Not all Bayer 04 fans are likely aware that Peter played for the club for eight years. He is probably better known for his many years as assistant coach. That started in 1989 when he is brought to Leverkusen by his former teammate and then head coach Jürgen Gelsdorf. In that role over the next eight years up to 1997, he wins the DFB Cup in 1993 and he saves our club from relegation as head coach for the last five matches in the 1995/96 campaign.
After that season, Christoph Daum is appointed head coach at Leverkusen and he brings Roland Koch with him as his assistant. Peter Hermann takes a back seat but he is not satisfied in his role as second assistant coach. In 1997 he became head coach of the Bayer 04 Reserves. Four years later, Peter again takes charge of the first team. Together with Klaus Toppmöller, he leads the Werkself through probably the most successful season to date in 2001/02 when the club finished runners-up three times. He also worked well with Klaus Augenthaler and Michael Skibbe up to 2008. When Bruno Labbadia brought his assistant coach Eddy Sözer with him to the Rhineland, Peter decided to change clubs.
He was assistant coach at FC Nürnberg for a year but returned to Leverkusen in 2009/10. He started his very successful partnership over four years with Jupp Heynckes. The duo take Bayer 04 to the runners-up spot in 2010/11 and back into the Champions League for the first time in seven years. Heynckes accepts an approach from Bayern Munich and Peter Hermann joins him in the Bavarian capital. The duo win the treble in 2012/13 with FC Bayern becoming champions of Germany, DFB Cup winners and Champions League winners.
Last season, Peter Hermann again took charge of the Werkself together with Hannes Wolf for the last eight games of the season and succeeded in leading the club into the Europa League. Today he is assistant coach of the Germany U20 team and sporting adviser to his former club Alemannia Aachen. Dear Peter, I've always liked working with you and I wish you all the best on your 70th birthday.
Hans Sarpei was born on 28 June 1976 in Tema, Ghana, and came to Germany with his parents at the age of three, where he grew up in Cologne. Even before he was born, his mother and father worked in Hamburg in the import-export sector. There they met an older man who introduced them to German culture and supported them. Out of gratitude, Hans was later given his first name, although this man died before he was born. Hans comes from a sporting family; his older brother Edward and his nephews Hans Nunoo Sarpei and Kingsley Sarpei were or are also professional footballers.
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On 3 June 1953, Hans-Josef (‘Sepp’) Kretschmann became the fifth coach in the history of Bayer 04 Leverkusen. Born in Allenstein, East Prussia, on 21 March 1902, the football coach first studied to become a teacher before later switching to football. He took over the Werkself from Franz Strehle, under whom the team twice managed to stay in the 1st Oberliga West. However, Strehle did not extend his contract in Leverkusen after these two very successful years.
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After promotion to Bundesliga North 2 in the summer of 1975, Bayer 04 are fighting relegation just eight months later. The club expects full commitment from everyone in this precarious situation. Promotion coach Manfred Rummel is to give up his main job as a teacher at the Mülheim special school and become a full-time coach at Bayer 04. The coach, who is very popular with the team, does not see himself in a position to fulfil the club's request. Despite a 2-0 home win against SpVgg Erkenschwick, Manfred Rummel is put on gardening leave by "mutual agreement".
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Bayer 04, already been promoted to the 1st Oberliga West, played friendly after friendly in the second half of May 1951. And that continued throughout the following month.
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Jacek Krzynowek was born on 15 May 1976 in Kamiensk, Poland, and grew up as a typical country boy. He spent his childhood less in structured training sessions and more on simple pitches, where he spent hours playing football with older boys. He realised early on that he had exceptional shooting power and enormous stamina. But for a long time, he didn't appreciate just how much talent he had. While others dream of a great career, professional football initially seems like a distant world to him that he only knows from television.
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