel was nota star, a world-class player, so he was not called to the national team. When he just joined the Rot-Weiss Essen, he was summoned several times to the semi-professional national team of Germany, but for the whole career Otto never received a single call.
Rehhagel, 34, finished his football careerbut he did not leave football - he decided to continue working in this area. A new profession that Otto Rehhagel has tried is the coach. He immediately became at the helm of Saarbrücken, but he stayed there only one season - the results of the team were far from perfect. Rehhagel was able to bring only three victories, so he was fired. In the summer of 1973, Otto decided not to hurry and went as an assistant coach at Kickers to gain experience, but in March of the following year the coach was dismissed, and the German was appointed to his place. Until December 1975, Otto led this club, winning 23 out of 60 matches, and after leaving his job he spent some time without work. Only in March 1976, he was taken to Bremen “Werder”, but he worked there only until the end of the season - in the summer of the same year he was signed by Borussia Dortmund. There he spent incomplete two seasons, winning 29 matches from 74, after which he was fired. Rehhagel spent a few more months looking for work, and only in October 1978, he received an invitation from Arminia. He spent an impressive year there, winning 15 games out of 37, so he received an invitation from Fortune. It was with the Dusseldorf club that Otto managed to win his first trophy - the German Cup. Naturally, this he drew attention to himself, and in April 1981, Rehhagel headed the “Werder” for the second time. This time he succeeded and stayed at the club for a very long time. From 1981 to 1995, the German coached Bremen, during which time he twice led them to victory in the German Championship, twice won the German Cup, and once won a prestigious tournament - the European Champions Cup (which now exists as the Champions League). Of the 609 matches, Werder Rehhagel won 322, and lost only 131. Naturally, he could not stay there all the time. In 1995, it was time to climb a step higher - Otto became the coach of the strongest club in Germany and one of the strongest clubs in the world, Bayern Munich. His results there were quite good - but only by the standards of the "Bremen". “Bavaria” the same results, which showed the coach, was not enough, and he was fired before the end of the season. After Bavaria, Rehhagel took a short break and in the summer of 1996 headed the club, which meant a lot to him - Kaiserslautern. There he spent four years, in the debut season, moving the team out of the Second Bundesliga in the first, and in the second having won a sensational victory in the First Bundesliga. However, after an incredible success, a recession followed, and in the fall of 2000, Rehhagel left his post.
