Die Altstadt

After passing out and getting about 12 hours sleep which meant I was waking up around lunch time; my coach came by the apartment and told me to meet him around the corner for lunch with the team president. We ate lunch at a restaurant called the Groefen Konig.

My apartment is located in the center of Monchengladbach; this part of town is called the Altstadt or “old part of town”. In this area there are lots of nice little restaurants, bars, the main train station or Hauptbahnhof, banks and stores for shopping. Generally malls are only located in big cities like Dusseldorf, and even then, most shopping hubs are located on roads. The streets are more or less like malls instead of hallways with stores; the streets are lined with stores. For those of you familiar with Montreal it is very much like St-Laurent Boulevard but lined with cobblestones the whole way.

As I walked around the corner from my apartment into the “Altstadt”, I was greeted by and image that really rang home for me; this little corner brought back images in my mind of going out for walks with my family in Lahr (the city in Southern Germany, where my family was posted for 2 years when I was younger), The cobblestones were covered with people sitting out on the many patios or walking around just enjoying the nice weather and having a coffee or a meal at one of the many restaurants. I walked towards the restaurant where I was to meet my coach and team president and nearly walked right by them since I was looking all around taking in the surroundings.

Here are some pictures of the Altstadt.





We sat, talked and ate for about two hours. We discussed about football in Germany, playing for the Mavericks, how I ended up in Germany, the team president’s love for motorcycles more specifically Harley Davidson’s, what I thought of the practice from the previous night and what some of my expectations were. It was nice to learn more about the Mavericks and how football in Europe operates. I was also informed about some of my fellow imports from North America and when they would arrive. I was to be the only import with the Mavericks for the next two weeks and then gradually over the next couple weeks we would have a total of 6 imports. Technically, I am not an import because of my German passport but all the guys still call me one of the “Amis”, no not French for friends but instead short form for Americans. The large majority of players that come over to Europe to play football are from the United States so they call us “Amis” and if they refer specifically to the Canadians they just say Mounties. I guess the Vancouver Olympic committee got it right with all the stereotypes shown at the closing ceremony of the Olympics.

I also found out that two days later we would be heading off to training camp. We would still be practicing on our home field but we would be travelling back and forth from a youth hostel they had rented out for the 5 days. The coaching staff wanted to have the players together for a few days away from all other distractions except football. This was something new that was being done this year and since there were many new players to the team and that some of them would have to travel up to an hour to make it to practice this would also be a lot easier for them. They were also emphasizing the importance to get to know all the players and form that bond that football teams have.

The Monchengladbach Mavericks are made up of many different backgrounds as far as football is concerned. We have players and coaches that have played and coached in the now defunct NFL Europe, one player played in the NFL, imports like myself from North America that have either played in the CIS or NCAA, some players that have been developed in Germany through local teams and even some German players that were overseas on exchange for school and fell in love with the game.

Not only are the teams made up of different skill levels and football backgrounds but they all have different “daytime lives” some players are still students, some work full-time in various fields of employment, some have families and so on. John Grisham’s novel “Playing for Pizza” gives a very accurate depiction of what a European football team make-up would be and it is also true for the Mavericks.

Following the lunch, and for the next two days until we left for training camp my coach would drive me around Monchengladbach showing me the various places where I would most likely spend a lot of time; the gym, the cafeteria for my daily lunch, my new adoptive mothers house, the other import players apartments and of course we spent some time at the Hockeypark.