Dhe photo session in the “Zeppelin Cat Hall A1” was planned for this Tuesday. There, in the huge exhibition hall of the city on Lake Constance, VfB Friedrichshafen had scheduled an on-site appointment. Mayors, head coaches and press representatives should also be there. It was about the new venue of the volleyball club. But the appointment was canceled, given the Corona situation, it would not have been available.
But the most important thing can also be disseminated online via a statement: the finance and administrative committee of the city parliament gave its approval on Monday. For the next two seasons, Germany’s most famous and for many years most successful volleyball club will be able to play its home games there. The city bears 55 percent of the costs of a good 1.2 million euros, 45 percent is covered by the Zeppelin Foundation. “VfB is one of the city’s figureheads,” says head coach Michael Warm: “Friedrichshafen and volleyball belong together.”
Up until five weeks ago there was no sign that anything could change. Then an appraisal destroyed everything that was familiar. The club had lost its home overnight. The ZF-Arena, the “benchmark for volleyball halls”, as the 52-year-old Warm puts it, had failed a routine inspection by building experts. Due to signs of corrosion on some of the 106 steel cables that support the concrete roof structure, the hall was locked overnight. “Even if there is no acute risk of collapse, the experts cannot rule out a latent risk, especially when there is snow load,” said the commune of Friedrichshafen on September 28th. A world collapsed for Warm and its players. For three days they seriously considered whether to continue at all. Then the sporting decision was made: “We’re not giving up.”
In order to understand the scope of the decision, it must be emphasized that the volleyball players in the ZF Arena, which was renovated only 15 years ago, not only played their home games, but also lived there as athletes. Offices, weight room, common rooms and even a kitchen were integrated. “We cooked and ate together here,” says Warm, reminiscing about the good times that weren’t so long ago and yet so far away. If the hackneyed athlete’s saying about a hall as a “living room” was true, it was in Friedrichshafen. But “whining is pointless,” as Warm noted.
As a traveling circus through the small halls
They had two days to clear out everything that made their life as a volleyball player. Then traffic tapes and signs with the ultimate statement “do not enter” took command. And for VfB Friedrichshafen the new and exciting experience of what it feels like to perform as a traveling circus began. Sometimes they trained early in the morning in one school gym, sometimes in the afternoon on a third of the surface of another. Then again in the evening shortly before the gate closes at another location. “All the communities in the area helped us,” said Friedrichshafen’s head coach, thanks to the athletic attitude of all the neighbors. Nonetheless, the former United Volleys Frankfurt coach admits: “Not a single hall is suitable for volleyball.” Much too narrow, especially much too low. “All in all, we have come to a training volume of 30 percent so far,” he calculates. Targeted training for a Champions League participant looks different.
Player Dejan Vincic: The team is still lacking blind understanding.
:
Image: nordphoto
Given the circumstances of the 13-time German champions, it is not surprising that the results in the Bundesliga are not as usual either. At the weekend, VfB lost 0: 3 to the well-rehearsed SWD Powervolleys from Düren. “It was practically our first normal game,” said Warm: “We’re not stable yet.” Despite all the anger he felt during the game on the line in Düren about the lack of coordination between his team and the new setter Dejan Vinčić, he took it he put his newly put together and understandably not well-rehearsed team into protection after the video analysis on Monday. “Everywhere we wanted to play training games, they were canceled.” The Corona crisis exacerbated the indoor misery of Lake Constance athletes, who of course vowed not to allow any whining or lamenting.
Thanks to Monday’s decision, the volleyball players can now look ahead and settle down in the exhibition hall. Training should start again in 14 days.
.
