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Michael Ballack (born September 26, 1976 in Görlitz, then East Germany) is a
German football player. He will play for Chelsea in the English Premier
League from the start of the 2006-07 season.
Ballack is 6' 2 ½" (189 cm) tall and weighs 179 lbs (80 kg). He and his
girlfriend Simone have three children - Louis, Emilio and Jordi.
He will play in central midfield for Chelsea in the English Premier League
following his departure from Bayern Munich and for Germany, which he has
captained since 2004. Ballack was transferred to Bayern Munich from Bayer
Leverkusen on 1 July 2002, for an undisclosed amount. Before that, he played
for Kaiserslautern. On 15 May 2006 he announced that he had joined Chelsea
on a Bosman at a press conference in London.
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Ballack is known for being a versatile and well-conditioned player, equally
at home in attack and defence, able to play in almost any position in
midfield. He made his name as an attacking midfielder with an eye for goal,
but Bayern have recently employed him in a deeper role, where he has been
able to direct play.He also has a first class free-kick-taking ability which
in many cases has been proven unbeatable for international keepers. He is
regarded as one of the most lethal headers in the world but is equally
competent with his powerful left and right feet. These attributes have
earned him the German player of the year award on three occasions (2002,
2003, 2005), a feat surpassed only by German legend Franz Beckenbauer, who
won the award four times. Some experts consider him the most complete
footballer in the world today. Since 2004, he has been one of Germany's
leading sports icons and the captain of the German national team, which is
seeking World Cup glory on home soil.
Michael Ballack started his career with BSG Motor "Fritz Heckert" Karl-Marx-Stadt
('BSG' stands for Betriebssportgemeinschaft). His parents sent him to train
with the side when he was seven years old, and he immediately caught the
attention of coach Steffen Hänisch, who had played second-division football
himself in East Germany. What particularly impressed Hänisch was Ballack's
delicate touch, which the coach would have attributed to many years of
training if the boy hadn't been so young. Also unusual for his age was
Ballack's ability to use both feet with equal authority.
Ballack was slowly eased into the first youth team, finally making his debut
on 4 October 1983, when he came on during a 2-1 win over Motor Ascona Karl-Marx-Stadt.
The more games he got into, the more obvious his uniqueness became. Ballack
invariably made his presence felt and led the side. He also increasingly
became a goal-scoring threat: in only his third season he scored as if there
was no tomorrow, 57 goals in only 16 games. At the age of ten, he moved on
to a bigger club - FC Karl-Marx-Stadt, later to become Chemnitzer FC.
The young hopeful who moved to FC Karl-Marx-Stadt didn't have to wait long
to taste success. In 1988, the gifted technician won the district indoor
championships with his new team. Nurtured by coaches Juergen Haeuberer and
Eberhard Schuster, Ballack moved up the ranks, winning the indoor title of
Saxony in 1991 and finally, three years later, the proper Under-19
championship of the federal state (by which time Karl-Marx-Stadt was called
Chemnitz again, the name the city had carried until 1953).
In 1995, Michael Ballack was given his first professional contract, thanks
to his impressive silky skills in the role as midfield maestro. Little
surprise, then, that he was dubbed the "Little Kaiser", in reference to
Franz Beckenbauer. His professional debut came on 4 August 1995, on the
first day of the new Second Bundesliga season. But Chemnitzer lost the game
2-1, against Leipzig (Chemnitz's equaliser, incidentally, was scored by
Silvio Meissner, today a player with VfB Stuttgart), and that more or less
set the tone: at the end of the season, during which Ballack made fifteen
appearances, Chemnitz were relegated to the multi-tiered, regional third
division. For Ballack himself, however, that season held one great success:
on 26 March 1996, he made his debut for Germany's Under-21 side.
In the following season, Ballack became a regular first-team player and
almost helped Chemnitzer to bounce straight back. He didn't miss a game and
scored ten goals for the "Sky Blues". It wasn't enough for Chemnitzer to go
up, but Ballack managed to win his own, personal promotion: in the summer of
1997, he joined 1. FC Kaiserslautern, who had just returned to the top
flight.
On the back of his strong performances for Chemnitzer FC and Germany's U21
side, Michael Ballack was lured to Rhineland-Palatinate's (Rheinland-Pfalz)
premier club, 1. FC Kaiserslautern, by coach Otto Rehhagel. This was a great
opportunity for the youngster: Kaiserslautern promised to be a fine platform
for his talents, since the club had just been promoted back to the
Bundesliga.
It was during the seventh game of the 1997/98 season, away to Karlsruher SC,
that Rehhagel decided to throw young Ballack into the Bundesliga for the
first time, if only for the final five minutes of the encounter. On 28 March
1998, Ballack found himself in the starting line-up for the first time - the
opponents were Bayer Leverkusen, and the novice was given the crucial job of
marking playmaker Emerson, his future team-mate, out of the game.
Ballack made sixteen appearances for his new team during the season and thus
played a not-too small part in Kaiserslautern's sensational triumph - the
club became the first-ever newly promoted team to lift the league title. In
the following season, Ballack became both a regular (he made 30 appearances,
scoring four goals) and one of the side's leading players. Kaiserslautern
reached the quarter finals of the Champions League, but were knocked out by
Bayern Munich.
On 1 July 1999, some two months after his first full international, Ballack
moved to Bayer Leverkusen at the age of 22. He still had a year left on his
contract with Kaiserslautern, which is why Leverkusen paid a transfer fee of
8m deutschmarks (€4.8m).
It was at Bayer Leverkusen that Ballack made his big breakthrough. Coaches
Christoph Daum and Klaus Toppmöller granted him the whole of the pitch as
his sovereign territory. With Bayer, he was the attacking midfielder in
front of Carsten Ramelow-the holding player, and was the man who pulled the
strings in the centre of the pitch, making late runs into the opponents
penalty box and also the reliable finisher upfront. In his three seasons at
the BayArena, he scored 27 goals in the league and a further nine in Europe.
In 2000, Bayer needed only a draw against minnows SpVgg Unterhaching to lift
the league title, but a stunning own goal by Ballack sunk the club.
However, by the time he left the club he had developed into one of Europe's
best midfield players. He left Leverkusen after a memorable, if ultimately
heartbreaking, 2001/02 season when they came second in the Bundesliga again
and were beaten in the UEFA Champions League and German Cup finals (he and
four other teammates were even runners-up in the 2002 World Cup). Ballack
finished with 17 league goals, and his remarkable season led to him being
voted into the uefa.com users' Team of 2002 as well being named Germany's
Footballer of the Year.
After joining Bayern Munich in a €12.9m deal in 2002, Ballack had to adapt
to a more defensive role but still managed ten goals as Bayern stormed to
the Bundesliga title. He also scored twice in the 3-1 German Cup final win
against Kaiserslautern.
After a trying second season with the Bavarian giants, Ballack was back to
his best in the 2004/05 season as Bayern Munich completed another double.
New coach Felix Magath said he was the only automatic starter in their
midfield.
In four seasons at Bayern, Ballack won three Bundesliga and German Cup
doubles and scored 47 goals in 135 matches. Between 1998 and 2005, Ballack
had notched up 61 goals in his domestic league. However, Ballack was
criticized for constantly choking in important UEFA Champions League matches
as well as regularly looking for a big international move instead of
proclaiming loyalty to Bayern. He drew heavy flak from Franz Beckenbauer and
Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, and during his final match for Bayern, he was jeered
throughout the stadium by Bayerns' supporters.
Ballack agreed to join Chelsea on a Bosman transfer on 15 May 2006. During
his last season as a Bayern player there were rumours of interest from
Manchester United, Real Madrid and AC Milan, but Ballack instead chose to go
to Stamford Bridge on a lucrative three-year-deal.
After debates in the media as to whether Ballack and Frank Lampard could
play together in the same team, Chelsea manager José Mourinho confirmed that
he was not worried about the players' compatibility.
Ballack's world class qualities were mentioned by Jose Mourinho. The Chelsea
boss has said of Ballack regarding the players qualities "For me he's one of
the best players in the world, He's very intelligent, tactically very strong
and he scores a lot of goals. For me in Europe there's only Frank Lampard
who plays at that level. The two would form a dream pair.
Shortly after signing professional terms with Chemnitz, Michael Ballack
first pulled over the famous white shirt with the eagle badge. On March 26,
1996, he stood in the starting XI for the national U21 team's encounter with
Denmark. In all, he played 19 matches for this side, scoring four goals.
Then, following his move to Kaiserslautern, national coach Berti Vogts
called him up to the senior team.
Ballack's first appearance, however, wasn't made until April 28, 1999, by
which time the man in charge was Erich Ribbeck. Germany was playing Scotland
on that day, and Ballack came on after sixty minutes to replace Dietmar
Hamann. Bizarrely, the Bremen floodlights failed during the course of this
match, yet this didn't turn out to be a bad omen for the rest of Ballack's
international career.
Euro 2000 wasn't a bright spot for Germany (Ballack only played 63 minutes
at this tournament), but the World Cup two years later in Japan and South
Korea became a glorious tournament for the country - and primarily for
Ballack. Until that time, he wasn't without his detractors, because he
suffered the fate every exceptional player has to live with: as soon as
Ballack put in a performance that wasn't of the highest class, he came under
criticism from the press, while a great game was considered normal. But the
World Cup became a triumphal procession for Ballack. His three goals against
Ukraine won the qualifying playoffs and made sure Germany would go to Asia,
where he again proved to be the player who made the difference. Only his
goals separated Germany from the USA and South Korea during the knock-out
rounds and sent his side to the final. But what the experts lauded even more
was his last-gasp effort to stop an opponent from scoring in the semi-final
- in so doing he risked a yellow card but still didn't shy away from the
tackle. That proved his leadership qualities. In the end, he was booked
indeed and had to sit out the final.
Following Euro 2004, Jürgen Klinsmann replaced Rudi Völler at the helm of
the national team and made Ballack the side's captain. He'll thus be the man
to lead the team - on and off the pitch - in its attempt to reach the
ultimate goal, winning the World Cup on home soil in the summer of 2006. In
a warm-up in his home country, Ballack scored the fourth goal in the 4-1
thrashing of the USA in late March 2006 to prepare for the World Cup in
Germany.
In his first 60 internationals, Ballack found the net 29 times. He wears the
famous number 13 jersey of Germany which was previously worn by Gerd Müller
and Franz Beckenbauer.
In the 2006 FIFA World Cup he was unable to start in Germany's first game
against Costa Rica due to a calf strain, but will be playing in Germany's
other matches. |
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