The past few weeks at Tim Meyer, 52, have been characterized by great personal tension. As head of a task force, the chief medical officer of the DFB had drawn up the hygiene concept for the Bundesliga ghost games in the corona pandemic. It worked, the season ended with sport. “Many sporting events have been and will be canceled, the Bundesliga has played again and no infections have been caused by football,” said the national team doctor in an interview with the German Press Agency, in which he spoke about the new season, the return of spectators to the stadiums and international matches Champions League and an antibody study speaks.
Before the restart of the Bundesliga in mid-May, there was criticism of a special role of football, the many tests by players and coaches, but also the concept for special game operation created by a sports medicine task force under your leadership. Now the season could actually be ended without any major problems. How do you feel? Proud? Possibly satisfaction?
Meyer: Most likely satisfaction that everything went well. Many sporting events have been and will be canceled, the Bundesliga has played again and no football-related infections have been recorded. The argument that test capacities were said to be insufficient had quickly become factual. I also don’t think there was an effect that restarting football was a wrong sign. My impression was rather that many people were happy that football was played again, even under these restricted conditions.
To person
Christian Charisins
In front of the green light from politics there was the video by Hertha professional Salomon Kalou, which showed the violation of corona measures. The coach of FC Augsburg violated the strict quarantine rules by buying a toothpaste in the supermarket. How much concern and tension have you had in the past few weeks?
Due to the very extensive public debate, this was already stressful. My personal tension was very high over a long period of time. From week to week, however, it decreased because you could tell that there was good basic discipline. And things like the video by Kalou, for example, were opposed to the name article by national team captain Manuel Neuer, which appealed to the responsibility of the football professionals. I found that very impressive.
How did the game days go for you? Have you ever been to a ghost game in the stadium yourself?
No, I couldn’t. A club would have had to do without one of the few people it was allowed to nominate as a visitor. On the morning of the matchday, I was always informed whether all the players had tested negative the previous day. Then I knew everything was going well. I watched the games in the afternoon or evening in a summary. But I wasn’t in the stadium. Barbara Gärtner, our hygiene expert, trained the club hygiene officers in a stadium before the first day of the resumption.
You were convinced that your hygiene concept could work. But they also said that a risk of infection for the players or coaches during game play cannot be completely ruled out. Have you been pleasantly surprised yourself?
No, I can’t say that. I already thought that it should work and the concept was the appropriate approach. But there was of course a certain amount of skepticism, because the virus and the infections it causes cannot be calculated to the last detail, even if everyone behaves in a disciplined manner. That is why we have always spoken of a medically acceptable and not a zero risk.
DFL boss Christian Seifert spoke of an “absolute emergency operation” of the Bundesliga in empty stadiums. The main aim was to secure the clubs with the ghost games a three-digit million amount from the TV channels, in order to protect a number of clubs from the impending bankruptcy in the Corona crisis. How does it feel to be one of the saviors of German professional football?
First of all I would like to say that besides me there were three other doctors and two representatives from the DFL and DFB in the task force and that we really worked with a working team. I personally saw another aspect in the foreground, even if the continuation of the season was economically important for the Bundesliga and 2nd division. I wanted the ball to roll again. I have watched the Bundesliga since childhood. Football was the sport that I was passionate about. And of course I also get feedback from my surroundings.
What were they?
I perceive that something was given back to people in this eventless Corona period. You can see that in the media. It was no longer just about how Corona restricted sport. You could also read articles in which all sporting aspects of the Bundesliga were discussed as normal. From a social point of view, this is the more important factor for me, even if I don’t want to miss the fact that one or the other club would have run into financial problems without continuing the season.
After the season is before the new season. There is a lot of discussion about an at least gradual return of fans to the stadiums. What options do you see for adapting the existing concept? Or will ghost games become the new Bundesliga normal for longer?
I don’t think the latter. I am confident that we will be given a vaccine that will allow full stages again. But that will still take a while. Of course, a company like the Bundesliga has to think about the next season. We developed the concept in April in the knowledge of the pandemic situation at the time. This is different now. However, we do not know how it will develop, keyword second wave. There must be a concept with scenarios that takes into account the activity of the Covid 19 pandemic and responds accordingly. The principles of occupational safety apply, of course, to the players. But if you allow viewers in a certain number again, it is also about the aspect of infection protection for the entire population. It is clear that full stages are not conceivable at the beginning. The question is: how can you rate this? There are many organizational factors to consider.
Which one, for example?
The organization of the inlet. Toilets. Things where hygiene aspects also come into play, but also practical ones, for example options for contact tracking in the sense of infection protection. Everything must remain doable. A concept with the effort, as it has now been driven for these nine match days in the Bundesliga, cannot be maintained for a season.
Could special Bundesliga operations also have scientific benefits with regard to the corona virus?
We had announced that professional football would like to give something back to the population for the advance of trust. An antibody study was carried out in the Bundesliga. This still has to be evaluated, and the results should then be made available to the public quickly. We have a sample of more than 1,000 people who are spread across Germany.
How could the results be valuable?
There is always the question of the size of the undisclosed figure. We see the numbers of the Robert Koch Institute with the currently confirmed new infections every day. These are the ones who have been officially diagnosed with the virus. However, we do not know how many people really got infected because many of them probably remained symptom-free. There are studies on symptom-free people, but they are often in one place, a hotspot. The sample of the Bundesliga and 2. Bundesliga is a nationwide and therefore more extensive than others. If we know how many people from a large sample are antibody-positive, i.e. have already dealt with the virus, then we can better estimate how high the infection numbers really are. One can thus make better statements about the degree of infection of the population.
The Bundesliga players have had to behave differently in the past few weeks than the normal population?
But only during this season with games without spectators. Before that, they too lived relatively normal in terms of the risk of infection, and the first blood was drawn at the very beginning of the team training operation. In addition, a larger group was included in our investigation – in addition to players, a significant number of coaches.
The Bundesliga was the first major league in Europe to start again. Now the ball is rolling again in England, Spain and Italy. How much DFL concept is there in the game?
I can’t say that for every country. We had a lot of communication on an international level. If our concept is in there, I personally would be a little proud of it, because football is an international event for me and we have to be happy when all other countries come into play. If we could help with that, it’s nice.
In August, the Champions League will be completed with a tournament in Lisbon and the Europa League with a tournament in Germany. You are in charge of the UEFA Medical Commission and can therefore draw up the next concept for it straight away. How can you build on the Bundesliga experience?
The Bundesliga concept is certainly a blueprint. But UEFA has different needs to serve than the national leagues. This can be organized relatively well for a final tournament that takes place in one country. But when all 55 UEFA nations start playing international matches and the Nations League in September, there will be other levels of difficulty, such as national legislation or laboratory availability. That will be far more complex at UEFA level. In my view, the two tournaments in August are easier to master.
Are the tournament concepts for Lisbon and the German EuropA-League venues Cologne, Dusseldorf, Gelsenkirchen and Duisburg already finished? Does it have to be played there without a spectator?
It looks like that at the moment, even if UEFA has not yet made a final decision. I also think it’s right that you wait as long as you can for organizational reasons to be able to react to the pandemic. The concept is therefore not complete, but initially only in the areas that concern direct team support, that is, the things that were also taken into account in the Bundesliga hygiene concept.
The international matches in autumn, which you have already mentioned, will include new challenges. We know pictures of games in Serbia or Belarus with an audience in the middle of the Corona crisis.
These are league games. UEFA competitions are based on UEFA regulations. Also in the countries mentioned, no one can admit a full stadium against the requirements of UEFA if it is a UEFA competition and the rules do not allow spectators.
