On January 30, 1992, the final round of the Asian Regional Finals of the 25th Olympic Qualifiers, the Chinese team played against the South Korean team. It was supposed to be a game of life and death, but the South Korean team ended the game in only 9 minutes and kicked the Chinese team out of the Barcelona Olympics. The loss of this game also caused a major change in the Chinese football industry, the local marshal can not let us change the foreign coach, and finally the Shanghai Volkswagen funded the First Foreign Coach since the reform and opening up of the Chinese football national team "Uncle Shi" Schlapner.
A career as a player not worth mentioning
Klaus Schlapner's early playing career was very ordinary, even worthless. Schlapner began his football career at the age of 19 in the youth team of his hometown team Lampetheim F.C., only played some amateur leagues and low-level leagues during his playerhood, he served as a soldier, after retiring from the army, he got a senior certificate as an electrical installation engineer, worked as an electrical engineer, in 1970, Schlapner Electrical Installation Company was established, 2 years later, the Biblis nuclear power plant began to generate electricity, but also let the Schlapner electrical installation company financial resources rolling. Overall, Schlapner's playing career can only be regarded as an amateur footballer.
Germany's only high-level professional football coach with a craftsman background

In 1976 Klaus Schlappner received his Bundesliga First Division Coaching Certificate, after which he continued to study football management at the Cologne Sports Academy, where he received his certificate as a lecturer in football in 1980. From 1977 to 1980 Klaus Schlapner was an assistant coach at SV Darmstadt 98 and took over as acting head coach on 6 April 1979. In 1980 Schlapner worked as a teacher at the Cologne Sports Academy, then came to FC Waldhof Mannheim as assistant coach and became head coach in the 1982–83 season.
After winning top players like Fritz Walter, Paul Linz and Hans Hein, Schlapner led Mannheim to conquer the entire Bundesliga, scoring 83 goals in 38 games and scoring big scores in many games, rising to Germany's highest level in the First Division in 1983, when Schlappner won the Herbeck Prize, the traditional award in German sports. In the 1983-84 season Schlapner created a tenacious whole, Mannheim still performed well, unbeaten in 13 consecutive games, even beating the league champions Bayern Munich that year, and finally achieved a sixth-place finish, only because the goal difference was less than the fifth place Hamburg team, unfortunately missing the UEFA Cup qualification. In a match for the best coach of the month, Schlappner received 43% of the vote to win the best coach of the month, and german football star Beckenbauer only got 9% of the vote, which was later hyped by the Chinese media as Schlappner is the famous coach in front of Beckenbauer. In June 1984, Schlapner also led the Mannheim team on a visit to China, winning the "Great Wall Cup". After the game, Mannheim wanted to buy three national football players such as Gu Guangming, of course, this was impossible in that era. The following year, Schlapner also invited two coaches, Li Yingfa and Kim Zhiyang, to train at the German club Mannheim for three months, which was Schlapner's first exposure to Chinese football.
Klaus Schlapner successfully helped Mannheim stay in the Bundesliga for the next few seasons, until Schlappner left Mannheim in 1987 and returned to the second division team SV Darmstadt 98 as the team's head coach, and brought Chinese football star Gu Guangming to the team. But in the 1987–88 season, Schlapner did not help the team to the first division, and after being removed as head coach, Klaus Schlapbena was idle at home to run his own electrical company.
The "Emperor" of Chinese Football
On January 30, 1992, the Chinese Olympic team conceded three goals in just nine minutes at the Merdeka Stadium in Singapore, and the press reported that it was "rare in world football", known as the "black 9 minutes". After Xu Genbao's defeat in class, no one in China was willing to pick up the "hot potato" of "Chinese football", and the Football Association planned to hire a foreign coach.
At the same time, Fang Hong, general manager of Shanghai Volkswagen Co., Ltd., who is a fan, also expressed his willingness to invite foreign first-class head coaches for China, and released words in the media: "We hope to invite first-class foreign coaches, don't think too much about money, the key is first-class." Even if We invited Beckenbauer, we could still afford it. "No one in the Football Association is willing to coach in China, and Volkswagen Co., Ltd. is willing to pay for the team to ask for a foreign coach, why not enjoy it?" The two sides hit it off, please marshal.
Because the "Volkswagen" side requested to hire only the head coach of the world champion Germany, there were two candidates sent to the Fa at that time, one was Eckhard Klauchen recommended by the German Football Association, who was the head coach of the Chinese "Golden Generation" national youth team in 2005, and the other was his mentor Klaus Schlapner recommended by Gu Guangming.
After the field trip to Germany by Makjian, director of the technical department of the Chinese Football Association, Makjian believes that Schlapner has established his position in the German football industry from the bottom by hard work. He is good at training, has experience in leading weak teams, has brought the obscure Mannheim team into the first division, and has also been to China and has a certain understanding of China. In the end, Klaus Schlapner was selected as the head coach of the Chinese men's national football team, of course, there are certain human factors in Gu Guangming.
China received the football's "savior" Klaus Schlapner with the same specifications as foreign heads of state, red carpets, police cars opening the way, flowers, applause, words of praise, and even received by Li Tieying on June 24, which he himself did not expect.
In China, Klaus Schlapner is known as the star coach who is in line with Cole, the best coach in Germany to beat Beckenbauer, in fact, these are caused by the lack of information, in fact, before coming to China to coach, Schlapner has been idle running the company at home, away from professional football for a long time.
After taking office, Schlapner made a number of beneficial reforms for the Chinese team, establishing player profile cards, formulating professional recipes for players, doing restorative massages after player training, emphasizing the professionalism of players, prohibiting smoking and drinking, which were unheard of in China at the time, and Schlapner claimed to cultivate world-class players for China.
However, Klaus Schlapner led the Chinese national team's debut "92 Wanbaolu Cup Shanghai International Championship" and lost to Czechoslovakia 3-2 and Romania 3-0, Schlapner was furious: "The shanghai game is a test, and half of these 22 players are unqualified. I'm going to eliminate them, and then I'm going to go to the people I like myself, and I'm going to train the coaches of the provinces and cities at the same level as the coaches of the European professional teams. ”
After that, Schlapner rotated the team lineup on a large scale, and each time the training list was different, saying to the players in training: "Be a leopard, don't be a rabbit!" "If you don't know where to kick, kick in the opponent's door." In the ensuing "East Asian Final Four", the Chinese team still performed unsatisfactorily, drawing 2-2 with North Korea, losing 0-2 to Japan and 0-2 to South Korea.
With a series of warm-up matches so unsatisfactory, the whole country has little hope for China's performance in the upcoming Asian Cup in October. Unexpectedly, the mourning division led by Schlapner qualified in the tenth Asian Cup with two draws and one loss, and after losing 2:3 to the final champion Japan in the semi-finals, it defeated the UAE team on penalties in the third and fourth place finals and won the third place.
The excellent result of the third place in the Asian Cup has made the whole country even more admired by Klaus Schlapner, believing that the reform of Chinese football has paid off and the rise of Chinese football is just around the corner. Uncle Shi's words and deeds have become news, and the Spring Festival Gala in 1993 also invited Schlapner to the scene, and a hair of Schlapner was auctioned in the cross-talk "Auction" starring Niu Herd and Feng Gong: "This hair of Uncle Shi is white in China, whitened for Chinese football, whitened for China, and we want to keep it in China forever." ”
But Schlapner during his tenure, the results of the national football team are indeed average, only the third place in the Asian Cup and the "King of Thais Cup" champion held in 1993 are still a shot, the main lineup of the national football team is never fixed, the tactics are unstable, and the team list can be determined in the first few days of the game, and the players themselves do not know whether the game will play and what position to play after playing. Even at the "Merlion Cup" football match at the end of 1992, China had just qualified for the group stage, and Uncle Shi gave up his command to return to China for a vacation, which was rare in the world, but at that time, media opinion not only did not accuse Schlapner of being unprofessional, but found various excuses for him.
Klaus Schlapner's godly status remained until the World Cup qualifiers, when on May 28, 1993, the Chinese men's national football team played against the weak Yemeni team in Jordan's Irbid. This is the third match of the national football team in the Asian qualifiers of the World Cup, before that, the national football team defeated Palestine 6-0 and Jordan 3-1, this time facing the weak yemen, the Chinese team has already added three points to its own body. Schlapner didn't even look at Yemen in his eyes: "Yemen is just a small snake, and we can cut it off with a single click!"
However, the process of the game was not the same as expected, the Chinese team controlled the situation on the field, but it could not be attacked for a long time. In the 15th minute of the second half, Yemen launched a counterattack, 25 meters away from the goal to get a free kick opportunity in front of the goal, the main penalty player flicked to the left, yemeni Team No. 3 player a strong shot through the middle of the wall and then bounced on Xu Tao's arm and crashed into the goal. After one goal behind, the Chinese team attacked wildly, but still did not break through the Yemen team's goal, and finally the Chinese team was assassinated by the "little snake" Yemen, who only had four shots in the whole game, and this game was called the "Irbid Massacre" by the domestic media.
After the "Irbiid Massacre", the Chinese team lost 0-1 to Iraq in the inevitable "decisive battle", although the next four qualifiers won all, they were kicked out of the United States World Cup.
After the defeat in the World Cup qualifiers, the Football Association did not dismiss Schlapner, but renewed the contract until the end of 1994, but Uncle Shi was hollowed out and changed from head coach to technical adviser. Klaus Schlapner also fell from the "altar", the charges were re-turned, and he also changed from the beloved Uncle Shi to the "international liar", and all kinds of attacks and ridicules were endless.
After the 1994 Asian Games, Klaus Schlapner quietly left China.
The unbroken love affair with China
Klaus Schlapner, who left China, did not fight with China, uncle Shi has been paying attention to China, paying attention to Chinese football.
Schlapp later developed a beer named after him in China, but the effect and response were very average, and in 1997 he briefly coached the avant-garde Huandao team, which was also unsuccessful. Schlapner coached Iranian side Paykan Teheran from 2000 to 2001 and has not coached since. In 2006, he was appointed by the German Football Association as an advisor to Mongolian football.
Klaus Schlapner is also a football manager, using his influence to run the transfers of Yang Chen, Xie Hui, Shao Jiayi and Zhou Ning to help Chinese players join German football clubs.
Now 76 years old, Uncle Shi is still concerned about Chinese football, helping to build China's youth football system, promoting campus football culture, and promoting football exchange activities between China and Germany, and is the initiator of the 4th Sino-German Youth (U16) Football Invitational Tournament in Shenyang in 2016, establishing a stable and smooth channel for China and German football associations at all levels and football elite schools, and bringing the German youth football training system into China.
Klaus. Schlapner's coaching ability may not be high, but his contribution to Chinese football can not be ignored, he has made many beneficial professional reforms for China, so that Chinese football has truly come into contact with world football for the first time, and the establishment of Professionalization of Chinese football in 1994 is also inseparable from Schlapner's suggestions and help.
With the popularity of the league, big stars and world-class coaches have joined one after another, today's Chinese football is no longer the previous Chinese football, and this god-making phenomenon like Schlapner is unlikely to appear, but it is not good enough, today's "Uncle Shi" is still the "Uncle Shi" who cares about China.