1. FC Köln was my first home, my first station as a player-coach. Rheydter SV was a stopover, Viktoria Köln a step backward. Borussia Mönchengladbach was my great stroke of luck — the “Buuren,” the farmers from the Lower Rhine.\n\nI started in Cologne with grand ambitions.
As a founding member and player-coach, I wanted to turn the newly created club into a force. I believe I would have managed it too, had they let me work in peace.\n\nBut “the boss” did not leave me alone — certainly not to do things my way. I wanted to gather young players from the region around me and shape them into a side that embodied my footballing ideas.
Kremer wanted established stars, backed by the local economy, and he got them, usually without asking me.\n\nThat arrangement was never going to work.
