Peter Fischer let tears flow freely at his last home game as Eintracht president.
Photo: imago/Jan Huebner
Sometimes looking back is extremely insightful. And if anyone can smile about the beginnings of his term almost a quarter of a century later, it is Peter Fischer. His farewell as president next Monday at the general meeting of Eintracht Frankfurt could be as emotional as the last home game against FSV Mainz 05, when the tears just rolled down the 67-year-old’s cheeks. What he can justifiably say in retrospect before the final applause: “We are better positioned in terms of sport, personnel and economy than ever, ever, ever before.”
That was certainly not the case when the advertising salesman came to this position on July 26, 2000 like a virgin to the child. Stefan Effenberg made it clear at the time that he would never play for the national team again. It’s been that long. The moody diva called Eintracht Frankfurt changed its leadership as a real case of restructuring because Rolf Heller had driven the club to the brink of bankruptcy with his course. Seven participants at a board meeting voted for an extroverted entrepreneur with a second home in Ibiza due to a lack of alternatives. Blonde hair, blue eyes, almost two meters tall.
At the Riederwald office, a thirsty manager found eight employees, a coffee machine, a computer – and no money. “We didn’t even have enough money to use a franking machine to invite our members to the annual general meeting,” says Fischer, “but we had rats in the basement.” He always has to smile at this point, but it was true that the beginnings remembered folklore. “There was nothing, no structure, no filing, no organization, no idea, no bosses.”
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When the new president spoke at his first press conference about the club having to have more than 10,000 members and building a training center, the middle Hesse man had to read in the newspaper the next day that he should “better go surfing again.” The club’s development since then is also thanks to Fischer’s decisions – he brought in current board spokesman Axel Hellmann as a strategist early on – and has been particularly remarkable in recent years. No traditional club has recently grown as rapidly in terms of sport and economy as the Frankfurt Bundesliga club.
The brand with the eagle now has 130,000 people behind it, has a turnover of more than 300 million euros per year, and in recent years the 2022 Europa League winner has collected the most German points in the European Cup after FC Bayern Munich UEFA five-year ranking. The image of Fischer raising the cup above his head at the Römer after the DFB Cup victory in 2018 – the first title in 30 years – is now immortalized on stickers that hang all over the city. The health-stricken frontman is certainly not a role model with his lifestyle, but he has long been considered an identification figure for Eintracht and for the entire city on the Main.
For a long time he lived well with his label as a hard-partying party president (“Peter gives one out”), but in recent years he has been on everyone’s lips as a committed defender of democracy. Above all, his fight against racism, discrimination, anti-Semitism and right-wing extremism gave Fischer a memory far beyond sport. His main concern is that Eintracht is perceived as “a colorful picture of a welcoming culture, tolerance, acceptance and integration”.
Years ago, Fischer was one of the first football officials to publicly position himself against the rise of the AfD. Whenever this topic comes up, his anger swells. He does not want to let up on his socio-political commitment in the future as honorary president or speaker. »This topic affects me deeply. I want to leave a mark there. The fight against the right is and remains my life’s work, even if I had to endure over 1,000 complaints against me,” he told the “Frankfurter Rundschau.” He concluded for himself: “Anyone who has character has enemies.”
This loud, shrill president, whom the businessman Mathias Beck is supposed to follow, polarized on many levels. He often downplayed the recurring violence of the ultras in Frankfurt (“Our boys defend themselves and sometimes hit people”). Before the inglorious relegation in 2011, he shouted into the microphone: “Then we’ll just beat the fucking BVB.” Today’s league supervisory board boss Hans-Joachim Watzke was very angry. Even RB Leipzig, an unpopular artificial product, was not spared from his tirades, but somehow that also seemed to be part of his clear stance to defend himself against externally financed intruders in paid football.
The public prosecutor’s drug investigation must be considered a personal low point. Even though the proceedings were discontinued almost a year ago, observers were left with a bad aftertaste. For Fischer it was “a pure air act” – but also a final push to resign from his position after a long effort.
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