Thomas Müller interview
Sep. 8th, 2010 08:59 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
chinra.livejournal.com posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
ontd_footballZEIT ONLINE made an interview with Thomas Müller about his fame, lost chances and the prophetic gift of his wife.
Source is this German article.
Sometimes I was not sure about specific terms or a sentence in general, but I think you can get the gist.
Question: Mister Müller, there is no football player who has went through such a fast advancement as you. Is your inner coordinate system actually still working?
Thomas Müller: I think it is. But I stay relaxed. Besides, I always was the type who wanted much. And that preferably fast.
Question: For example?
Müller: When there were two pieces of cake on the table, I always wanted the bigger one. My mother and my brother can confirm this.
Question: Your brother probably didn't agree with always having the smaller piece.
Müller: Most of the time I just took the bigger piece and then listened to the trouble. But I had what I wanted.
Question: It is said that as a child you already were on the pitch for one and a half hours at your first training...
Müller: I have read that somewhere, too.
Question: Then the other way: You already married with 20. That is very early, as well.
Müller: That's right. For people at my age this is uncommon. But often they are in a different situation: They study, don't have a regular job and are very mobile. With my wife and me it went well right from the start. Quite early I accommodated in with her. She was living in a suburb of Munich. That was very handy for me, because the way to the practive field of FC Bayern became much shorter through that. Other couples first live in seperated flats. We skipped that phase. That is why it went so fast in the end.
Question: It still is a rather unconventional way to live. Does it help you to get along with the discomposure about yourself?
Müller: I think it does. When you are living the in the public and then in such a shark-tank like Bayern Munich, it is important that you keep yourself a certain amount of privateness. You know that everything at home has its place, that you belong there, that you feel good there.
Question: Do you enjoy being famous?
Müller: Everybody who wishes to be famous probably doesn't know what it means. Of course it's nice when people are interested in you, when you, where-ever you are, are the center of attention. But you also have to be able to deal with that.
Question: Which amenities does it have to be famous?
Müller: Small example: When you enter a plane you sometimes are asked if you want to meet the captain in the cockpit. But when you leave again, you have to allow four pictures of you when you are at the baggage claim. It's like everywhere in life: Everything has two sides. Many of those who want to be famous probably only see the positive things.
Question: Would you suffer from losing your recent status?
Müller: For my well-being I don't need a certain status. I need athletic succes, which probably is linked with the status. In general I could get along quite well if I were less important for the public.
Question: How does your wife deal with you being recognized everywhere?
Müller: For her it's a bit more difficult. Also when it's just the two of us she never has me for herself alone. Since the World Cup I am part of the public life. I try to please this without giving myself up. It is not as if I do everything. I also say stop when I get the feeling that something is going too far. But I think that by now the maximum of interest is reached.
Question: Do you believe or hope that?
Müller: I hope that. But I can't imagine that it will become more. By now ever so often people recognize me or talk to me, also people who don't have anything to do with football. Women around 50 for example, who never watch a match when it is not the World Cup and then suddenly tell you about their excitement. Though that is nice as well.
Question: How do you protect yourself? Do your parents help you?
Müller: I rather try to protect my parents. During the World Cup they had a lot of stress. For a while there were two or three camera teams at theirs. I was not comfortable with this.
Question: Even your grandmother Erna had to do interviews during the World Cup...
Müller: That was my mistake. Because I greeted my grandparents over television I called attention to them by media. But this is something I understood now: you have to be careful with everything you say. Everything has an echo.
Question: Do you think that especially now people look at you? That the people are nearly waiting for you to make a false step?
Müller: That is always the case. When someone has achieved a lot some people wait for it: When does he break? When is he made a head shorter? I think the people want that also stars show weakness, so they can identify with them. They are not allowed to become supermen. That is also the reason why in gossip magazines one can find those pictures of Hollywood celebrities where you can clearly see their wrinkles. There everyone can see: They just are normal people, too.
Question: Are you prepared for the mood to revert?
Müller: Yes, I am aware that is can change when it is not going that well. That is something I have to get along with just as well, even when this is the actual difficulty. That is why I try to show it quite plainly to myself that all the positive headlines which came with the wave of success can revert just as fast into the negative. One can't allow themself to be electrified by it or turn crazy.
Question: Are you endangered in this aspect?
Müller: Basically, I am more the rational type. But sometimes I also catch myself checking in newspapers what is written about me. Sometimes I ask myself: Why do you read this nonsense? But of course it is a feedback.
Question: You make a very self-confident impression. Did you think that what you have reached in the last years in some way was possible?
Müller: I might be self-confident, but not that self-confident. The way it happened is just crazy! I can remember the summer when I went from the A-youth of Bayern to the amateurs. A few months ealier I met my wife, we have been to vacation together and we talked about how it would be with the amateurs. I was not sure if I managed this. My wife doesn't know much about football, but she predicted that I will make it to the professionals. I told her: Keep calm, being a professional player for Bayern, you might not know this, but that is really difficult. Actually it is impossible. Then she answered: No, you will make it. And then it also happened.
Question: What else did your wife predict for your further career?
Müller: Maybe I should ask her what is going to happen in near future. ... Nah, I just try to keep my niveau at football. I hope that I can improve, grow.
Question: Louis van Gaal, your coach at Bayern, said it will be a tough season for you. Does he do that to protect you?
Müller: I can't imagine that. Louis van Gaal knows that I get along quite well when everything is going well. And that is the case. At the moment I don't think that I will be in trouble.
Question: Were you surprised that he was critisizing you so harshly a week ago after you gave away a big chance against Kaiserslautern to take the lead?
Müller: No, he has not done that.
Question: Don't you think so?
Müller: No, it was just media blowing everything up. Internally everything was much more businesslike. Van Gaal said that out of that situation a goal should have come. He is right with that. It was not good that I didn't play the ball to someone else. However, that there were two players running next to me who just would have needed to push the ball in the empty goal is something I truly only saw afterwards on video.
Question: Another scene: In the Champions-League-Final against Inter Mailand you had the big chance for the 1:1. How often did you think about this situation afterwards?
Müller: I watched that scene several times in the days after the match. Because I wanted to know why it didn't work to score the goal.
Question: So? Have you succeeded in that?
Müller: No. In similar situations I already scored. Then ten or twenty centimeters are missing in one or the other direction. But you have to get over it. Because of the World Cup I was already looking for the next aim. That is the positive at football: After a negative experience immediately there will be a new challenge. That's how it goes. What has been does not count for a long time. That is good for those who lost and a pity for those who won something. Success in football doesn't last.
Question: Do you sometimes feel like the time is running away?
Müller: The rhythm is set very high. Louis van Gaal often gives us free-time even though he knows that it physically would be better if we were training. But he also knows that the mind is even more important.
Source is this German article.
Sometimes I was not sure about specific terms or a sentence in general, but I think you can get the gist.
Question: Mister Müller, there is no football player who has went through such a fast advancement as you. Is your inner coordinate system actually still working?
Thomas Müller: I think it is. But I stay relaxed. Besides, I always was the type who wanted much. And that preferably fast.
Question: For example?
Müller: When there were two pieces of cake on the table, I always wanted the bigger one. My mother and my brother can confirm this.
Question: Your brother probably didn't agree with always having the smaller piece.
Müller: Most of the time I just took the bigger piece and then listened to the trouble. But I had what I wanted.
Question: It is said that as a child you already were on the pitch for one and a half hours at your first training...
Müller: I have read that somewhere, too.
Question: Then the other way: You already married with 20. That is very early, as well.
Müller: That's right. For people at my age this is uncommon. But often they are in a different situation: They study, don't have a regular job and are very mobile. With my wife and me it went well right from the start. Quite early I accommodated in with her. She was living in a suburb of Munich. That was very handy for me, because the way to the practive field of FC Bayern became much shorter through that. Other couples first live in seperated flats. We skipped that phase. That is why it went so fast in the end.
Question: It still is a rather unconventional way to live. Does it help you to get along with the discomposure about yourself?
Müller: I think it does. When you are living the in the public and then in such a shark-tank like Bayern Munich, it is important that you keep yourself a certain amount of privateness. You know that everything at home has its place, that you belong there, that you feel good there.
Question: Do you enjoy being famous?
Müller: Everybody who wishes to be famous probably doesn't know what it means. Of course it's nice when people are interested in you, when you, where-ever you are, are the center of attention. But you also have to be able to deal with that.
Question: Which amenities does it have to be famous?
Müller: Small example: When you enter a plane you sometimes are asked if you want to meet the captain in the cockpit. But when you leave again, you have to allow four pictures of you when you are at the baggage claim. It's like everywhere in life: Everything has two sides. Many of those who want to be famous probably only see the positive things.
Question: Would you suffer from losing your recent status?
Müller: For my well-being I don't need a certain status. I need athletic succes, which probably is linked with the status. In general I could get along quite well if I were less important for the public.
Question: How does your wife deal with you being recognized everywhere?
Müller: For her it's a bit more difficult. Also when it's just the two of us she never has me for herself alone. Since the World Cup I am part of the public life. I try to please this without giving myself up. It is not as if I do everything. I also say stop when I get the feeling that something is going too far. But I think that by now the maximum of interest is reached.
Question: Do you believe or hope that?
Müller: I hope that. But I can't imagine that it will become more. By now ever so often people recognize me or talk to me, also people who don't have anything to do with football. Women around 50 for example, who never watch a match when it is not the World Cup and then suddenly tell you about their excitement. Though that is nice as well.
Question: How do you protect yourself? Do your parents help you?
Müller: I rather try to protect my parents. During the World Cup they had a lot of stress. For a while there were two or three camera teams at theirs. I was not comfortable with this.
Question: Even your grandmother Erna had to do interviews during the World Cup...
Müller: That was my mistake. Because I greeted my grandparents over television I called attention to them by media. But this is something I understood now: you have to be careful with everything you say. Everything has an echo.
Question: Do you think that especially now people look at you? That the people are nearly waiting for you to make a false step?
Müller: That is always the case. When someone has achieved a lot some people wait for it: When does he break? When is he made a head shorter? I think the people want that also stars show weakness, so they can identify with them. They are not allowed to become supermen. That is also the reason why in gossip magazines one can find those pictures of Hollywood celebrities where you can clearly see their wrinkles. There everyone can see: They just are normal people, too.
Question: Are you prepared for the mood to revert?
Müller: Yes, I am aware that is can change when it is not going that well. That is something I have to get along with just as well, even when this is the actual difficulty. That is why I try to show it quite plainly to myself that all the positive headlines which came with the wave of success can revert just as fast into the negative. One can't allow themself to be electrified by it or turn crazy.
Question: Are you endangered in this aspect?
Müller: Basically, I am more the rational type. But sometimes I also catch myself checking in newspapers what is written about me. Sometimes I ask myself: Why do you read this nonsense? But of course it is a feedback.
Question: You make a very self-confident impression. Did you think that what you have reached in the last years in some way was possible?
Müller: I might be self-confident, but not that self-confident. The way it happened is just crazy! I can remember the summer when I went from the A-youth of Bayern to the amateurs. A few months ealier I met my wife, we have been to vacation together and we talked about how it would be with the amateurs. I was not sure if I managed this. My wife doesn't know much about football, but she predicted that I will make it to the professionals. I told her: Keep calm, being a professional player for Bayern, you might not know this, but that is really difficult. Actually it is impossible. Then she answered: No, you will make it. And then it also happened.
Question: What else did your wife predict for your further career?
Müller: Maybe I should ask her what is going to happen in near future. ... Nah, I just try to keep my niveau at football. I hope that I can improve, grow.
Question: Louis van Gaal, your coach at Bayern, said it will be a tough season for you. Does he do that to protect you?
Müller: I can't imagine that. Louis van Gaal knows that I get along quite well when everything is going well. And that is the case. At the moment I don't think that I will be in trouble.
Question: Were you surprised that he was critisizing you so harshly a week ago after you gave away a big chance against Kaiserslautern to take the lead?
Müller: No, he has not done that.
Question: Don't you think so?
Müller: No, it was just media blowing everything up. Internally everything was much more businesslike. Van Gaal said that out of that situation a goal should have come. He is right with that. It was not good that I didn't play the ball to someone else. However, that there were two players running next to me who just would have needed to push the ball in the empty goal is something I truly only saw afterwards on video.
Question: Another scene: In the Champions-League-Final against Inter Mailand you had the big chance for the 1:1. How often did you think about this situation afterwards?
Müller: I watched that scene several times in the days after the match. Because I wanted to know why it didn't work to score the goal.
Question: So? Have you succeeded in that?
Müller: No. In similar situations I already scored. Then ten or twenty centimeters are missing in one or the other direction. But you have to get over it. Because of the World Cup I was already looking for the next aim. That is the positive at football: After a negative experience immediately there will be a new challenge. That's how it goes. What has been does not count for a long time. That is good for those who lost and a pity for those who won something. Success in football doesn't last.
Question: Do you sometimes feel like the time is running away?
Müller: The rhythm is set very high. Louis van Gaal often gives us free-time even though he knows that it physically would be better if we were training. But he also knows that the mind is even more important.
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no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 07:10 pm (UTC)and i don't usually agree with anyone getting married so young (mainly cos i'm the same age and the thought of being married and settling down is like WHAT) but like he said, he's in a vastly different circumstance to 99% of other 20/21 year-olds so GO THEM
no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 07:13 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 08:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 08:33 pm (UTC)Still, I don't know him personally and can't judge, but he seems pretty level headed from interviews, so I'm sure he gave that a lot of thought before proposing.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 08:57 pm (UTC)It rather came across as: They still are busy with school-like-stuff, which might also mean something like not being fully independent/grown; the mobile thing: they don't have a job that keeps them in a certain area. They are free to travel around whenever they want. They can fly off to the other side of the globe to study there for a year or stay there.
When you are married you should stay together. A trip once in a while is okay, but students for example aren't really bound. He has a job that keeps him in Bayern and the impression he gave in other interviews as well was that he really loves Lisa and wants to stay with her and close to her.
I guess it also has to do with personal...opinions? I can't come up with a better word. I couldn't imagine being married now and I honestly think it's weird when someone is married with 25, too. Simply because I am not that far yet, I wouldn't want to marry already. Then again, when someone finishes school early, they also will start working early, will move out early, in general grow up faster. So when someone who finishes school with 16 is married at 23, well, why not. But for a student who finishes their education with 23, marrying then seems...early.
Then again, Thomas finished school about a year before he married, so...
Oh well, as long as he and Lisa are happy together everything is fine!
no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 09:53 pm (UTC)The point I was trying to make is kinda of what you said, about opinions, and there usually being this very subjective "feeling" of not being ready for that kind of commitment in your early 20's, no matter where you are at professionally.
I was just trying to say that I think this part (the subjective hesitation) probably affects people's decisions more than the practical stuff does (and I got the opposite idea from what he said), but it was just a general random comment, not even related to his situation specifically, lol, so Idk why I even made it :p
no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 10:12 pm (UTC)Why not make it? I think it's nice and good when people share their opinions. That is, in a coherent way. If you had went off bitching without point, well then...but simply commenting on what someone says is okay and I think this is how people should deal with things.
Would be boring if no one ever said a thing or only gave pro, but never contra or a thought-provoking impulse.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 07:12 pm (UTC)cheers to you bb muller!
no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 07:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 07:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 09:36 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 07:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 07:19 pm (UTC)And my favorite:
"When there were two pieces of cake on the table, I always wanted the bigger one. My mother and my brother can confirm this."
-->Baaaad brother, Müller! x3
no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 07:39 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 07:45 pm (UTC)this made lol and reminded me of ONTD_Football except we do know and watch football.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 08:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 09:36 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 07:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 08:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 08:13 pm (UTC)Modest Level Headed Muller gahh I love him :D
no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 08:25 pm (UTC)God, I think I just listed the qualities of the perfect man and fuck, he's married to an amazing woman. She knows how lucky she is and as long as she makes him happy, I am cool.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 08:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 10:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 09:23 pm (UTC)So much.
There are not even enough words to show how much I agree with you right now.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 10:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 11:05 pm (UTC)OMG, but your icon is pretty much epic win! :D
no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 11:27 pm (UTC)but I KNOW! He must have special powers.... and totes sooo perfect.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 08:25 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 08:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 09:35 pm (UTC)now i must make a muller icon
no subject
Date: 2010-09-08 09:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-09 01:26 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-09 02:13 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-09 04:38 am (UTC)Sheesh, are we all sure that he's just turning 21? Muller's got a good head on his shoulders. Also in Twatter, he's really friendly (bordering on flooding LOL).
Really interesting/adorable recent Tweet from him though:
no subject
Date: 2010-09-09 04:41 pm (UTC)It's very likely that his and Basti's twitter are fake. Actually I have no doubt about that.
Podolski, Mertesacker, Marin and Jansen have official twitters. But no other player is known for having one. Of course there is the whole team plus Jogi and all the girlfriends and wives and probably dead dogs of them on twitter, but those are fake.
I don't believe any twitter to be real before it isn't mentioned on their official homepages ;)
no subject
Date: 2010-09-09 04:57 pm (UTC)Ahhh no not dead dogs :(
no subject
Date: 2010-09-10 04:17 am (UTC)