Michels, Cruyff, Guardiola – Only the best of everybody

When Peter Bosz took over as the new Bayer 04 coach at the start of the year, he became the 25th coach in charge of the Werkself since promotion to the Bundesliga in 1979. The 55-year-old knew very early on where his future lay – and he has had very high-profile mentors and role models in Rinus Michels, Johan Cruyff and Pep Guardiola. A portrait of the Werkself head coach.

Peter Bosz is very much in demand on this early afternoon. Training is followed by a meeting with sporting managing director Rudi Völler, then an interview with colleagues from Ajax TV from Amsterdam and after that he moves on with a spring in his step and clearly in a good mood for our meeting. He introduces himself as Peter and, on shaking hands, he looks at his counterpart with an open and friendly expression. There is no sign of the slightly fierce image that is sometimes evident at public events and on the touchline. "That's only because I'm very focused on my work. And when my eyebrows come together then I often look cagey and withdrawn," he once said. "But that impression is false, I'm not a grumpy man." That is clearly evident in a ten-minute YouTube video that shows him together with his niece Joy, wearing a blue T-shirt and talking affectionately about his preference for vanilla ice cream and holidays on Curaçao.

The 55-year-old is a pleasure to talk to, he is thoughtful and speaks in quiet tones. Bosz carefully chooses his words but makes sure his statements show no signs of lacking commitment. He certainly has a lot to say from a lively sporting CV as a pro and 19 years as a well-travelled football coach. These two sides of the game are not clearly defined in his case because Bosz was also a player-coach. "At the age of 16, it was clear to me that I would be a coach one day. I felt that early on and knew that I would not get to the absolute top of the game as a player. But I definitely wanted to be one of the best later on as a coach." He was full of glowing ambition at the Cios sports College in Holland where he gained all the badges he needed. When he was 18 he only lacked the UEFA Pro licence.

As an ambitious young buck there were benefits to being able to visualise his future career after hanging up his boots: Early on, you start to have a two-track approach in your mind and you start to store relevant information, knowledge and impressions that can later be of most use. For Peter Bosz as a young player that meant: observe and remember what's valuable and worth remembering. Here, a fellow countryman and former Bayer 04 coach played a not insignificant role: Rinus Michels, who led Holland to victory in the 1988 European Championships in Germany and later took charge of the Werkself, was the manager for six of the eight internationals Bosz played for the Netherlands.

"When Michels had a meeting with us, I went straight to my room afterwards and immediately wrote down everything he said in my notebook because I didn't want to forget it. If I was to be a coach later on, I had to know everything and retain it," explained Bosz quoting an example: "Michels asked us: Who are the best defenders in the world? The Italians. How do the Italians defend? And then he explained in great detail and clearly showed us how they defend by not only looking at the man but also always at the ball." The book, that he obviously still owns and continues to write in, must now be quite a tome.

Peter Bosz started archiving and analysing much earlier on. As a boy, he put together a book on Johan Cruyff with his friends. "King Johan", whose charisma in Holland is comparable to that of Franz Beckenbauer in Germany, was a world star in football. He was voted European Footballer of the Century in 1999 and later went on to revolutionise the world of professional football as coach of Barcelona with his concept of 'Voetball totaal'. Bosz devoured and collected all articles and interviews he could find by Cruyff, cut them out and stuck them all in a scrapbook as people used to do when the World Wide Web was still in its infancy. And everything was carefully sorted and divided into defence, attack and tactics.

Many years later, Bosz came really close to his main role model. After his first managerial posts in his home country at AGOVV Apeldoorn, De Graafschap, Heracles Almelo, Feyenoord (where he was sporting director) and Vitesse Arnhem, he moved to Israel to manage Maccabi Tel Aviv at the beginning of 2016. Cruyff's son Jordi, the sporting director there, had been constantly sweet talking Bosz for two years and definitely wanted to sign him up as coach. "I always said to him: 'Jordi, why should I come to Israel when my future as a coach is in England, Germany or Spain.' But at some point he persuaded me, my only condition was: If Ajax come and want to sign me then I'll have to be able to go. Because the football I'd love to play in Holland is the Ajax football and it doesn't work at Feyenoord or Eindhoven," said Bosz.

He had been working as the coach in Tel Aviv for two months when Jordi Cruyff mentioned that his parents were visiting in March and staying for one week. This announcement got the adrenaline flowing for Bosz. "I was really excited and just asked: Is your father coming too? Is he coming to training as well?'" The evening before the first day when Johan Cruyff was due to visit the Maccabi training ground, Peter Bosz stayed up late into the night thinking about how to construct his training session. "I wanted it to be a great session when Johan called in."

Afterwards, the two of them sat on a bench, drank coffee and talked for hours about football. There was close contact in the following days as well. When Cruyff invited him out for a meal in a restaurant it was clear he  was also enormously famous in Israel. After 15 minutes, the staff in the restaurant called their boss who immediately turned up with his son and took a huge number of photos with Cruyff. That procedure  was repeated  shortly afterwards – except this time it was the turn of the Israeli sports minister to have his picture taken with the Dutch idol.

At that time Cruyff was already seriously ill with cancer. Bosz was incredibly impressed by the way he handled the terminal disease. "Johan was really open and he talked about having tumours in his head and back. He never moaned or complained and I've never seen a person since who dealt with it as positively as he did. He said: 'I'm so lucky the cancer is on this side of my head. If it was on the other I wouldn't be able to walk any more.' Johan was able to see good in the bad. It was an incredible week and experience to be able to meet him in that way."

When Johan Cruyff then flew back home to Barcelona from Tel Aviv he suffered serious pains. When they landed his wife called a doctor to the plane and then they went straight to hospital instead of his home for further investigations. Cruyff never left and he died there on 24 March 2016 at the age of 68. The whole world of football mourned and felt sympathy. The last photos and videos of Johan Cruyff show him on the training ground at Maccabi Tel Aviv sitting on a bench in conversation with Peter Bosz.

hen Johan Cruyff inspired a storm of enthusiasm as the Barcelona coach at the Camp Nou, he had a young player under his wings from 1990 who is now considered to be the absolute master of his art: Josep 'Pep' Guardiola. The current head coach at Manchester City and former manager of Bayern Munich started learning his trade under Cruyff. "Johan built the cathedral. We are only maintaining it," he once said. For Peter Bosz, Guardiola is the third football coach after Michels and Cruyff he most admires. The book 'Herr Guardiola' about his time at Bayern really fascinated him. "A great book that I've learned a lot from. When I was the coach at Vitesse we bought the book for all members of staff and made it compulsory reading. There are lots of things in there that I still apply today at Bayer 04. Of course, everybody has their own style at the end of the day," said Bosz.

Above all, he has learned and taken in a lot from Cruyff and Guardiola: "The priority is always wanting to win and that is obviously clear and it comes first. But we also want the fans to go home after a game full of enthusiasm having experienced a wow effect over the 90 minutes. People pay a lot of money for a season ticket and they've earned getting something back for that and to feel they've enjoyed the best football possible." In his short time in charge at the Werkself this approach has already been evident – regardless of winning (as in the 3-1 victory over Bayern Munich after being behind at half-time) or losing (as in the 3-2 defeat at Dortmund when Bayer 04 completely dominated and boxed in the opposition for the first 30 minutes).

Under Bosz it is remarkable at Bayer 04 to see the enormously increased amount of running – both in terms of distance and tempo. The stats show the Werkself run up to nine kilometres more per game than their opponents. And the 300+ sprints as against Bayern or Wolfsburg have only marginally been beaten once in the Bundesliga – in 2014 when Bayer 04 played the first game under Roger Schmidt at Dortmund. Peter Bosz knows only too well that this approach to the game requires real energy. "Our style is very, very intensive but cannot be maintained every three days for 90 minutes over six months, that is impossible. So it’s essential we learn to control games after taking the lead. The way the team has absorbed that and implemented it in the short space of time is impressive. The lads are doing really well up to now."

For that reason, the coach has probably been really impressed by performances such as against Fortuna Düsseldorf with over 1,000 passes or in the second half in Mainz where FSV could not get hold of the ball for four minutes. "Opponents are broken by such a degree of dominance. When we have the ball and move it around then the opponent has to move as well. And if we play the ball quickly then the opponent has to run quickly. At some point they tire so that spaces open up and we can create chances and goals," declared Bosz. And the media wonder how the coach who stands for attacking football appreciates this controlled and controlling approach to the game and is positive about it in public. There doesn't always have to be fireworks as the control movement of the ball is also a pleasure to watch when it grinds down the opponent.

Bosz continues to keep books and notes at Leverkusen: He assesses the Werkself pros – as with players at his previous clubs – after the game with marks on the scale of 1 to 10. Up to now he has not awarded the highest mark. "I think the highest mark was a nine once but that was only once and not at Bayer 04. You can't get everything right on the pitch and there is always a run that you should have made but didn't."

That statement does not surprise Julian Brandt. "Our coach is a little perfectionist. We can never get it really right for him," said the Germany international who has blossomed under the new coach and in a new role. He is probably the key element in the basic approach that Bosz has changed in the Leverkusen game as he as chosen Brandt to be the creative free spirit in midfield alongside Kai Havertz: "I increasingly see ‘Jule’ playing more in the centre than on the wing. He is such a good player and good players have to have the ball as much as possible." A shrewd move. The triangle with the two magicians on the ball and best buddies Brandt and Havertz plus the strategist and uncompromising ball winner Charles Aránguiz alongside and behind is amongst the best on offer in this area in the Bundesliga.

The new style goes down well with the team. "We are all having fun playing football like that" said Jonathan Tah. "We have a clear and really good approach to the game," said Kevin Volland. "We are doing a lot of things much better than before," vouched Kai Havertz. "Every player has a clear role and knows what he has to do on the pitch," explained Karim Bellarabi. Of course, the fact not all the moves are being made automatically is part and parcel of it. "Nevertheless, the two weeks Peter Bosz had with the players was incredibly important. That's why we consciously made the change of coaches in the winter break," said sporting managing director Rudi Völler.

The player Peter Bosz, a number six in defensive midfield, would not be a first choice for the coach Peter Bosz although he has certainly achieved in the game with eight international appearances for the Netherlands, winning the league title and three domestic cups with Feyenoord plus playing abroad in France (SC Toulon), Germany (Hansa Rostock) and Japan (JEF United). "I wasn't great technically, I wasn't fast, I wasn't very strong physically and I wasn't good at heading," he said without any signs of blowing his own trumpet. "But I was at least somebody who liked to win and an intelligent player, which brought me up to a very decent level in the end."

Former team-mates like Bernard Schuiteman, who played six games in the Bundesliga for Bayer 04 from 1993 to 95 and played alongside Bosz at Feyenoord for 18 months, confirm that. "When I returned to Holland from Leverkusen as a young lad, Peter had long been a leading player in Rotterdam. He was a strategist with a good eye and solid technique who could read the game. And as a player he was somebody who already thought like a coach," said Schuiteman who has spent 13 years living in Austria and is the international scout for Premier League club Wolverhampton Wanderers. Schuiteman also has a clear opinion of the coach Peter Bosz: "He has developed step-by-step and built up his own style of play. You can't just identify a good coach by results but also by his own hallmarks and he definitely has them."

Another fellow countrymen of Bosz, the long-term Bayer 04 player Eric Meijer, makes a similar assessment. "He works very hard and is always well prepared. Bosz takes calculated risks and attacks quickly but from a good basic setup. You need a lot of energy for this style, Peter demands a lot from his players. For me it's a very new way of watching football. I interviewed him for Sky when he was the coach at Dortmund. He always has a plausible and good explanation for things functioning or not functioning. I think he's a really good coach," said Meijer.

For Bosz, there are reasons for a gap of one year without a job between his time at Dortmund and taking over the helm at Leverkusen. "It was what I wanted and needed. The day after finishing at BVB, clubs were ringing me up but I didn't fancy it any more and I was completely tired and lacking energy. In the three years before that, my wife and I moved six times and that took it out of us so I consciously didn't want to start again last summer and opted for a longer break. For a time I was happy with it and I thought about not doing anything any more," he said.

But when contact with Bayer 04 worked out at the end of last year, football fever took hold again and Peter Bosz didn't have to think twice. Here he has something to achieve and complete. "People in Germany haven't yet seen the true coach Peter Bosz," he said at the press conference when he was presented at Leverkusen at the beginning of January. It rang like a promise that he has just started to implement at Bayer 04.

Ralph Elsen

This text is from the Werks11-Magazin (2018/2019, edition 19)