Otto Rehhagel - Coaching Style

Coaching Style

Rehhagel has popularized the phrase kontrollierte Offensive (controlled offence). He prefers a grass-roots approach to football, stressing the importance of at least two (often also three) big, strong headers in central defence. His defensive schemes often use a dominant libero, such as Miroslav Kadlec, Rune Bratseth or Traianos Dellas. In defence Rehhagel usually prefers robustness and height over footballing abilities (the most notorious example being Ulrich Borowka). In the period of all-round, fluid defence, many have criticized this as dated and anachronistic, but Rehhagel loves to reply that his success makes him right.

Rehhagel's teams also regularly develop a lot of pressure on the wings, e.g. Mario Basler/Marco Bode (Bremen) or Andreas Buck/Marco Reich (FCK), who were dominant wingers when Rehhagel coached them. His teams also regularly employ at least one dominant header as the central striker (Karlheinz Riedle, Rudi Völler, Frank Neubarth, Olaf Marschall, Angelos Charisteas). The wing play and the header-strong striker obviously complement each other.

The backbone of his teams are usually older, more experienced players, talents rarely find themselves taking responsibility. Under him, even the young Michael Ballack often sat on the bench as a substitute. However, Rehhagel is also known for being an excellent talent scout, having discovered Völler, Riedle, Marco Bode, Dieter Eilts, Marco Reich, Miroslav Klose, Angelos Charisteas, Sotiris Kyrgiakos, Theofanis Gekas and many others.

Rehhagel is also known for being a good motivator. His teams regularly have a lot of team spirit, most famously the Greek national squad, which he turned from a dead-end squad nobody wanted to play for into a must-be-there-at-all-costs team. He is also famous for reigniting the careers of older, seemingly dead-end players, such as Manfred Burgsmüller, Mirko Votava, Olaf Marschall or Theodoros Zagorakis.

Rehhagel is also a deft and ruthless club politician. He is notorious for restructuring clubs so that he wields absolute power, making friends with powerful people and using them to eliminate the opposition. He prefers the system of a benign dictatorship. His way of handling a club – in a competent and innovative, but also highly patronizing and condescending way – has been immortalized as ottocracy, a pun on his name alluding to the style of management/government; autocracy.

Finally, Rehhagel is considered somewhat of a maverick in Germany. In decades of interviews, he has established a reputation for being elitist, eccentric and unwilling to admit mistakes, similar to e.g. José Mourinho. However, seeing his impressive record, he is apparently able to back up his words.

Famous players associated with Rehhagel include Klaus Allofs, Mario Basler, Marco Bode, Rune Bratseth, Manfred Burgsmüller, Theofanis Gekas, Angelos Charisteas, Traianos Dellas, Dieter Eilts, Andreas Herzog, Marian Hristov, Miroslav Klose, Olaf Marschall, Hany Ramzy, Karl-Heinz Riedle, Wynton Rufer, Thomas Schaaf, Ciriaco Sforza, Rudi Völler, Theodoros Zagorakis, Andreas Brehme and Michael Ballack.